Page 87 of The River Is Waiting

“What are you smiling at?” someone asks, yanking me out of my reverie.

“Hmm? What?” It feels like I’ve just been caught doing something wrong.

Boudreaux’s walking beside me. “Where did you come from?” I ask him.

“I was walking up there with Daugherty, but Anselmo sent him back on account of he got a bloody nose. Told me to buddy up with you instead.”

“How did he get a bloody nose?” I ask. “You pop him one?”

“Nah, he was picking it too hard. Didn’t mean to spook you just now, but man, you was someplace else. And from that shit-eatin’ grin, I bet you was thinkin’ ‘bout some nice piece of ass. Am I right or am I right?”

“Guilty,” I say. And Idofeel guilty, but not in the way he thinks. Do I have any right to enjoy ahappymemory of my little boy? Do I need to tamp down recollections like the one I just had to atone for what I did? For the pain I caused?

“Iknewit, brother,” Boudreaux says. “I can read people’s minds by reading their faces. And your face was saying loud and clear that you was having yo’self a poontang memory.” Yeah, right, I think. The AmazingKreskin must be shaking in his boots knowing what a powerful mind reader Boudreaux is.

Entering the chow hall, Boudreaux and I get in line behind Lobo, Angel, Manny, and the new guy he’s crushing on. Rashan, the head server, ladles creamed chipped beef onto my tray—slop on Styrofoam. One-Eye adds a watery scoop of canned peas. The third server—he’s not familiar—tops things off with two slices of white bread and a powdered-sugar doughnut, cellophane-wrapped. As we get off the line, Goolsby points to an empty table like he’s the fucking maître d’.

The six of us take our seats, lean forward, and start eating as fast as we can—everyone, that is, except Manny, who can’t ever keep his mouth shut, and his new friend, who doesn’t know speed-eating is advised. “Hey, you guys, this is Austin,” Manny says. “He was telling me he used to compete in motocross races when he lived in Florida.”

“Cool,” Angel says. “What did you ride?”

“A Kawasaki KX Two-Fifty.”

Lobo wants to know where in Florida he lived. “Grew up in Ocala,” he says. “Raced in Tampa before I screwed up my leg during a practice run.”

“He came up here to go to the business school at URI,” Manny tells us. “And get this. He worked part-time for a caterer who did parties at Taylor Swift’s beach house in Watch Hill. This past summer, he was a waiter at this big Fourth of July party she had. And guess who some of the guests were?”

No one guesses. We’d rather eat.

“Give up? Nick Jonas, Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively, Miranda Lambert, Lorde!” Manny, a teenybopper in his fifties, is way more excited about the guest list than the rest of us, Austin included.

Anticipating Anselmo will cut our mealtime short as usual, I shovel it in as fast as I can. It weirds me out that every time I look over at him, he’s watching me. Meanwhile, Manny keeps talking a blue streak. I feel sorry for this Austin guy. I remember when I first got here how Manny overwhelmed me with his advice and mentoring.

“Chow’s over!” Anselmo shouts, maybe eleven or twelve minutes into what’s supposed to be our twenty-minute meal. All around me, guys stand to obey, stuffing sopped-up bread into their mouths and packaged doughnuts under their shirts. Austin, whose meal is only half-eaten, looks shocked that lunch is over.

I spend the afternoon reading another one of the Easy Rawlins titles Lester Wiggins recommended. During five-on-the-floor, I see Austin standing by himself, looking a little lost. “About Manny,” I tell him. “Don’t be afraid to tell him to back off. He enjoys taking new guys under his wing, but you don’t want to suffocate under there, right?” He nods but doesn’t smile. Then, speak of the devil, Manny approaches us carrying two Styrofoam cups. “Coffee, Austin?” he says. “I got instant in these. Come on. I’ll show you where the hot pot is.”

A few minutes later, they’re back, neither of them talking or holding coffee. There’s a red mark under Manny’s eye that looks like it’s starting to swell. I don’t know for sure what happened, but I think I can guess. When we’re locked back in our cell, I ask Manny whether his eye’s okay. He says it’s fine. Changes the subject by telling me about a rumor he’s heard: Piccardy’s wife asked him for a divorce. “Maybe that’s why we haven’t seen him for several days,” I say. “He must be taking time off to do some soul-searching.” We both laugh at that.

A hundred and fifty pages of Easy Rawlins later, Goolsby yells that it’s chow time again. When the doors pop, I see Anselmo at the other end of the corridor. These two must both be doing double shifts. “Grab a buddy and line up!” Anselmo shouts.

Subdued by what’s turned into one hell of a shiner, Manny hangs back and partners up with Lobo. Once again, my buddy is Boudreaux. As we head off, he says, “Hey, Ledbetter, the post office is open.” What’s he talking about? “Thepostoffice, man. It’sopen.” He points down at my unbuttoned fly. When I close it up, he nods and says, “Ça c’est bon.” I tell him half the time I don’t know whether he’s speaking English or Swamp. He says it’s not his fault if we people “up the bayou” don’t talk right.

Our four o’clock supper is meat loaf, mashed potatoes, canned carrots, bread, and cake: enough carbs to bloat us up and a sodium level so high we could all have strokes. Austin’s at the far end of our table, eating fast and talking to no one. Manny’s at the other end. For once in his life, he’s not saying much either. An argument breaks out at a table on the other side of the room, but Anselmo shuts it down before fists fly. I find an undissolved protein pellet in my meat loaf, which means there’s more cereal than meat in there. I concentrate on the potatoes, bread, and carrots instead, thinking my mom would probably faint if she saw me eating carrots without making a fuss. Boudreaux, seated across from me, keeps eyeing my cake. “Jesus Christ, just take it,” I tell him. He makes the grab.

When Goolsby yells that time’s up, I look at the clock on the wall. He and Anselmo have given us seventeen of our twenty minutes to eat. Not bad.

Manny, Boudreaux, and I are walking side by side out of the hall when Anselmo tells me to hold up. The other two stop, too. “There’s a salt shaker missing from the table where you guys were at,” he says. “You swipe that, Ledbetter?” I tell him no, that there was only an empty pepper shaker where we sat down.

“But this wouldn’t be the first thing you ever lied about, would it? You know the drill. Let’s go.”

“Hey, come on, brother. He didn’t take nothing,” Boudreaux says.

Anselmo gets in his face. “I’m not your brother, brother. Keep moving.” The Ragin’ Cajun shakes his head and does what he’s told.

I’m about to be patted down and there’s nothing for me to do but comply, so I stare up at the ceiling as Goolsby does the honors. His hands move from my shoulders down my outstretched arms, then up and down the rest of my torso. “Step aside, Officer Goolsby,” Anselmo says. He pats down the outsides, then the insides of my legs. When he’s up around my groin, he clasps his hands together and knuckles me in the nuts. I wince and cough but force myself not to cry out or double over from the pain. I’ll be damned if I’ll give him the reaction he wants.

“I’m thinking he might have stuck it up his butt,” he tells Goolsby. “A lot of these artist types are into that kinky shit. Drop trou, Ledbetter.”

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