Page 37 of The River Is Waiting

“Yup. You too.”

A few seconds after he’s gone, I hear his voice again, coming through the tray trap in our steel cell door. “Hey, Ledbetter?”

“Yeah?”

“Keep the faith.”

“Uh-huh. Thanks.”

Lying there, I start wondering about Cavagnero’s motivation for visiting me. Have I just been offered some genuine compassion? It’s in short supply around here, so it’s nice to think so. Keep the faith: Was he pushing religion? Or has he been sent here to try to prevent any future bad publicity Yates might get if there’s a second suicide within a week? Don’t trust any of them, Pug said.

Later that afternoon, during one of our tier’s five-minute breaks forcommon time, I go out on the corridor to show them I’m not isolating. That’s what they want to see, right? There are just a few others out here, talking and laughing together halfway down the corridor. One of them is DeShaun. And there, maybe ten steps away from me, is his cleaning cart, parked by itself with a box of garbage bags on the top. Opportunity seems to be whispering,Do it. This is a sign. Don’t be a wuss.I look around to see whether the coast is clear, then yank out two of the bags, fist them, and walk back in my cell.

That night, after lights-out, I make my plan. I’ll do it in the morning. Once Pug leaves for work, I’ll grab that stubby little pencil in my survival kit and use the backs of those commissary order sheets to write notes to Emily and my mother, explaining why this is the best thing for all of us.… I’ll double up the bags in case I accidentally poke a hole in one or try to claw my way out before I lose consciousness. If everything goes the way it should, I’ll be dead before the midmorning count. That’s probably when they’ll discover me. By chow time, I’ll most likely be the topic of conversation.I can’t place him. Kept to himself. Killed his own kid.A week later, I’ll just be another “back-door parolee” whose name nobody will remember. With my decision made and my plan in place, I feel relief. I pull one of the plastic bags from beneath my pillow, unfold it, and place it loosely against my face. It rises and falls with each breath I take, almost as if I’ve given it life. In the morning, it will return the favor and give me death. My way out of here is just hours away.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

August 2017

Days 23–28 of 1,095

I’m poked awake. Someone’s shining a light in my face. As my eyes adjust, I realize there are two of them, but I can only see them in silhouette. Who are they? Is this a home invasion? Then it hits me like a brick to the head. I’m not at home, I’m in prison; these must be guards. But bed checks are done by one officer, not two. From his bottom bunk, Pug asks what the fuck is going on. “Doesn’t concern you, Liggett. Go back to sleep,” one of them says. I don’t know what’s going on either, but if it’s not about him, then it’s about me. I’m poked again, blinded by the flashlight’s beam. “Let’s go. You going to cooperate or do we need to pull you down off there?”

Disoriented, I slip off my bunk and onto the floor. A wave of nausea hits me as I’m led out of our cell. By the lights in the corridor, I can see the guards now, but neither is familiar. One of them cuffs me; the other holds a fistful of plastic in my face. “What were you planning to do with these, Ledbetter? Huh? Check out early?” I’m too scared to answer. Flanked by the two of them, I’m walked down the two flights of stairs and out of B Block.

Outside it’s foggy and cold; crickets are chirping like crazy and there’s an opaque half-moon. Barefoot and shivering in only my underpants, I ask where they’re taking me. Neither one answers. Their flashlightslead us along the walkway until I see the medical building rising out of the fog.

Inside, we stop at the front desk. “Ledbetter,” one of the guards says. The receiving officer puts down his Game Boy and stands. He’s short, slight, bearded. His name tag says O’Brien. “Is he belligerent?” he asks. The other two shake their heads. He grabs a ring of keys from a plywood board and comes out from behind his desk. Says, “Okay, follow me.”

The four of us head down a hallway, then take a right, passing a sign that says Psychiatric Unit. I’ve heard that having to go to seg is bad, but being locked up in the “ding wing” is worse. What fresh hell is this going to be?

“Take him to number two,” O’Brien says. “I’ll be right there.” The other officers walk me to a cell that says Observation #Two. I watch O’Brien unlock a cabinet and take out some bulky blue thing. When he rejoins us, he unlocks the observation cell and motions me in. He and the escorts follow.

“Drop your underwear and put this on,” O’Brien says. He and one of the escorts hold out the blue thing—a sleeveless wraparound garment. O’Brien tells me to put my arms through the holes. I ask him what it’s for. “Safety smock,” he says. “So you can’t hurt yourself.” When one of the escorts quips that it’s “noose-proof,” O’Brien frowns. I slip my arms through the holes and feel the weight and bulk of the thing—four or five pounds of some sturdy, nylon-like material. O’Brien pulls the front straps and Velcros the garment around me. “Too tight,” I tell him. “Can you loosen it a little?” He shakes his head and says it’s supposed to be tight. I lock eyes with him. “Why am I here?” I ask. It’s more of a plea than a question. Because he doesn’t look away, he suddenly seems more human than robotic.

