Page 90 of The River Is Waiting

“Stop it, Manny. I don’t need to see a doctor because there’s nothing physically wrong with me. Those bloodstains were from weeks ago and never came out. Okay?”

“Maybe it’s emotional then. I know something’s up with you. If you don’t want to talk to me about it, maybe you should put in a request to see one of the shrinks who come here.”

I consider his suggestion. There are two psychologists at this place. I’ve heard that the younger one is pretty good, but seeing Blankenship would be a waste of time. He’s the one who interviewed me when I was on suicide watch and he was pretty much dialing it in. Their schedules rotate, so you can’t make a specific request. Maybe I’ll give the psych wheel a spin anyway. Telling either one what they did to me would be brutal, but at least it would be confidential. Keeping it to myself is driving me nuts. Still, even if I get the new shrink, how useful will a sympathetic ear and some coping strategies be when what I really want is to figure out how to make those fuckers pay?

“Hey, you’re right,” I tell Manny. “I have been acting douchey lately. Sorry. Maybe Ishouldgo talk to one of those shrinks.” He says it couldn’t hurt. “Oh, by the way, do you mind if I hold on to those ibuprofens?” I ask him. It’s been a little over a week since the assault and it doesn’t hurt as much, except when I take a dump, which is when there’s a little blood. I promise him I’ll order him a replacement bottle on my next commissary sheet.

“Don’t worry about it,” he says. “Hey, by the way, you got any more of those Jolly Ranchers?” I remind him that he ate the last of them. “Did I? Oh, yeah. My bad. Mind if I watch TV?”

“Go for it,” I tell him. I lie on my bunk, face to the wall as usual, half listening to Alex Trebek and then Pat Sajak. Start dozing when one of those lame-ass sitcoms with the phony laugh track comes on.…

I must have slept for a couple of hours at least, because when I wake up, it’s already lights-out. Needing to take a leak but not trusting my aim in the dark, I sit on the seat. My butt is still sore, so back in bed I grope around in the dark for the ibuprofen. Instead, my fingers touch the smooth, cool surface of my river stone. I pick it up and clutch it in one hand, fumble around for those tablets with the other. I swallow three more, then flop back down and try to deep-breathe my way back to sleep. No go. The night demons are taunting me.…

Maybe after I get out of here, I can contact one of those investigative reporters on TV or in the paper. See whether I can get someone to do an exposé about the kind of shit Piccardy and Anselmo are getting away with in here—not just what they’ve done to me. What about what they did to Solomon? And others. I didn’t witness it myself, but it’s gone around the compound about how they amused themselves that time by convincing Billy, a Down syndrome inmate, to imitate a bunch of farm animals. And how Piccardy got transferred here because his uncle, Zabrowski, pulled some strings after Lover Boy knocked up that female inmate. Maybe if the public gets wind of this shit, the commissioner might have to fire them both. That’s the thing DOC is most afraid of: negative publicity, complaints from the public.…

Maisie understands that you’re “away” but that you’re coming back. We still have to figure out how that’s going to work.Yeah, well, maybe if you’d brought her down here to see me, they wouldn’t be telling you she needs a shrink. Tell the truth, Emily. Isn’t keeping her from me another way to punish me because of Niko? Having to be caged in here for three years isn’t punishment enough? And what do you mean when you say we have to figure out how that’s going to work after I’m out? How much are you going to try to restrict access to my daughter?

When that judge came out of her chambers with her decision, she saidsome sentences were easy to decide, others kept her up at night, and mine was one of the latter ones.My decision is that you are to be incarcerated for a period of five years, suspended after three, and another three years.Then she pounded her gavel and left the courtroom. I bet she hasn’t thought of me once since then.… And why had Dad sobbed when he heard her decision? Who was he crying for: the grandson he’d only bothered to see once? For himself because he’d fathered a loser for a son? It’s doubtful Professor Ledbetter was crying for me. If that had been the case, he probably would have answered the one letter I’d written him two or three weeks into my bid here. Or maybe even shown up here and sat down across from me to see how I was doing.…

I have months, not years, left to go before I get out. No matter what’s going to happen between Emily and me, I’ll fight her tooth and nail if she’s going to try to screw with my parental rights. I was agooddad before it happened. Sheknowsthat. Doesn’t that count for anything? Does it all just come down to that one worst thing I did? I guess I know the answer to that one.…

