It had been three days since I had called Aaron asking for him to call Brian and help me. Three whole damn days!! At least I think it has….things are sort of running together since I have been sitting in a windowless room with no way of discerning day from night.

Hearing the outer door in the hall open and close, walked over to the edge of my cell and tried to see who was walking in. Basically it was stupid for me to think I could see someone before they got in front of my cell, but you really don’t have any other source of entertainment in this hole.

“What day is this?” I called out.

“What the fuck does it matter to you?” someone grunted back at me.

“Hey it was just a simple question,” I growled back. My patience was wearing thin and I could literally feel the ugliness wash over me as my mood was starting to turn from being scared shitless to angry and ornery.

A paper plate was shoved onto the ledge of my cell door containing a runny looking tuna fish sandwich and a small cluster of cheap potato chips. My hunger strike had ended but once I noticed the paper plate, I debated about starting up the hunger strike again.

“Who the hell makes this shit?” I seethed. Evidently my voice carried farther than I had intended when the person that was serving the food threatened to take the plate away.

“Sorry, I’m just not in a good mood,” I apologized.

The man nodded as he accepted my apology.

‘Whew….score a point for me,’ I decided mentally. “Could you tell me what day this is?”

The older man shook his head in a dejected manner. “Why do you care?”

I shrugged my shoulders. “I dunno, days kinda run together…” I started to say as I gestured toward the back wall. “No windows and stuff so I have no idea if it’s night or day.”

“Dis is supper so it’s night.”

I stared at the plate. “Supper?? When the hell did I get lunch?”

“Kid I only gets to your area once a day, someone else brought yous breakfast and yous lunch. I don’t keep track. Dis is only time I gets out of my room. Boy, if I knew wat day dis was I’d tell yous. Da one ding I can tell yous is dat it is at least four o’clock at night.”

“Can you at least take a guess what day this is?”

The old man flashed a three tooth smile. I instantly shivered….

“My guess be Saturday.” When the old man said Saturday, I immediately realized that he had as much insight on days of the week that I did. It wasn’t Saturday, that much I knew.

The old man turned his attention back to the plastic serving carrier and shuffled his way out of my field of view.

After he had left the area I mentally kicked myself. I had so many questions to ask the old man and he seemed willing to talk once I had ‘warmed up’ to him. The gnawing pain in my stomach indicated to me that despite the appearance of the runny tuna fish sandwich, I had to eat since I wouldn’t see another meal until morning.

**********

”CARTER!”

I jerked awake when I heard my name being shouted. The action caused me to fall off the metal bed, landing onto the floor knocking the wind out of me. Thank god the floor was only four feet below.

The guard snorted as he looked down at me lying on the cold cement.

“New room assignment. I’d tell you to take your belongings but you don’t seem to have any,” the guard stated in a gruff voice.

I slowly stood up, rubbing the hip I landed on….I knew that was going to definitely leave a bruise! It also hurt like a bitch!

“Hold your hands out, palms up,” the man ordered.

Silently I did as he asked and I was immediately greeted with a slap of cold metal on my wrists as he handcuffed me. The guard stepped out of the cell and gestured with a nod of his head. “C’mon.”

I limped out of the cell to follow the guard. I seriously wondered if I had injured myself when I fell out of bed!!

“You always walk like that?” the guard asked, definitely feigning concern.

What did it matter? “Yeah,” I mumbled a lie. I suddenly decided to ask the question no one had answered yet. “What day is it?”

“Tuesday.”

’Tuesday? I went out on Friday night, woke up in jail on Saturday morning…..Aaron bailed me out and I went home that afternoon….‘

“C’mon Carter, keep walking,” the guard grunted as he took a hold of my arm.

“It’s Tuesday?” I asked as I limped alongside of the man.

“Yup.”

“What time?”

“Two-thirty.”

“Two-thirty in the afternoon?”

The guard shook his head. “Two-thirty a.m.”

It took my brain a moment to process what the man had said as he led me out to another area of the jail. I had talked to Aaron on Sunday asking him to get a hold of Brian to help me and I haven’t seen or heard from my attorney yet! What the hell was going on?!

We stopped outside an area that was labeled laundry. The guard asked the person dressed in the traditional orange prison scrubs for a pillow and blanket. The man nodded and quickly handed a folded dingy white blanket and a thin pillow.

“Hold your arms out Carter,” the guard grunted waiting for me to do as instructed so he could lay the items across my open arms.

Next I was led into a new area that had two floors. Cells were on the top and the bottom floors that faced a large desk in the center with a guard seated at the desk.

