CHAPTER II: AVOIDANCE

Day 6
Sunday, December 28

"Rey," Tim Bayliss greets him the next morning, back at Block H after breakfast.  "Don't stay in your cell.  Come on out to the common area," he says with a smile.  Rey stares at him for a moment, unsure about his sudden friendliness.  "I, I didn't want to say hi when you were brought in, 'cause I didn't want to make trouble for you - everyone here knows I was a cop.  But, uh, the whole block knows about you too now, so there's no point staying in your cell.  As a matter of fact, you're usually a lot safer out in the open, where the guards can see you."

He follows Tim cautiously to a table where another inmate, a nondescript young dark-haired man, is shuffling a deck of cards.

"Welcome to the pariah's card table," the inmate says with a friendly grin.

"Rey, Snapple, Snapple, Rey," Tim introduces them.  Snapple gives his hand a firm shake, and shuffles again.

"You play poker?"

"Uh, yeah," Rey sits down.  Snapple deals him in.

"It's not really the pariah's table," Snapple says, "Other guys play here too sometimes but mostly it's a nice place to just hang together and not get hassled.  We get the bottom of the totem pole here - snitches, rapists, ex-cops, kids, he-she's, hookers, you know.  It's our own cozy little corner of Hell."

"Call the game, Snapple," Tim reminds him.

"Uh, straight draw?"

"Sure."

They start to play.  Rey tries very hard to not be reminded of what happened yesterday.  Tries very hard to concentrate on his cards and not on the occasional whistles and catcalls being tossed his way.  Tim and Snapple seem oblivious.

"Oh, in case you're wondering, Rico's in the Hole.  He won't be back till after lunch," Tim mentions casually partway through their second game.

"How do you know that?"

"Only thing that travels faster than light is prison gossip, man," Snapple replies.  "Everybody in the block knows Rico Gonzalez tried for you yesterday and sent you to the infirmary.  That's also why you're not gonna get hassled too much today either, 'cause he's put a claim on you that you're his boy, so hands off to anybody else."

Rey draws in his breath sharply.  A claim on him.  God.  He shudders and firmly brings his mind back to the cards.  Gonzalez is not here right now, and he's got a family visit today at 10:30.  He won't be back on the block until after 3pm.  Hopefully he'll be able to stay out in the open and be OK until he's transferred to Seg.

===

"What are you gonna do for a job?" Tim asks him a few games later.

"A job?" he hadn't thought of that.  He'd assumed he'd be in Seg.

"What can you do?" asks Snapple.

"I was a cop... think they'll let me be a cop in here?  There's plenty of crime going on," he jokes.  Tim and Snapple laugh.

"They're always looking for cleaners," Snapple points out.  "The cafeteria's always hiring too."

"Yeah, but cleaner and cook, that's a high inmate-guard ratio.  He wouldn't last long," Tim tells Snapple.

"The infirmary - they're looking for orderlies, if you don't mind bedpans and cleaning puke and blood and other body fluids," Snapple suggests.

"I could do that.  I'm used to it."

"I thought you were a cop?" says Snapple.

"There's disabled people in my family.  I've done a lot of medical stuff.  I'm trying to get into Seg though."

"Yeah, well, don't count on that.  It could be months."

Months. Don't think like that.

"What do you do?" he asks Tim, making conversation to keep away unpleasant thoughts.

"I'm the clerk for the Rec centre.  I keep track of the weights, sports equipment, all that stuff."

"What about you?"

"Cleaner in the kitchen.  I get to see what they don't feed us.  It's hard to tell sometimes what I'm supposed to throw into the incinerator - the food or the garbage."

"Some of that crap, the incinerator would really improve the taste," Tim grimaces.

"Why's it so awful?"

"A few years ago, the cooks actually made a good meal.  Guys went back for seconds.  The boss was ripshit 'cause it screwed up his budget, and they almost got fired," Snapple explains.  "Kitchen's a lousy place to work.  You're not the on same schedule as everybody else, the boss is an idiot, it smells awful... but hey, you take what you can get."

"Why do you have to work?"

"Well, your correctional plan.  Part of your 'rehabilitation' in here is employment.  Looks good for the parole board.  And you get paid."