Piccardy and Anselmo better watch their backs once I’m out of here. If I can’t get the media to do anything, I’ll find some other way to make them pay. At the library, I’d found an article in the staff newsletter about the pair. They’d played football for competing high schools. After graduation, they both enlisted in the army. Both went to Fort Benning for basic training and they bonded there. Piccardy fought in Afghanistan, Anselmo in Iraq. After they both got out, the article said, they commuted to the police academy for their training to become correctional officers. They’ve run 5Ks together, been each other’s best man, and competed together in one of those Tough Mudder challenges. The article included two photos of them. In one, they’re at a game at Yankee Stadium, both of them wearing US Army caps, one of them with an embroidered eagle, the other camo with a stars-and-stripes patch. In the second picture, they’re caked with mud and baring their teeth for the camera—a couple of self-congratulating “tough mudders.”… Lying here, I imagine the two of them jogging alongsome country road, unaware that I’m tailing them in a car—something heavy like a Ford Expedition or a Chevy Suburban. When I’m sure no one’s coming, I gun it, passing close enough to scare them both. Then I turn the car around. When I get close enough for them to recognize me, I floor it, aiming right at them. It’s a sick fantasy, but a satisfying one. They deserve it. Then I’m stopped cold, realizing whodidn’tdeserve it: my little boy. I was at the wheel when he died, too. Nausea overtakes me. I get off my bunk, rush to the bowl, and heave. Lying back down, I break out in a cold sweat. You see what kind of a sick bastard prison’s turned me into, Emily? And half the time, you can’t be bothered to pick up the phone and accept the charges? You can’t manage more than a couple of letters a month, sometimes one a month? How long has it been since you visited? Two months. Right, Em? Eight weeks. Fifty-six days.

Clock says twelve forty-seven…

One sixteen…

Two thirty-nine.

Fuck all this lying awake thinking. What I need is sleep.… The river is loud tonight. After all that rain we’ve had, it sounds urgent as it rushes past, heading south. Rubbing my thumb against the stone, I begin to relax. Start to doze. Wake up, doze some more, then fall into a deep sleep.

When I crack my eyes open, I glimpse, through the slit of the cell’s back window, the drab gray of another morning getting ready for the sun to break through on the horizon. Lying there, I recall the dream I’ve just woken up from. Emily and the twins are in a paddleboat on some lake. I’m happy that Niko’s alive again or wasn’t dead after all. For some reason, I’m not in the boat; I’m swimming after them, trying to catch up. When I hear something behind me and look back, I see a bear, dog-paddling after me. I swim faster, but the paddleboat has gotten far ahead. The bear is gaining on me. I can hear it chuffing and growling. When I look back, its eyes meet mine.

“But it’s baked chicken leg night,” Manny says. “You don’t want to miss chicken leg night, do you?” He’s up on his bunk in just his skivvies, his scrawny legs dangling over the side. I’m sitting on my storage box, my face in the book I’m pretending to read so he’ll shut up. It’s not working. “Last week you skipped Jamaican meat pies and now this? I wish you’d just tell me what’s bothering you, Corby. Maybe if you talk it out, you’ll feel better.”

Without looking up, I tell him I’ve been on this same freaking page for ten minutes now and I’m wondering whether he’s going to shut up anytime soon.

“Is it about your wife? Or—”

“Leave it alone, Manny.”

“Are Piccardy and his wingman still bothering you? I thought that had died down, but has it?” Now he’s really pissing me off because he’s getting too close to the truth. And yes, their harassment seems to have stopped, but the assault served its purpose. The toy cops must be so proud of themselves now that they’ve shut me up and shut me down.

Out in the corridor, CO Sullivan shouts five minutes till chow call. Manny jumps down from his bunk, pulls on his pants, and slips his feet into the frayed checkerboard Vans I wear as slippers. He used to ask me whether he could wear them. Now he just assumes they’re his.

“Is it about your daughter? The custody thing?”

“Stop it, Manny! You’re not my shrink.”

“No, I’m your friend.”

When I look over at him, the compassion in his eyes hurts so much that I have to look away. He’s myonlyreal friend in this place. Well, he and Javi over at the library. “Look, I’m sorry I’ve been so surly lately, but I’ve got less than ten months left in here. All I want to do is lie low and keep crossing off those days on my calendar. Okay?”

“I still think you should put in a request to talk to someone.”

“I already did, okay?”

I’m disappointed to see I’ve drawn the short straw. It’s Blankenship again. He’s on the wall phone, talking to someone he’s calling “sweetheart.” He holds up his be-with-you-in-a-minute finger and gestures that I should take a seat.

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