Pills, Pills and Attitude

Somehow I ended up with a job in the doctor’s office. You did not get paid for working, but it got me off of the unit twice a day, and the guard who ran things there was pretty laid back. We got along well and he kept talking about how I was far too young to be in the pen. He and the nurse treated me very well.

Work consisted mainly of writing names and unit numbers on little yellow envelopes. Blue ink for most, red on those that were supposed to be crushed before being given to the inmate. Cyril (the guard, or Warder as they were actually labeled and Mr. Flynn to me) could fill the envelopes from a tray full of mixed pills without ever having to look up who got what medications. He had it memorized. The pills were locked up of course except when he was putting them into envelopes. I once walked into the office to get something and the tray was sitting on the desk; hundreds of pills just sitting there. Cyril was in the other office where inmates visited the doctor and the nurse was not around either. I got what I was looking for and paused, looking at the tray. I thought about it, believe me I did. There would be no way that he would be able to tell especially if I only took a few… I turned away and went back to my desk outside the office. Maybe he was testing me and maybe not. No matter though; it would be like stealing from Cyril himself, and that I couldn’t do.

When the time came to go back to my unit Cyril came up to me and put his hand out. “Put these in your pocket,” he said. When I was alone in the stairwell I took them out of my pocket for a quick look. There were half a dozen pills, only a couple that I recognized. To say I was surprised would be an understatement and it again raised the question of if he had been testing me.

I was glad that I had made the decision not to steal from the tray. Perhaps this was his way of telling me that he knew I could have. I would never find out for sure.

There were times when I would fall asleep at work, simply too wacked out on pills to keep my eyes open. Cyril would wake me up and send me back to my unit. “Stay away from screws,” he would tell me as I left. Yeah, no problem there. He would have to call up to the control room to let them know I was on my way up. I would head straight to my cell, trying not to stagger as I walked.

“Veinotte, come here.” I made my way to the front of the unit knowing this was not going to end well. It was Sergeant Scott calling my name from just inside the unit door. I’d had some dealings with him before; enough to know he was a prick.

“What?” I said as I got close to him.

“Here!” He threw me a box of SOS pads. “I want every black mark off of this floor!” he said, pointing at the floor tiles. I didn’t see how using an abrasive scrubbing pad on a waxed tile floor make any sense, still don’t, but that is what Scott wanted me to do.

I tossed the box back to him. “Well I guess you better do it yourself then, cause I sure as fuck ain’t.” I knew it was stupid, but did not care. I also knew that this was what he wanted.

“You’re going to the hole!” He said joyfully.

I walked up closer to him. “Yeah but you’re not going to put me there are you?” I hissed leaning in towards him.

“I don’t have to!” he said, turning and going back out the door.

I went to my cell to get a cigarette. I managed to suck back a smoke and a half before the door opened again and the unit filled up with guards. “Well guys, I will catch ya all later. My escort is here.” I said from my cell door. Maybe if I went in I would just get locked up.

I heard a guard ask “In his cell?” Scott replied quickly “No he’s going to the hole!” I stopped, standing the in doorway, put my hands behind my back waiting for the handcuffs. Instead I was slammed to the floor with knees on the side of my head and my back. I tried not to make any noise, but it hurt like hell, and I ended up doing some screaming and picking up yet more disciplinary charges for “Using abusive language toward a staff member.” I cursed and yelled at them even as they stood me up and dragged me off of the unit. Going to the hole anyway, so why go easy?

During the walk to the hole from Unit 2 I don’t think my feet touched the ground much. When we got to the cells I thought it was over with, that I would just be thrown into the cell and that would be it. Some of the guards had other ideas though. They removed the cuffs and then I was held in the air by my arms and legs while one of the guards began punching me in the stomach. I have no idea how many times I was hit. It may only have been two or three times, but the first punch knocked the wind out of me. I couldn’t breathe. My cloths where torn off of me. I was thrown into the cell, still trying to get my breath, trying to suck in air. A boot hit me in the ribs. I could not see who kicked me and didn’t really care. I was too busy trying to breathe.

“This ain’t the boys home now Veinotte! We’ll break you!” I don’t know who said it but I tried to reply. I don’t know if they heard me or if I even managed to speak the words loudly enough, but I tried to say “Go fuck yourself.”

I laid on the floor for a long time. When they brought the supper tray in I didn’t bother getting up to eat. I hated myself for doing this yet again. I could have done what I was asked. But, although I didn’t hate all of the guards, Scott was one that I did, and there would never be a time when I was able to keep my mouth shut and do what he wanted me to do.

“Hey Veinotte!” The voice was coming from the cell next to mine.

“Yeah?” I replied, not wanted to talk to anyone. The guards would likely not let us carry on a conversation anyway, depending on the guard of course.

“I’m getting out of here tomorrow and when I do I am going to call the department of human rights. I am going to tell them that there is a fifteen year old in here that they guards keep beating on. They can’t get away with that shit man! I was right here watching the whole thing!”

“Yeah sounds good man. I appreciate it. But you know how it goes in here. ‘He had to be restrained.’ That’s all they say.”

Mike did make that call – he or his girlfriend on his behalf. Nothing ever happened of course. And I kept ending up in the hole, sometimes with no incidents along the way, sometimes with some bumps and bruises. The bruises made my rage and attitude towards the guards worsen. I would have dreams of revenge that were so vivid and disturbing that I have no desire to recall them here.

I have not gone into detail up to this point about what it is like to spend a week (or weeks) in the hole. I likely won’t. There were times when I thought I was losing my mind and times when the guards thought that I had completely lost it. The worst thing you can do to a mind is deny it of stimuli. Leave it alone with itself. Of all the things in my past that are hard for me to look back on, hole time is likely the worst, and there was a lot of it. I would take a beating any day, complete with broken ribs, over a week in solitary confinement.

Occasionally there would be different pills in my envelope at night when I was in the hole. I would smile inwardly, and gladly swallow them. On those nights I slept a little better.