Chapter 7 Never Again
The giant metal grill clacked along the runners and hammered home to its open position. The CO that had opened the grill looked at me and asked “white boy -you got a knife “
“No absolutely not “ I quickly replied
“Ya better fukn get one”
He said as he shoved me through the gate onto K section- killer K — roaring with laughter at his own joke. I had come from University Hospital Shock Trauma where I’d flown after 3 guys had a stabbing party and I was the guest of honor. With both my lungs collapsed and filling with blood, I’d needed a helicopter to fly me to the hospital. A flight that had surely saved my life.
The CO was cracking jokes, he knew damn well I didn’t have a shank, not anymore.
He was the fattest person I’d ever seen in a uniform. Barely 5’6” tall and easily that much around. A true pickwickian. He yelled “white boy on the tier pop cell 18”
I began to walk down the tier towards my new home “cell 18”. It was dark and damp. Cold and smelling like roadkill. The tier had two rows of cells, one row on the ground floor and an identical row above on the second floor. The “flats” a cement walkway that ran the length of the tier in front of the bottom cells was boundaried by an identical walkway for the COS, except that one was protected by an expanded metal cage. This was the catwalk, where the CO’S walked when making their rounds every 30 minutes. They only came on the tier when a “code” was called. This was Killer K section and Correctional officers rarely walked the tier on the flats and never by themselves. Too easy to get hit by batteries or piss and shit thrown incognito by felons on the first and second floor.
The missiles that the inmates threw at the Cos were called “stingers” when a careless new blood CO came on the flats and some kid whizzed batteries full force at the newbie, it was great entertainment for the felons and very dangerous for the target. As soon as one inmate started sailing stingers at the CO just about everyone would join in. Sometimes, we would see new officers running for their lives off the tier, with their hands tying impotently to protect their heads.
Nobody was throwing stingers today. As the fat CO waddled off to safety, I began walking towards cell 18.
The noise was deafening. The sounds of metal on metal as cell doors were opened or slammed shut. Loud music ranging from rap to rock was competing with the yelling. Everyone was yelling. Sometimes the yelling was in fact screaming. Plenty to scream about here. There was so much yelling I thought I would lose my mind. Some were shouting to each other. Some were shouting at me, “White boy ya better strap up, this killer K section”, “they didn’t finish the job on “P”, but we will” someone yelled at me, laughing at their own joke.
I was back in Baltimore City Detention Center or City Jail. Straight from shock trauma where they’d patched me up after getting stabbed for the second time. I was charged with 4 counts of armed robbery, 2 counts of assault with a deadly weapon, handgun and 2 counts of committing a felony while in possession of a handgun. I had 2 “no-bails” and 2 million-dollar bails, and 4 $250,000 bails. I arrived with a very aggressive heroin habit about 6 months ago that I had finally kicked just in time to get stabbed the first time. Here I was back again, and shit was already about to get real.
I got to cell 18 and walked in. It was 10’-12’ and inside was a double bunk bed made of sheet metal and riveted to the wall. About 1 foot from the bottom bunk was a stainless-steel sink/toilet combo with no toilet seat. On top bunk was a tall skinny black teenager. He looked like he was 16 but I would later find out he was 23. He was wearing a robin’s egg blue Nike sweatsuit with tan timberlands unlaced and he had on Gucci gold rim sunglasses. The ones Biggie Smalls wore all the time. In the 6 months that id been in “receiving” I had learned a couple things. One, if you had anything of value, you’d better be ready to fight with your life to keep it, and two, anyone that had anything of value was a very good fighter. City jail was gladiator school and no two ways about it.
Before I had a chance to think much less say anything — he’d jumped off the top bunk and squared up in front of me.
“White boy — this is my fukn cell. You gonna stay in here you gonna stand up for yourself. You dig” he said. He had a completely confident air — he was definitely in charge.
“You got a tool?” He asked
I knew he meant a knife. I shook my head and said with a grin, “wasn’t able to get one in shock trauma”
“Mother fukn White boys come up in here and don’t have no shank. What the fuck you think gonna happen, they perforated you like a fuckin spaghetti strainer in receiving and you still ain’t got a tool?” he made the question seem a statement.
He spat the words at me. Clearly with contempt but something else. Maybe resignation. “I guess you didn’t learn nothing from them that hit you up you last time” he said.
“You gonna check in? Cuz if you gonna check in — you better get with that shit now”
Checking in was telling the COs that your life was in danger, of fucking course my life was in danger, I was completely surrounded by criminals, and psychopaths. I was one of 4 “white boys” on a tier of 160 men. The loss of “privilege” had taught me some hard truths, the officers , supposedly in charge were just as bad as the inmates. If you checked in, they’d put you on PC — protective custody. This would color you as a snitch and a bitch and even though city jail was in the topmost violent institutions in The whole country, “checking in” would give me a reputation that I would never lose.
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“I ain’t checking in” I said, “but I don’t have a shank”
“Look, I ain’t giving you no shank, you being a white boy and all, but if you feel under the bed along the wall, you’ll find a piece of steel. Go ahead and Make a tool and deal with that bitch was hollering at you, do that and you can stay. If you don’t deal with that whore, I’ll fukn hit you up myself, ain’t having no whores up in here, “You got till the doors hit in the morning” he said as he lept back onto his bunk.