"What, a dollar a day?"

"$6.50.  We're not slave labour, you know," Snapple says with a disdainful sniff.

"What do you use it for?"

"You get basic food and shelter but anything else - toothpaste, aspirin, cigarettes, whatever, has to be from your own pocket," Tim tells him.

"And if you don't use up your pay?  You put it under your mattress and hope nobody steals it?"

"It goes in a bank account.  But you won't have that problem.  Rico won't let you keep it."

He raises his eyebrows.

"He'll take every penny, give you whatever he thinks you'll need - cigarettes, booze, crack, whatever.  Not much though, Rico's a bit stingy with his boys," Snapple explains.

"Don't call me that," he mutters, irate.

"What?"

"His 'boy'.  I'm not his boy, OK?" he decides to gather clubs for this round.

"What do you prefer?" Snapple smirks, "Girlfriend, wife, honey, sweetheart?"

"No, actually, I wouldn't prefer any of those either," he snaps back, annoyed.

"Boy toy? Kid? Punk, whore, bitch?"

"Yeah, yeah, I get it," Rey turns back to the cards.

"Property?"

"Whatever."  Just shut up and play cards.

"Can't be thin-skinned in here, Rey.  That's a good way to die young," Tim warns him.

===

There's a sudden flurry of activity in the quad, silent but noticeable enough that Rey glances up from his cards.  Inmates are moving swiftly through the common area.  A man playing chess is suddenly grabbed by three other men who lift him up and quickly and silently carry him out of the quad and out of sight.  He raises his eyebrows questioningly at Tim and Snapple, who've watched the sudden move with amusement.

"Mackie.  He owes them big time.  I was wondering when they were gonna take him out," Snapple says, chuckling.  Rey looks up at the guard post.  It's empty.

"What are they gonna do to him?"

"Rough him up a little, remind him to pay his gambling debts on time," Tim says absently, pondering his cards.

"Snapple?  You in?" a young redhead with a bunch of tattoos up and down his arms has appeared next to Snapple as if by magic.

"Just two, man, I still owe Petrie from last time," Snapple says, and almost faster than Rey's eyes can follow the two have clasped hands and made some sort of exchange.

"Timmy?" the redhead asks.

"Not today," Tim says casually.  The redhead shrugs and walks off.  Snapple slips whatever it was into his shoe.  And just as suddenly as the burst of activity started, it ends and the quad appears as calm as before.  Rey glances up.  Sure enough, there's the guard at his post again.

"What was that?"

"Opportunity.  Guard leaves - there's always supposed to be two on so this kinda thing doesn't happen, but whenever they slip up everybody's watching.  That's when stuff goes down here - deals, contraband moving, Mackie being taught a lesson," Tim shrugs.

"I gotta go, be right back," Snapple wanders off to his cell.

"Drugs?" Rey asks Tim.

"You heard him sniffling?  Snapple's always gonna tell you he's got a cold.  He's had the same cold since the day I met him.  It's called cocaine," Tim informs him with a chuckle.

"He's a user?"

"Most guys here are."

"You?" Rey challenges.

"I'm taking a break from it.  But yeah, for a while there I had the same cold Snapple does."

Rey frowns at his cards, disturbed.  Tim clears his throat.

"Something you wanna say?"  He shakes his head.  "Spit it out, Rey."

"You used to be a cop."  Rey tells himself he has no right to judge Tim - after all, he himself used drugs even before he came to prison.  But he can't help thinking that there's a bit of a difference between pot and cocaine.  Or there should be, to a cop.  Not that either one is acceptable, but...

"Emphasis on the 'used to be'," Tim points out.  "It's a way to get through, in here."  Rey bites his tongue.  God knows he's got no right to judge, not any more.  "You never know, you may want a bit of that kind of help yourself, after you've been here long enough."  Rey shakes his head automatically.  "You've never taken anything?" Tim asks curiously.

"Yeah, I have," he admits.  "Nothing harder than pot though."

"Well, if you want some I can hook you up with a guy who deals pretty good stuff."