“0713200713572,” the guard said to the man that was sitting at the desk. He clicked in the numbers into the computer.

“Carter?” he asked as he looked at the monitor.

“Yeah.”

The guard at the desk smirked for a moment and then said, “Cell B 16.”

“C’mon,” he said as he placed a hand on my upper arm. The cell he was taking me to was on the second floor and my hip was really starting to bother me as we walked up the small flight of steel steps.

“Lucky you….you have a cell mate,” the man smirked as we stopped outside of the cell waiting for the door to be electronically opened. The guard pushed the blanket and pillow away from my wrists with one hand while he pulled keys from his belt with the other. Without any further conversation, the handcuffs were taken off and I was instructed to go thru the open door.

I walked over to the unoccupied bed and stared at the paper thin plastic covered mattress. Laying the pillow and blanket down, I slowly sat down and then gingerly lifted my leg up to lay down. Pain was shooting downwards from my hip into my left knee. ‘Man, I really messed my hip up,’ I thought to myself. ‘I probably should have said something to that guard when he asked.’

**********

It seemed as if I had only had my eyes closed for a minute when the overhead light in the cell went on.

“Goddamn!” the guy in my cell moaned.

“Rise and shine ladies!” the guard sitting at the desk announced over the intercom.

“What the hell is that all about?” I mumbled outloud.

The cellmate got up and stared down at me for a minute before he cursed. “Sonofabitch! I thought I heard someone coming in last night but I was hoping it was all a bad dream.”

I looked up at the young Latino. He reminded me a little of Howie only with more tattoos than skin. The only thing I could do was give a half smile. This guy sounded like he had some serious anger issues and I didn’t think I was in any position to provoke him. The other thought that popped into my head was all the horror stories about prison rape!! Would I have to start sleeping with my back against the wall??

“I ain’t gonna rape you!” he paused and then smiled. “I ain’t no fag.”

“How’d you know I was thinking that?”

“Body language tells a lot about what a person is thinking. I’m a psychology major.”

‘He doesn’t sound very educated,’ I thought to myself as I nodded. I have been in contact with thousands of people most of my life and I think I can smell a bull shitter a mile a way…well as long as they don’t have huge boobs and bottle blonde hair I’m pretty good at a judge of character – at least that’s what Kevin always told me.

The man turned toward the toilet and started urinating while he started to ask me, “You look familiar, do I know you?”

I raised my eyebrows. “I don’t think so. I don’t even know your name.”

Without washing his hands he came over to me and offered a hand for me to shake. “Name’s CJ.”

I cringed as I looked at his unwashed hand. I noticed he had a letter tattooed on each finger – just like AJ had on one hand….

“Nick,” I said as I swallowed when I shook his hand. I know I’ve probably shook worse hands before. I’ll just get up and wash my hands now…..

“Great, they stick me with a gimp. I don’t like being with gimps.”

“Am I limping?” Stupid question…I knew I was limping. It hurt like hell to move my leg. “This is temporary, I hurt it.”

CJ sat down on his bed waiting to hear about my leg. I didn’t feel very comfortable knowing this guy was watching me while I was taking a leak. I guess this was something I was going to have to get used to for the time being, like it or not.

“Temporary, eh? That’s a first – a gimp with a temporary limp.”

“I said I hurt it,” I muttered.

“Yeah…yeah you said that but you didn’t say how.”

“I was going to tell you but you interrupted me,” I hissed, trying to sound tough all the time trying to think of what to tell him. I didn’t want to sound like a total puss and tell him I fell out of bed. Man, then he would take me for a total wuss. “I hurt it in a fight…..a gang fight.”

CJ leaned forward, his attention was definitely grabbed. “A gang fight? What gang are you affiliated with?”

‘Shit! Good lie Carter!’ I mentally cursed. I needed to come up with a gang name….a non familiar gang name. “You know, Parkside—“

“Parkside?” CJ asked.

“Yeah, Parkside Posse.”

“Never heard of them before.”

“It’s a new strain..” ’Strain?? Did I just say strain? That is what they call flu epidemics! I should just keep my mouth shut!’“Yeah it’s a totally new gang.” ’Totally??’ Now I sound like a teenie. I need to keep my fat mouth shut.

“Sounds cool,” CJ replied, seeming to approve of the gang I was a member of.

Before I could say anything more damning to myself, the cell doors opened. CJ got up and stopped in the doorway.

“Nick, you have to go.”

“Where to?”

“The chow line to get what they call breakfast.”