“Thanks. What’s your name?” I asked
“Fucker if you make that steel and hit that nigga up I’ll tell you my name. You don’t” he laughed. “My name won’t matter”. with that he rolled over and put on his headphones. I had been dismissed by a kid who was 150 lbs. soaking ringing wet.
With nothing left but to get the job done I got down on my knees and felt under the bunk.
Sure enough wedged between a little crack alongside the bed and the wall was a piece of metal. It was about 6” long and 3/4” wide. This was perfect and I couldn’t believe my luck that this stranger had done me such a kindness. I began the long process of shaping and sharpening the shank on the floor, all the while keeping my ears open for the COs walking the catwalk. The knife made these little swishing noises as I ran it back and forth on the cement floor. Gradually it took shape. I’d worked in kitchens since I was 15 and one thing I knew how to do was sharpen some steel.
I got lost in the meditative movement of sharpening my knife. Slowly my sides began to ache. I had been stabbed so many times in the side I wasn’t sure if it would ever fully heal. Right now making my knife was all I could focus on. I put the pain out of my mind and turned it to anger. For now, I was on a mission.
As the dawn broke, exhausted and hurting bad, I used a piece of my sheet to tie my knife to my right hand. The improvised handle was made of torn sheet and my Cellie had told me to make sure I tied it to my hand because the blood can make the knife slippery. “Like cum on a dolphin's back slippery” was how he described it.
A huge blaring horn sounded letting us know the cell doors would hit in 5 minutes for breakfast. My cellie told me to holler at the stranger that had been showing off talking shit about me as I walked down the tier the night before. He told me the mans name was Westside.
“Yo Westside wassup ” I yelled down the tier. Right on cue he yelled back
“What you want to be up White boy” he said.
“I’ll show you what’s up bitch, when the doors hit” I responded. Immediately the tier erupted. The yelling was deafening. I had thought it was loud last night but that was nothing. With my fate sealed I tried to calm my nerves. The adrenaline screaming through my veins. As soon as I called Westside a bitch the whole tier began yelling and laughing. There was one common thread- they all agreed that someone was in deep shit.
My ability to hear the yelling was compromised by the pounding pulse in my ears. I tied up my boots and tied my knife to my hand. I tied a piece of sheet around my face like a bandanna and as soon as the clank of sixty cell doors opening at once rang out, I yanked the door the rest of the way open and ran down the tier towards where the yelling last night had originated. I didn’t stop. I saw Westside in the cell, boots on and ready. I ran towards him and raised my knife as Though to stab. He moved to block my stab with a raised forearm. I was feinting. I side kicked him hard to his knee and he started to go down. As he fell, I was able to crack him with my left knee straight to the side of his face. I began stabbing him. I swung the homemade knife up and down, with my arm arcing towards his shoulders and face. The whole time I stabbed, I was praying he wouldn’t die. Here I was stabbing a man in sight of a whole tier of potential snitches. I didn’t want to kill him, but I had to make a point. I couldn’t be the bitch that so many who end up in prison become. The stakes were impossibly high. So, I stabbed him a more than a few times in his shoulder and once in his head. Westside fell backwards and bleeding from his face and shoulders, he raised his hands in the universal sign of surrender. Still in this world surrender was only slightly less dangerous than a loss. I told him to get his shit packed and get the fuck off this tier or I’d kill him after breakfast. I spit in his face and kicked him one more time in the side. I had to make sure he was wounded enough not to be able to come back at me later. My kick surely had fractured some ribs. Even though I wanted to run, I forced myself to walk back slowly, casually to my cell.
As soon as I got to my cell a loudspeaker blared “locktime. Laddy dahddy everybody locktime”. A herd of about 30 COs came running down the tier shoving inmates back into their cells and slamming the doors. This was par for the course. It was so dangerous for the officers to intervene in the many knife fights, they would wait until it was over then come running like they were going to save the world.
My cellie told me to throw the face mask and string I’d made out onto the flats and to give him my knife. I hesitated, He looked at me and said, “white boy that was the fucking shit. You can stay”. I handed him the knife and he slid it into his waistband.
“My names Mo, What they call you”?
“I’m Trixter “ I said.
“Sit the fuck down on your bunk and calm the fuck down” he told me “I got this” then with a loud clackety clack our door opened up and out went Mo. Turns out he was the tier runner and had to hand out bag breakfasts, since now our tier would be on lockdown while the prison crime unit investigated the crime scene. Westside had bled all the way down the tier on his way to “checking in”.
As Mo walked down the tier he yelled out to nobody and everybody “ that white boy, that’s my motherfuckin cellie. Any of you swinging dicks think you want to try him, ya gotta see me first” he laughed and yelled. “That is a fucking G and my new cellie”. He laughed again. It was as though he couldn’t believe what had transpired, and at the same time seemed very proud at what I’d done. I was beginning to like my new cellie, but didn’t find the situation nearly as funny as he did. Still laughing and yelling at everybody, he headed up the tier to “Control” the little glass booth at the head of the section that housed the COs in a giant hexagonal terrarium.
It had been a very intense half a year that I’d been in BCDC.
As I laid on my bunk, for the first time, I felt at ease. Till now the reality of feeling comfort from an attempted murder never sunk in. I fell immediately asleep.