"No thanks."  Not only would that break a promise he made to himself to not do it any more, but he really wouldn't want to.  It would be nice to get a reprieve from the tension he's been feeling since he came in and the knife-edged nerves since the attack yesterday, but not at the expense of dulling his senses or impairing his judgment.  Not in here.

===

It's mid-afternoon and his family visit is over.  Overall, it went pretty well, although he really wishes he had phone privileges so he could have warned them that he'd been injured.  They were all shocked at his injuries at first, but the girls got over it quickly enough.  And he was able to deflect Deborah enough so that he didn't have to go into any kind of detail in front of the girls about what happened.  He sure wishes he'd been able to not go into detail with Deborah either.

He wonders what it's like for his daughters, coming to Sing Sing, seeing their father cuffed and chained along with thirty other criminals.  Is it better or worse than losing him from their lives completely?  He's heard of fathers in prison who refused to let their children visit.  He always assumed that was just an excuse to not see their kids, what with them being lowlifes who never really cared about their children in the first place.  But now, seeing his girls in this terrible place... he wonders if maybe they had it right after all.

Your father is supposed to be a role model.  He's supposed to be strong, protecting you, helping you, taking care of you and showing you how an adult is supposed to act.  He's not supposed to be confined and restrained, treated like a child or, worse, a dangerous animal.  He knows he's done a piss-poor job of being any kind of role model in the last few years, but at least before he wasn't in handcuffs.

Maybe they shouldn't come.  He takes a deep breath, realizing that even thinking that makes his heart ache.  Not seeing his daughters at all for six years... the thought is agonizing.  Now that he's back on the block he's realizing just how much he was looking forward to seeing his family today.  He doesn't know if he could take not having that to look forward to.

On the other hand, while seeing the girls was wonderful, it was also painful.  He was able to forget where he was while he listened to their stories, read to Tania from one of the books in the visiting area... but he kept being reminded that this was just a visit.  He remembers what it was like when he and Deborah were separated when the girls were little, how awful it was to only see his daughters every few days.  Not living with them, not really being their parent any more, just a visitor in their lives.  He felt like that when he was living at Lennie's too, but then at least it was partially by his choice and he knew it was only going to be for a few weeks.

Six years.  Missing six years of his children's lives.  That's one third of a childhood.  This is not what he ever envisioned when he and Deborah started their family.

And what a comedown this is right now.  Going from being with his family, almost feeling human again, to being back here.

The last part of the visit was a bit of a nightmare too.  Telling his wife he'd been sexually assaulted - just what every guy wants his wife to know.  It's the same as the whole issue of being treated like an inmate in front of the kids.  Your wife is supposed to see you as strong, not as a victim for some large hairy inmate.  He remembers how uncomfortable he felt when his lady boss was coming on to him at OCCB, how embarrassing it was telling Deborah that he was thinking of transferring because of sexual harassment.  That was nothing compared to this.

He remembers sexual assault victims, how they were often ashamed.  He always told them that it wasn't their fault and they didn't need to feel that way, but that's so much easier said than done.  There's no getting away from the shame of having been a sexual target.  It's humiliating.  No wonder so many of them never report it.

Telling McCoy about the attack - that was a nightmare too.  He felt like he was reliving it.  He tried to keep a calm, professional distance from it, tried to think of the incident as a cop would.  The perpetrator was here and the victim was there and the weapon was this and the events were as follows... but he couldn't do it.  Not when it was his story he was telling.

And then, hearing the guard say, "Back to home sweet home," and knowing that he was coming right back here...

So now he's back on the block.  And he knows Gonzalez is very likely to come after him again, he's not safe even in the quad, out where the guards can see him.  He could be taken out just like that, just like Mackie was this morning.

Maybe he can go to the infirmary.  He approaches a guard who's gazing out at the open area.  Reminds himself to be respectful.

"Ma'am?"

"Yeah."

"Can I go to the infirmary?"

"You sick?"

"No ma'am.  I'm looking for a job."

"Oh.  Uh, sure.  You'll have to wait till after dinner though.  Oh - actually, no you won't, I've gotta go there myself to deliver some reports.  I'll take you.  Wait here while I finish up."

