David Mathew - O My Days

Second worry is Julie won’t get me my books.

Third worry is, if I lose Enhanced, my mail will get read in both directions—and I need to send a letter to some of the boys I roll with. I need my money back from this fucking Bailey waste—and I need to offer him a reminder, via the medium of non-verbal communication, that I am not to be fucked with. The money gets returned (this itself a sub-concern: how far can I trust my own boys not to spend the rewards?); and he stays away from my ting and my daughter. In return, once his bruises heal, he has given back to him the full use of his limbs and the only visible memories will be the shank scars on his torso, every one of them a tale to tell, a tale that was told.

My fourth worry is what Dott wrote in blood on the pillowcase.

And my fifth—and most pressing immediately—is how I’m going to get rid of the fucking thing. Flimsy prison-issue pillowcase it might be, but it’s still a pillowcase. I can’t dash it out the window—it’ll get found and I’ll get blamed. Not even the Dellacotte winds, up here in the hills, are going to move a pillowcase far once it’s snuggled up nicely to the tulips in the flowerbed. And I can’t eat it.

I’m tempted to wrap it inside my towel for when I’m allowed a shower, but then what? The single shower down block is checked before and after every rinse, just in case someone leaves something—a sewing needle, for example—for someone else to use. (I wonder if Dott has dashed the needle out the window. It’s the sort of thing he can easily hide in his mattress, after all. What’s he thinking?)

The answer to the pillowcase conundrum arrives, as so many solutions do in this place, when I am moving my bowels into the fire brigade red plastic bucket. I have heard from other lads that when you’re down block, it’s best to time your bowel movements for just after breakfast. You don’t want to eat your cereals with a container of shit in the corner of the cell. But I can’t wait. My body clock is out of sync from so little shut-eye. I must be quick. Clenching my batty cheeks, I knock-knee my way back to the mattress. The pillowcase is under it. I complete my defecation into its open maw, a sense of self- disgust rising within myself. As best I can, I flatten down the waste and replace the loaded linen beneath the mattress. I wipe myself clean and dry. What the screw will see in the bucket, if he’s one of the sick govs who look, is a small amount of prison-issue shit, battleship grey, bulked up with too much paper.

Slop out, I’m told in due course. When I empty the bucket into the chute there is no comment. And when I empty the bucket, eventually, containing the shit-soiled pillowcase—its whiteness stained darker—with my faeces and a load of bumwad, I hope there will no comment either.

I have been allowed one roll-on deodorant for my stay here in Hell’s Hotel. I apply a layer of it to the pillowcase, to ease any smell that might start wafting. It’s as close a procedure to feeding a pet as I’ve ever known. I don’t recall having a pet in the flat when I was a boy. Not allowed.

At the Adjudication I plead guilty. Hot on the heels of my belief that I have no choice but to do so is the thought that I am still innocent until.

Allow it.

It’s to your advantage, Alfreth, I’m told, that the assailant refuses to make any kind of statement at all. What did you pay her?

Eighty-five fucking grand, I want to say. Good old Julie. I nod my head; it’s a sympathetic, humble gesture.

So I have no choice, he adds, but to hold you here pending further psychiatric reports. I want to be sure, Alfreth, clean record or not.

My backside rises now from the plastic seat.

Sit down, Alfreth, I am told.

I deep-breathe to regain my composure.

Sir. I’ve never been in trouble before. I’m going legit.

I’d like to believe that, Alfreth, the Governor tells me.

It’s true, sir. I’m going to be an accountant.

Is that so?

Yes, sir, it’s so. It’s true, it’s actual. Everything is satisfactual.

Less of it, Alfreth.

Sorry, sir. I glance up at Kate Wollington. She’s there as my compadre . I don’t know why, but you learn to ride it. I can’t stand that smirk on her face though still. Or the thought that she’ll be reporting back to Kate Thistle. I wish her dead. At this moment. Swear down.

Alfreth. As this has been your first serious charge since you entered this institution, I am willing to offer you the benefit of the doubt. The tone is weary, icy. You may keep your Enhanced status.

Thank you, sir. May I ask you a question, sir?

The question has him wrongfooted and distracted. He thinks he’s done me a favour but he says, Go ahead, Alfreth.

Sir, why is Miss Wollington present here today? I don’t look at her. I want to exclude her from the inquiry.

She’ll be writing your psychiatric assessment, Alfreth.

I understand that, sir.

Don’t stand up.

I’m not about to, sir. I just thought I’d mention that this is highly irregular and I would like a reason. Most psych reports go on the evidence of the court report and I’m curious why Kate Wollington is here right now.

Yeah, Charlie, I know her first name. I know yours too. I have painted him into a corner and he knows it.

He betrays a sign of weakness by asking: Are you taking the piss out of me, Alfreth?’

No, sir. Quite the opposite. I’ve shown nothing but politure.

Politure?

Yes, sir. I don’t run the risk of offending him further by defining the word although I want to. I simply wish to understand this breach of protocol.

It’s my prison , Alfreth. That’s the only sort of protocol you need to know. Do you understand me?

It’s at this point that I think it’s his arse that’s going to rise from the seat.

I understand you, perfectly, sir, I say. I turn to Kate Wollington. Please say hello to Kate Thistle, I ask her. (Yeah, I know her forename too.)

Will do, is Miss Wollington’s only contribution to the conversation.

Thank you, sir.

And I am led back to my temporary pad in the Seg. It smells like a tramp’s beard in there, but already still the officers have ceased to remark on it. I’ve heard them all—the insults.

Smells like a rat crawled into this shit-hole and died, Alfreth.

Yes, sir.

Smells like a scabby whore’s Mound of Venus, Alfreth.

Yes, sir.

Insults don’t matter here, at Dellacotte Young Offenders. Why not? Because insults are the air you breathe and you get used to them quickly.

There’s a note from Reception. It’s been pushed under my cell door, and I unwrap it immediately. It’s about the books I’ve ordered via Julie. Bless her, Julie has tried her best. For whatever reason. The books have gone straight into my Personal Belongings in Reception. All three of them. Rationale: Material not suited to a prisoner. Allow it and fuck it. I don’t need the motherfuckers anymore. Where has she got the money? That’s sixty sheets.

Five things.

He asks two questions, but without question words, does Dott. Prometheus? he asks. Hair shirt? he asks. And then he asks a question, in blood, with a question mark. It doesn’t take a genius of memory. He insults me, bruv. Prometheus is the Titan chiefly honored for stealing fire from the gods in the stalk of a fennel plant and giving it to mortals for their use. I can read, you know, Dott. He is depicted as an intelligent and cunning figure who has sympathy for humanity. Promethean refers to events or people of great creativity, intellect and boldness. Allow it. But we’re not done. Next comes the real question, and it makes me sit down on my mattress.