“An emergency order’s come down to put you in administrative segregation.”

“Why? What did I do?”

“It’s not what you did,” he says. “It’s what they think you might do.You’re on a seventy-two-hour suicide watch.” I deny that I’m suicidal—so emphatically that I half believe myself. “Someone’s made a mistake.”

“That’s for a clinician to decide,” he says. “I’m just following orders.”

“We done here?” one of the escorts asks. O’Brien nods. They leave the cell. O’Brien starts to leave, too, but he stops at the door. “Maybe itisa mistake. But if I were you, I’d just go with it and cooperate. You cause a stink and those seventy-two hours might be just the beginning. You see that up there?” My eyes follow his pointing finger to a surveillance camera mounted to the ceiling. “You’re being observed and evaluated by staff. Behave yourself, okay? Get some sleep.” Having offered that little bit of kindness, he closes the door and locks me in.

I look around, but there isn’t much to see. Bare concrete walls, a thin plastic mattress on the cement floor. No sheet. I stare up at the bright-as-hell halogen lights overhead and the surveillance camera. Two cameras, actually. They’re watching me from more than one angle. I feel something move across my bare foot. It’s an ant. I would bend down and flick it off if this fucking safety suit wasn’t so bulky. It crawls down my ankle and across the cell. Disappears into a crack where the wall meets the floor.

How did they figure out what I was planning? Had I flunked my interview with Cavagnero? Did it get back to them that I said Hogan was better off than the rest of us? Maybe a camera in the corridor caught my spontaneous grab of those plastic bags from the janitor’s cart and someone put two and two together?

I open my eyes; somehow I’ve slept. There’s no way of knowing how many hours I can subtract from the seventy-two I have to stay in this goddamn cell under the glare of those fucking lights. They never go off and those surveillance cameras never stop watching me. With no way to escape the reason I’m in prison, Niko’s death hits me full force. I drank and drugged that morning and robbed him of his life. Stole him away from his mother and sister. I deserve this shame I’m feeling. Deserve tohave had my suicide attempt thwarted. Big Brother’s up there, watching my every move to make sure I don’t cheat them of the thirty-six months of suffering I owe them.

At some point I start pacing, counting the number of times I’ve gone around the cell. One thousand, seven hundred and twelve. When I stop, I lean against one of the walls and begin to doze on and off. I’m awakened by the sound of the door being unlocked. Are they letting me out? Have seventy-two hours slipped by? I gaze up at the cameras, then at the unfamiliar CO who has entered the cell. He’s carrying a Styrofoam tray of food: powdered scrambled egg, oatmeal, two slices of bread, and a foil-covered plastic container of apple juice. Breakfast food. So it’s morning? Is the sun up? When I ask what day it is, the CO doesn’t answer. He puts the tray on the floor, comes over to me, and removes the safety smock. “Eat up,” he says.

Naked, I sit cross-legged on the mattress, look up at the cameras again, and try as best I can to cover my privates with the tray. When I tell the guard the kitchen forgot to give me a utensil to eat with, he says, “You’re on suicide watch; you eat with your fingers.” Seriously? How the hell would I be able to harm myself using a plastic spork? I put handfuls of the eggs and the oatmeal on the two slices of bread. Fold them together and eat them like they’re tacos. Take small sips of apple juice to help swallow it down.

After I’m finished eating, I tell the CO that I need to go. Instead of leading me to a bathroom outside the cell, he points to a drain in the corner. When I say I need to take a crap, too, he points again to the drain. After I’ve pissed then squatted to relieve myself, I’m given nothing to wipe my butt with before he puts the safety suit back on. How is making someone who’s suicidal live under these conditions supposed to make himnotwant to kill himself? True, the observation cell is a place where it’s just about impossible to harm my body. But it’s likely to accelerate mywantingtodo myself in. When I start to whimper involuntarily, I turn over, facing the floor to keep the watchers from seeing my face.

The ants come and go. I don’t mind the black ones so much, but the smaller red ones bite. To fend them off, I start pacing the perimeter of the cell again. This time, instead of counting, I think about all the other suicidal inmates who have had to wear this smock before me. How many of them, I wonder, are still alive? How many killed themselves after they got out of here? I can’t predict what I’m going to do.…

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