He stands and waits for about twenty minutes while the guard does some paperwork, takes a couple of radio calls, trades gossip with another guard, and finally wraps up.  It's amazing how much of an inmate's life is taken up waiting for staff.  It doesn't occur to the guard to let him know how long he'll be waiting, or tell him she'll come and get him when she's done her tasks.  He needs her to get him to the infirmary, she'll go when she's good and ready, and there's no reason why he shouldn't be made to stand and wait until she's done.  It's not malicious.  It's not done to demean or belittle.  It's just the way things are in here.

Finally.  She's done.  "All righty," she takes out her cuffs, "Off we go."

===

"Ma'am?"

"Yeah?"

"I was told you were looking for orderlies."

"You wanna be an orderly?" The hard-faced, sharp-voiced young nurse in a pastel pink uniform checks him over.  "Got any medical experience?"

"My wife's got MS and my daughter's disabled.  I've done a lot of medical stuff in the last couple years."

She shrugs.  "OK, sure, no problem, we're short right now anyway.  I'll want you to write it down - you know how to read and write?"

He nods.

"Good.  Write down your experience like a resume.  We're supposed to give you guys real-life work experience here and that includes resumes and interviews, but we don't have time for that crap, especially for an orderly job.  You know how to write a resume?  'Cause if you don't, just give it to Santini there, he'll type it up for you."

"No, I'm OK, I can do it."

"What's your HIV?"

"My what?"

"You positive or negative?"

"Negative."

"Don't shit me on this, 'cause you can't work here if you're positive."  She peers at him for a moment, then apparently decides to believe him.  "I'll take your word for it for now.  We'll have you tested eventually, but we need you working right now.  You can start right away if you want, Stephens is doing the afternoon shift by himself today till six.  You get dinner here instead of the cafeteria 'cause stuff goes down in the caf sometimes and we need orderlies to help out."  That sounds great, and he nods.  "Most of the time you mop, change bedpans, change diapers, feed the ones that can't feed themselves, all that.  Hey you're not in on a drug rap, are you?"

"No."

"Lemme see your arms."

He stares at her quizzically.

"Your arms, pal, your veins," she taps the bend of her elbow impatiently.  "What, this your first time inside?"

"Yeah," he mutters as he shows her his arms.  She peers closely.

"OK, good, no tracks.  I don't care if you're a user, but I won't hire anybody stupid enough to leave tracks where anybody can see them.  What are you in for?"

"Murder.  Um, Man One."

"Oh, good.  Not drug-related?"

"No."

"Anything else on your sheet?"

"No.  Oh - uh, yes."

"Well?"

He clears his throat.  "Public Lewdness."

"You in on a skin rap?" she looks at him askance.

Skin rap - that's a sexual offence.  She must think he raped and murdered somebody, then pled down to Man One and Public Lewdness.  "Oh - no, no, it... um..."

"'Cause I don't want you grabbing the nurses.  Or the patients, for that matter."

"No, no, it wasn't-" he takes a breath.  "Oral sex at a bar," he says quickly, willing himself to not blush.  This is a prison nurse, she's surely heard of much worse crimes.

"Oh," she laughs.  "OK, well don't blow anybody in here," she says, stern once more.

"I - I didn't-"

"OK, so, that's great, that's great," she doesn't really care.  "OK, I'll check your file tonight, and I mean it, you got a narcotics charge and you're outta here so fast... we can't have our orderlies pilfering, we get little enough as it is.  You steal one aspirin, you go to the Hole for a week.  You been to the Hole?"

"No."

"You don't wanna go.  No clothes, no books, no cellmate, no nothing, just you bare-ass all by yourself in a cell for days at a time."

That sounds pretty good, he thinks, how can I get sent there?  Where do you keep the aspirin?

"What's your number?"

"65B713."  He's heard that number so many times in the last few days at count-up.

"Last name?"

"Curtis."  She writes it down, not bothering to ask his first name.  Your number is your first name, in here.

"Curtis?  That an alias?" She looks at him and he figures she doesn't think he looks or sounds like a Curtis.

"No, my real name."

"OK, suit up, there's the uniform, there's the inmate washroom," she points to a shelf with white clothing on it, and a door behind him.  He changes into the white orderly clothes, pants, shirt, apron.  Why white?  So the blood and other stuff can show up better against it?  Nice change from tan, anyway.

