Walter Myers - Lockdown

I took the book back to my room after rec time. I didn't know if I was going to read it or not.

Sometimes, when things get stupid, I just shut it all out and, like, start all over again. So when I woke up in the morning in my own room, I was feeling good and thinking good stuff. Usually when I woke up, it was five thirty or five forty-five, before the rooms were unlocked, which was exactly six. I must have been tired, because I woke up just as the bell rang and I got up real quick, cleaned the room for inspection, and got dressed.

Mr. Pugh took us to breakfast, and Diego asked him what we were having.

"Eggs, sausages, hash browns, and juice," he said. "Real eggs today, not that crap that comes in a box. They're buying them from local merchants now, so we blend in with the community."

"We could go out and rob a local bank," Play said, "and then spend it on some local girls."

"Shut up!" Mr. Pugh said. He was smiling.

Mr. Pugh was right. We did have real eggs instead of those scrambled eggs.

"How you want your eggs?" the fat round cook asked me. Griffin could make the eggs either hard or almost hard. He wouldn't make them over easy no matter what you said.

"Poached," I said. "With some caviar on the side."

He broke two eggs and dropped them on the grill, and I watched as they got done on one side before he flipped them and cooked them hard on the other. No big deal.

Toon sat by himself two tables down from me and Play, and I was wondering if I should ask him to come over to where we were sitting when Mr. Wilson entered. He looked around and called over to me.

"Anderson, let's go," he said.

"Where I'm going?"

"Get your ass up out of the seat," he said, "and let's go."

I didn't like Mr. Wilson's tone and figured something was going on. When he took me out in the hallway, King Kong pointed at me and started laughing. I figured that ugly sucker must have told some lies on me.

We got to the administrative wing and he unlocked the doors and my heart went cold.

"Yo, man, they sending me upstate?"

Mr. Wilson was a cool guy, but he didn't answer me and I figured I was gone. Nobody had said anything about me going upstate, but I knew I had had two fights. I thought about Cobo, the guy I had fought when he first came to Progress. They had sent him upstate, but he was headed there in the first place.

"You need to pee?" Mr. Wilson asked me. We were standing in front of the bathroom.

I went in but I couldn't pee. I felt like I had to but I was too uptight so I came out.

"Wash your damned hands," Mr. Wilson said.

I went back in and washed my hands. When I returned, Mr. Wilson took his cuffs and made a spinning motion with his index finger.

No matter how bad you feel when you're locked up, you feel worse when you get cuffed. It's like you ain't human or something. You're some kind of thing that needs to be restrained.

Mr. Wilson took me to the office and signed me out. The clerk, a little fat lady, was looking at me and I felt naked.

"I can't take none of my stuff with me?" I asked.

Mr. Wilson took me by the arm and started walking me through the wing toward the side door. We went into the yard and it was a nice day. Sunny, bright, with birds walking around on the grass.

The back of the transportation van has rings on the sides and I was cuffed to one of them. We drove for almost two hours. I could tell because Mr. Wilson was listening to the news on the radio the whole time. From where I was sitting, I couldn't see out the back window but I could see through the front window when Mr. Wilson moved his head a little. I could tell we were in a city and I could see black people. I thought that maybe something had happened at home, somebody had died or something, and they were taking me to the funeral. I figured it had to be either Mom or Willis. They wouldn't take me to see my father because he didn't live with me, and I couldn't imagine anything happening to Icy. I didn't think God liked me, but I didn't think He would let Icy get hurt.

When the van stopped and Mr. Wilson came to take me out, I saw a small crowd of Puerto Rican-looking people on the sidewalk. I wondered if they were waiting for me. Mr. Wilson got me to the sidewalk, locked the van, and then started making a call on his cell. I looked around and recognized where I was. I was in front of the 135th Street precinct and I figured I had been right-that something had happened in my family. Mr. Wilson finished his call and then took me into the precinct.

He led me to the sergeant at the desk and gave him my name and number from Progress. Another cop came and got me, and he and Mr. Wilson went with me up a flight of stairs and put me in a small room. It was about the size of the detention room at Progress. The room looked hard. There was a table with three chairs, two on one side and one on the other. The cop pointed toward the one chair.

"Sit there," he said.

I sat down, still cuffed, and the cop and Mr. Wilson left. I didn't hear them lock the door, but I saw there wasn't a doorknob on the inside of it.

The room was painted dark on the bottom, a reddish brown, and green on top. There weren't any windows or nothing. In a corner I saw a camera and there was a red indicator light next to it. I knew somebody could look at me through the camera and maybe even tape me.

For a while, I tried to look cool, like I was innocent or something and then that made me laugh. How you supposed to look when you innocent? I told myself if I ever got back to Progress, I was going to tell Play about how I was trying to look.

When you in a room with no clock and nobody there to talk to, you can't tell how long you been in it. It seemed like a long time, and I was beginning to feel like I had to go to the bathroom. I knew they wanted to make me feel uncomfortable. Being in a chair and handcuffed was uncomfortable all by itself. I stretched my legs out and tried to relax.

This wasn't nothing about somebody being hurt or anything. This was about something else. I wasn't worried about it because the only thing I ever did I got caught for and was up in Progress ever since. I thought maybe Willis did something and they wanted to know what I knew about it. If I did know something I wasn't going to snitch, but I didn't know anything. That was the truth whether they believed it or not.

I was glad for the camera. At least they couldn't beat me up. Or maybe they could. Just turn the camera off a little while and kick my ass, then turn it back on.

When the door opened, I jumped. Two guys, one white and one black, came in. The black guy was real big, about six feet two or six feet three, and dark skinned. He had a cigar in his mouth. He took it out and looked at it like he was real interested in it and then he took his jacket off. He had a holster on but he didn't have a gun in it. The white guy was wearing a soft shirt and was big but a little fat. He put a folder on the desk.

"We thought you were light stuff," the black guy said. "What you think about that?"

"I don't know what you talking about," I said. Up at Progress they always said to never talk to the police or answer any questions no matter what happened because they will just hang your butt. I didn't want to talk or answer any questions.

"This is Detective Browning and I'm John Rhodes, Mr. Anderson," the white guy said. "You don't have to remember our names."

"You need water or anything?" the black guy said. "You hungry?"

"I just had breakfast," I said.

"Before we ask you any questions, we have to read you your rights," the white guy said. "Just listen to them. 'You have the right to remain silent and refuse to answer questions. Anything you say may be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to consult an attorney before speaking to the police and to have an attorney present during questioning now or in the future. If you cannot afford an attorney, if you wish, one will be appointed for you before any questioning. If you decide to answer questions now without an attorney present, you will still have the right to stop answering at any time until you talk to an attorney. Knowing and understanding your rights as I have explained them to you, are you willing to answer my questions without an attorney present?'"