Piper Kerman - Orange is the New Black

You mentioned seeing your old crimeys, that it was chilly at first. It’s amazing how misery can instantly bond folks. Once upon a time I was doing time in a California prison but had to go to a county jail to receive another sentence. I was at the county jail for a month and couldn’t wait to go back to the state prison. I wanted my old routine, my old friends, my own clothes, better food. So I understand your desire to go back to Danbury. I once felt the same thing.

Anyway, stay strong, Piper. You’re almost done and then you can put this thing behind you in a large way. Not completely, but mostly.

Until next time,

Peace.

Joe Loya

THE MCC tested my endurance and tolerance. At least we had feminine hygiene items, all emblazoned with Bob Barker’s name. I finally was allowed to buy shampoo, conditioner, stamps, and food from the commissary, plus tweezers. My brows were in a shocking state, and as there were no mirrors in the MCC, the Jansen sisters and I had to play beauty parlor. I did push-ups and crunches, but there was no place to do yoga without someone eyeballing me, certainly not in our six-woman cell. It contained the three of us, an Eminemlette, a cheerful six-foot-four giantess called Tiny, and a new Spanish mami named Inez who was also in Chicago on a writ.

When Inez had first been arrested, another woman in the county jail had thrown cleaning solution in her eyes and blinded her. After nine operations she had recovered partial sight, but she was extremely light-sensitive and so was allowed to wear gigantic wraparound sunglasses. Inez had just celebrated her fiftieth birthday; we tried to make it cheerful.

Now I didn’t just miss Danbury, I also missed Oklahoma City. The Jansen sisters agreed. We talked longingly about doing “the shackle dance” on the tarmac again. Our shared mantra became “It can always get worse.” We literally repeated it aloud every day, as a charm to ward off the possibility that our situation might grow even more unpleasant.

The women’s unit was granted “privileges” only once a week, such as recreation time in what resembled a 1970s elementary school gym with dead basketballs and no weights, just one medicine ball, and access to a law library that contained cheesy paperbacks in addition to ancient legal texts. We were escorted by a CO to and from these activities like a kindergarten class. During these journeys we always encountered male prisoners at work; they had far more freedom of movement than we did, which infuriated me. To get to the gym we had to pass the kitchens, where some hopeful-looking guys were always waiting to catch a glimpse of us.

“You ladies need anything up there?” one of them asked one day as we were being herded onto the elevator.

“More fruit!” I shouted.

“I’m gonna send you some bananas, Blondie!”

I COULD barely contain myself when I got the news that Larry was going to visit me. It took all my self-restraint not to climb up onto one of the unit tables and pound my chest and scream. But the most dangerous thing in prison-jealousy-was not something I wanted to tangle with right now. So I kept it on the down-low. Plus, I was growing skeptical that anything would ever go right for me again.

On the Saturday he was supposed to come from New York, I took a hot shower. Another prisoner had tipped me off that there was one window of time in the morning when for some reason we could get hot water. My wet hair hung down my back-no hair dryers in the MCC. I went into the bathroom and stared at myself in the metal plate that was bolted over the sinks in lieu of a mirror. It was probably for the best that I couldn’t really see what I looked like. I noted the pencil scrapings on the wall, where other prisoners had made makeshift eyeliner by mixing the lead powder and Vaseline. I didn’t have that kind of skill.

Visiting hours were very short in Chicago. I sat nervously watching the clock. The Jansen sisters sat nervously watching me. “He’ll be here,” they assured me. It was sort of touching how invested in his visit they were, how they had started to talk about Larry as if they knew him. I felt bad that Hester/Anne’s husband was not able to come visit her in Chicago -he lived not far from the prison where she was serving her seven-year sentence.

After over an hour of the visiting time had elapsed, I was beside myself. I knew what was happening. The morons who ran the MCC had turned him away. I was sure of it-these people were completely incompetent in every way I had observed so far; why on earth would visitation be any different? I was beaten and furious, a horrible combination.

And then the security door opened, and a CO walked in and conferred with the CO on duty in the unit. “ Kerman!”

I bolted across the room.

When I finally got into the big, dirty visiting room, I felt calmer. There were a lot of prisoners with their families in there, and at first I didn’t see Larry, but when I did, I felt faint. I hugged him, and he looked a little faint too.

“You wouldn’t believe what they put me through. These people are just unreal!” he almost shouted. We sat where we were told, facing each other on molded plastic chairs. I felt truly calm for the first time since I left Danbury.

The remaining hour flew by. We talked about how on earth I was going to get home, what was going to happen. “We’ll figure it out, babe,” he soothed me, squeezing my hand.

When the guards called “time,” I wanted to cry. After I kissed Larry goodbye, I practically backed out of the room so I could see him as long as possible. And then I was being herded into a room with a handful of female prisoners. Everyone had the postvisit glow of happiness, and they all looked a lot better for it.

“Piper, you had a visit?” someone asked.

“Yeah, my fiancé came to see me.” I grinned like a fool.

“He came all the way from New York to see you? Wow!” It was as if he had come from the moon.

I just nodded. I didn’t want to be boastful of my great fortune to have a man like Larry.

I HAD been hearing about the roof since I got to the MCC. Apparently there was a recreation area up on the top of the building, and when the weather was agreeable, an officer might bring us up there. I had been indoors for weeks now; I was dreaming about the track and the lake at Danbury every night. Finally one day it was announced that we could sign up for roof time. As many women crammed into the elevator as could fit. At the top there were nylon coats we could throw on, and then we were out, high in the sky, albeit caged under razor and chicken wire. There were a couple of basketball hoops up there, and the temperature was in the forties. I immediately got hiccups from the oxygen differential and just breathed as deeply as I could. The roof reflected the building’s triangular footprint, and you could see far in every direction. In one direction were railway yard tracks. A nearby building had a fabulous art deco statue at its pinnacle. And to the southeast I could see the lake.

I walked to the south side of the rec deck, which was fenced with black iron. The bars were wide enough apart that I could wedge my face between them. I stared out at the lake, scanning the city below me.

“Hey! Nora. Come here!”

“What?” She came over.

I pointed through the bars. “Isn’t that the Congress Hotel?”

She stared through the bars for a moment, trying to find the spot where she had packed a suitcase full of money for me to carry, more than ten years before. “I think you’re right. You are right. Jesus.”

Neither of us said anything for a moment.

“What a dump.”

THE TRIAL finally began. Jonathan Bibby, the guy who had taught Nora how to smuggle drugs way back when, claimed that he had been an innocent art dealer who happened to hang out with a lot of convicted drug smugglers. But the feds had detailed evidence against him, including records of him traveling to Africa on the same flights as Nora, Hester/Anne, and others. Hester/Anne was taken away to appear in court first. She had known the defendant for years. She came back teary-eyed; the defense attorney had ripped her apart.