"You'll be expected to be here at work-up, sign in, do as you're told, don't talk back, don't screw around on the job.  Got that?" she asks as he emerges from the washroom.

"Yes."

"And we got lotsa AIDS and Hep.  Gloves anytime there's blood, but you will have to deal with it.  Bleeders come in all the time, stabbings, all sorts of stuff.  If you're scared of AIDS, get the hell out."  She hands him a pair of latex gloves, indicates his apron string, and he tucks them in.  No belt, no pockets - like most prison clothing. No way to hang yourself or anybody else and supposedly no place to stash contraband.

"There's a small AIDS ward, and you'll be doing time there.  Might not make you popular if the guys on your block find out you're working there... lotsa them are a little shy about AIDS."

That's food for thought.  Maybe he can request to work the AIDS ward a lot; Gonzalez just might be stupid enough to leave him alone then, figuring he's contagious.

"First off, I'll need you to mop up over there, we had a vomitorium just now.  Stephens!"

Another orderly approaches quickly.  Heavyset and middle aged, white, pleasant looking face, tattoos up and down his arms and a teardrop tattooed under his left eye.

"This is Curtis, show him the cleaning closet.  Oh, and Curtis, no stealing from the cleaning supplies either except for bleach.  You need bleach to clean your works, take as much as you need.  You start trying to sell it to the guys on your block though and you're fired, sent to the Hole, and written up big time.  It took a hell of a lot of persuading to get the Warden to let us hand out free bleach for needles.  He finds out some con's making money off of it, and the program's over.  Same with condoms.  They're free, take as many as you want, take 'em back to the block, give 'em away as party favours, but don't sell 'em.  Got it?"

"Got it."  He starts to follow Stephens.

"Oh and Curtis, if you are a user, don't be high on the ward, and if you're hooking, no hooking on the ward either.  And if you're using, make sure you clean your works and stay negative.  And don't shoot the bleach," she adds, smiling at Stephens.  Stephens grins back and chuckles as he leads Rey to the back of the infirmary, to a large storage closet.

"Don't shoot the bleach?"

"Inside joke," explains Stephens.  "When they first taught safe sex and safe using in here, they told the users to clean their works with bleach.  A couple of the lads decided to see what kind of buzz they'd get if they shot the bleach.  Figured it just might be a free high."

Rey frowns, disturbed.

"It's not a free high, in case you were wondering.  Not a high at all.  Don't try it."

"I'll keep that in mind."

Stephens shows him the cleaning closet and he mops up the vomit on the floor.

"Curtis, you were in here the other day, weren't you?" the nurse asks him as he's mopping.

"Yes ma'am."

"Slice, arm?"  He nods.  "Not my shift, but I read the log.  Nasty stuff, twelve stitches."

"Yeah."

"How's it feeling?"

"OK," he finishes mopping, starts to bring the bucket back to the storage room.

"You OK with mopping?"

"Yeah, they said it didn't hit anything major.  It's on my left arm anyway."

"A clean cut.  Good.  Who did it?"

He looks at her uncertainly.  He's been told to be respectful, but does that mean answering any and all questions she poses?

"I'm asking because if the guy who cut you comes in I don't want you working on him.  That's a lawsuit waiting to happen.  Who was it?"

"Rico Gonzalez."

"Oh.  I know him.  Creep.  What did you do to piss him off?"

He looks away from her, not knowing what he can and can't say.

"Oh."  She looks him over.  "Oh.  OK, don't worry, you're safe here."

He feels his cheeks burning, knowing she knows and feeling exposed.  He brings the bucket back to the storage room and washes it out, firmly turning his mind away from anything but the job he's supposed to be doing.

Later, taking a break with Stephens, he finds himself glancing at the elaborate tattoos snaking down his arms.  Stephens notices.

"You got any?"

"What?"

"Tattoos."

"No."

"Didn't think so," Stephens smiles.  "You're pretty new to the system, aren't you? This side of it, anyway."

He doesn't really know what to say to that, just stares at Stephens blankly.  Stephens smiles again.  It seems a genuine, unthreatening smile, but it's hard to tell in this place.

"Whoever suggested taking on a job at the infirmary, be sure to thank them, eh?  This is probably the safest place for you in the whole institution."

He changes the subject.  "You get those done in here?" he nods at Stephens' tattoos.

"In prison, yeah.  Not all here though.  The teardrop and the swastika were done at Millhaven."  He hadn't noticed the swastika, but there it is, hidden among other geometric patterns near Stephen's elbow.  "Yeah, I covered the swastika.  It's from another life," Stephens says ruefully.  "Same with the teardrop, but I can't cover that one."  It's on his face."

"You not in a gang any more?"

"Oh I was never in a gang."

Rey raises his eyebrows.  A teardrop on the face is usually a gang-related tattoo, usually indicating either a person the gang member has killed or a family member who died while they were in prison.  It varies from state to state and gang to gang though.

"No?"

"No, I'm Canadian.  Well, American citizen, raised in Canada.  I was there till I got deported after my conviction."

Rey doesn't get it.  "The teardrop means something else in Canada?"

"Yeah," Stephens suddenly seems a little uncomfortable and Rey draws back.  It's important to not be too curious around here.  Most of them have lots of stuff they don't want to talk about, and the general rule is you just don't ask.

"No, it's OK, I don't mind talking about it, just... you probably wouldn't wanna know."

"Why not?"

"It means I killed a cop."

Rey quickly suppresses any outward reaction.  Christ, if this is the safest place for him to be...

"Relax.  I killed a cop twenty-two years ago, Curtis.  Besides, it's not like you qualify any more."

He frowns, irritated.  Damn it.  "Does everybody in Sing Sing know I used to be a cop?"

"After Rico spotted you?  You bet.  It's not every day a guy gets to target the cop who brought him in.  Rico's been telling the world.  He's scoring macho points like you wouldn't believe."

"Oh, good for him," Rey mutters.

"Hey, getting back at the cop who arrested you... for half the guys here, it's like a wet dream come true."

"That's an image I can do without, thanks," he manages to say evenly after a moment, suppressing a grimace of distaste.  Stephens' face is a little abashed.

"Yeah, sorry, man.  Anyway, you're pretty safe in the infirmary.  Same inmate-staff ratio as everywhere else, but..." he gestures around at the beds.  "Most of the patients are cuffed to the beds.  And there's only two orderlies on duty most of the time.  And then there's the inmate clerk, Santini."  Santini's a mousy little guy who seems scared of his own shadow.  "It's a nice, relaxing job - at least, when we're not short-staffed."

"How long you been in here?"

"Prison, twenty-two years, Sing Sing, twenty years this July, the infirmary, twelve years.  How long is your bit?"

"Six years."

"Short-timer."

"Doesn't seem that short to me."

"No, I guess not.  You got family waiting for you?"

Rey looks away and crosses his arms.  He's picked up a few habits here, and that's a general inmate signal for 'don't go there'.  There's no way he's going to go into detail about his family to anybody in here, no matter how friendly they seem.  Stephens nods and backs off.

"So what kind of cop were you outside?"

"Desk cop - admin."

"How come Rico's got it in for you then?"

"I used to work Homicide."

"How come you took a desk job?  You get shot or something?"

He looks away again.  Stephens nods again and changes the subject and they chat about the cafeteria food for a few minutes.

Then it's time to go back to work.  "You wanna do a general mop or feedings?  Makes no difference to me, I'm just glad to have a helping hand around here."

His arm is really starting to throb, but one thing he knows is that you don't admit weakness to cons.  Stephens flicks his eyes over his arm.

"Tell you what, you already mopped, why don't you do the spoon-feedings?  We got two in the regular ward and one in the AIDS ward today."

The first is Chen.  Thick, dull features further dulled by pain, he's in four-point restraints.  Stares at Rey blankly as he brings the food.  Ugh.  He thought the cafeteria food was bad... this is some kind of grey mashed potato and orange creamed corn and viscous bilious yellow jello.  He wouldn't feed this to a rat.  Actually, maybe he should, it might get rid of a few of them.  He's seen and heard quite a few scurrying around.

He starts to feed Chen, and Chen eats quite nicely for the first little while.  He's starting to wonder how come the guy's in restraints when Chen suddenly spits a stream of jello at him.  Chen shrieks with laughter at his startled exclamation, and Stephens sighs.

"Sorry, I shoulda warned you.  I thought he was too snowed to do that."  He comes over.  "Chen, buddy, come on.  Keep doing this and nobody's gonna wanna feed ya."

"Piss off, whitey," Chen giggles, jello dribbling down the side of his face.  Stephens sighs and quickly wipes off his face, and Chen tries to bite him.

"You'll wanna watch out for that.  Almost everyone's cuffed, but the ones in four-point restraints when they're conscious are the problem children.  They're usually biters, spitters, whatever."

Rey looks down at the uniform.  Yellow jello.  Nice and bright against the white.

"Clean aprons are over there.  Don't bother till you're done the feedings though."

The next inmate is Salar, who's so doped he can't possibly handle a tool as complex as a spoon.  And he wants to talk.  And talk, and talk, and talk, about his wife, children, sports, chess, women, on and on and on.  He can't feed him, and the other patients are starting to shoot annoyed glances at them.  He finally has to tell Salar to shut up and eat.  And then the guy's pouting at him, like one of his daughters when they were three years old, and complaining.  Stephens pauses his mopping and asks, "Curtis, you see any good movies lately?"

"No."

"Read any good books?"

"No."

Stephens comes over and leans close, saying quietly "Remember the plot to any book at all?  'Cause Salar's just gonna keep yacking unless you can fill up the airwaves yourself.  Do us all a favour and talk to him."

He's at a bit of a loss for a moment, and the patient in the bed next to Salar adds irately, "Say something, man, anything.  Fuck, sing him a song, tell him about Goldilocks and the Three Bears.  Anything."

So he finds himself telling this guy about a movie he saw once, a long, long time ago, and catches a few grateful looks from the other patients.  And Salar finishes his meal contentedly, and goes to sleep with a smile.

"OK, the next one's in the AIDS ward.  Gloves on and extra gown over your whites," Stephens tells him, grabbing gloves and an extra gown from a supply table at the entrance to the ward.  They enter the small AIDS ward.  There's only two patients there, one of them an emaciated old man who's not even cuffed, just lying there staring blankly and drooling and nodding to himself.

"Hi Joe," says Stephens, "This here's Curtis, he's gonna feed you today."

The old man slowly moves his eyes towards Rey, but obviously doesn't really see him.

"Here's his stuff," Stephens hands Rey a tray of mushy food.  "If he doesn't eat at least half of it, he gets an NG or IV, so make sure you note it.  And actually note it, don't fluff it, OK?"

"Why would I?" Rey asks, curious.

"Oh - yeah, you wouldn't know.  This here's Father Joe, probably one of the only guys in Sing Sing lower on the totem pole than you."

"Why?"  As soon as he says it, he's pretty sure he doesn't really want to know.  An old priest, lower in the prison hierarchy than an ex-cop.  It doesn't take a genius to figure out what he's in for.

"Yeah.  You guessed it, hot for altar boys.  The way I heard it, over a hundred of 'em, for about thirty years," Stephens moves Father Joe's bed so he's sitting up.

Rey finds himself putting the tray down.  No way is he gonna spoon mush into this pervert's mouth.

"Hey, if you can't feed him proper and not treat him any different from any other patient, you're outta here," Stephens says firmly.

"A child molester?"  Rey asks him incredulously.  Father Joe keeps drooling, oblivious.

"A child molester.  He's doing his time and he's gonna die soon.  God's gonna judge him, so you don't need to.  Now, you gonna do your job or what?"

He reluctantly picks up the tray again.  "Just you remember there's plenty of people here'd like to see you where he is right now," Stephens says over his shoulder as he leaves the AIDS ward.  He doesn't say it maliciously though.  More like he just wants to remind Rey of what's the right thing to do.  Do unto Father Joe as you would want done unto you.

He thinks of Father Mike, his priest through Baptism and First Communion and Confirmation, who helped him when he had problems at school, when he was upset about his father's constant cheating, when his little sister died.  He seriously considered joining the priesthood as a kid, before he realized that the whole celibacy thing just wouldn't be doable.

He thinks of Father Morelli, who might not have done all he could for him and his family, but who would never hurt a child.  Who did his best, as far as he knew how.  Who tried so hard to help him, in the only way it occurred to him to help.

The prosecutor said that Morelli had let him down, made him feel guilty, drove him to despair.  He didn't mention all the times that Morelli reminded him of his blessings, reminded him that God would still accept him and forgive him, no matter how far he'd fallen.  The prosecutor didn't know that it was often Morelli's words he'd heard when he thought of killing himself, even though he'd never told Morelli that he wanted to.  It was often Morelli's words that brought him back, made him keep trying for one more day.

Your family needs you, Rey.  You need to be strong for them.

Your family is a gift from God.  You need to care for that gift.

You are still a child of God.  Your sins hurt Him, but He still loves you as much as He ever has.  Trust Him.  God is still with you.  He hasn't forsaken you, and He never will.

And here's this miserable creep.

Took the sacred trust given to him by the Church, by God, and did to little kids what Gonzalez wanted to do to him.  A fucking monster.

Just like Rico Gonzalez.  Except he hurt little kids.  Gonzalez wants to use him, hurt him... this guy did it to little kids.  He's seen victims of child molestation.  They're marked for life.  Many of them never really get over it, dealing with shame and feelings of unworthiness for the rest of their lives.  Many of them turn to drugs, alcohol, crime.  Father Joe might even have met some of his victims here in Sing Sing.

Just like he'd met Rico Gonzalez.

That's not the same thing at all!  Gonzalez deserved to be in here!!  He didn't do anything wrong by putting him away!

Yeah, and who knows why Gonzalez turned out to be the vicious monster he is.  Maybe he has a Father Joe in his past too.

He can't just feed this piece of scum, can't pretend he's just another inmate.  He's even worse than Rico Gonzalez.

Would he feed Gonzalez if he was lying there helpless?  Or would he take revenge, dump the food, make him suffer at least a little bit, as adequate payback for the suffering he caused?

There's nobody in the ward, just him, Father Joe, and another AIDS patient lying sleeping or unconscious two beds away.  Nobody will know if he doesn't bother to feed this piece of shit.  He can dump the food and nobody will know.  Father Joe deserves that and more.  Father Joe deserves to suffer.

Father Joe looks like he is suffering.  He's lying in a bed, mind obviously gone, drooling on himself.  He's in Sing Sing, the closest you can get to Hell and still be alive.  He has AIDS, and Rey's willing to bet he didn't when he came in.  He must have gotten it here, and Rey doubts he got it by sharing needles.

Rey gazes at him, lying in the bed drooling, and the old man finally focuses his eyes and croaks, "Thirsty..."

Rey looks down at his tray.  There's a cup with water, a straw... and the old man is dying, and thirsty.

"God's gonna judge him, so you don't need to," and "Just you remember there's plenty of people here'd like to see you where he is right now," Stephens said.  Very nice.  He's got a cop killer giving him a mini-sermon.

"Thirsty..."

Rey chews on his lip, not knowing what to do.  He knows exactly what he wants to do, to avenge all the kids this freak has hurt.  And let's be honest, for some kind of revenge against Gonzalez too.

How many days has he been inside?  And already he's considering doing something he never would've considered on the outside.  Taking vengeance for one man's actions out on another, a helpless old man lying in an infirmary bed.

No.  That's not who he is.  In the heat of the moment he can and has committed violence.  But premeditated, cold-blooded?  That's not him.  He confessed to as much in court, but when he did that he committed perjury.  Five days inside isn't enough to turn him into the kind of person who can do it for real.

He's already got perjury on his conscience, and that's hard enough to live with.  Taking the name of the Lord and then lying.  No matter how good his reason, it's a sin, a mortal sin, and it gnaws at him.  He doesn't need to add committing an act of vengeance on a helpless old man, no matter what his crimes may have been.  He doesn't need that on his conscience too.

God will judge Father Joe.  He doesn't have to.  He pulls up a chair and brings the straw to Father Joe's lips.  "Here," he tells him, and holds the cup steady as the old man sips.