A few weeks into my sentence, I’m still reeling from where I’ve landed, but I’ve finally come to terms with the daily routine. I’ve been moved from C-95, for detainees with drug problems, to the 6 building, for sentenced inmates. Almost everyone is doing less than a year for stupid shit, but there are definitely some guys in here who deserve to be off the streets.
At first I was so traumatized bouncing around the system I thought I was going to have a breakdown. I wasn’t scared, just totally alone and depressed and beaten down by the constant humiliations. Like the day after I got sentenced, a bunch of us were strip-searched and lined up naked in a dingy room full of T-shirts, uniforms, underwear, and socks. The CO asked my size, reached over to a shelf, and handed me a pile of clothes.
I quickly pulled on the boxers and unfolded the ugly green jumpsuit—which looked like it would’ve fit Magic Johnson. When I told the guard it was way too big for me, he said, “You wear what you get.”
That’s when it hit me: I’m not a detainee anymore, I’m a fucking prisoner.
There was a three-hundred-pound guy next to me who’d gotten a uniform that was about four sizes too small, so without saying a word we swapped. That’s how it is in here—you figure out how to get by, adapting almost by instinct.
I’ve been off drugs for almost a month now, so the dope sickness has faded, but it’s been replaced by a persistent, gnawing depression and these crushing waves of regret. At least with the physical effects of withdrawal you know they’ll eventually end—the mental agony feels like it could go on forever. That just adds to the painful monotony of each day, which follows the same mind-numbing routine.
5:00 A.M. Breakfast
I have no idea why we get woken up so fucking early for breakfast, but if you skip it, lunch isn’t until noon and since dinner is at five o’clock, that’s a long time to go without eating. But after a while I don’t bother getting up. It’s not worth it for some shit coffee, a piece of tasteless fruit, a mini cereal box, and a few slices of bland bread. “Sleep late, lose weight,” everyone says—and that’s no joke. I already feel bloated, eating way more than I did when I was using.
7:30 A.M. Shave—if you’re lucky
A CO steps into the dorm and says “razors” so quietly sometimes no one hears her—usually it’s the female guards who like to fuck with us. But if it’s actually audible, everyone who wants to shave has to line up, exchange their IDs for a cheap single-blade razor, and try to shave using a mirror that’s been scoured so much you can hardly see your reflection. Not that I really care how I look—I know it can’t be good.
8:00 A.M. Coffee
Once I’ve got some money on my commissary account, I can make instant coffee—52 cents for a small pouch of coffee, 10 cents for a tiny creamer, and 5 cents for a packet of sugar. It’s not great, but it’s better than the insipid crap they serve in the mess hall. Sometimes the only newspaper I can find is a day-old El Diario, which I can’t read since it’s in Spanish, but I look at the pictures and try to figure out the story. This is always the worst time of the day for me, realizing I still have fifteen hours to get through until lights-out.
10:00 A.M. Yard time
Before we can go out to the yard—a patch of dried-up grass—we get searched multiple times: standing against the wall with our arms and legs spread, then passing through a metal detector, then another pat-down with guards constantly shouting, “Shut the fuck up or you’re going back to the dorm!” All just to walk in circles around a dusty track or wait for a turn to lift a set of rusty barbells. Sometimes I lie on the grass watching planes take off from LaGuardia Airport—so close I can almost make out the faces in the windows.
12:00 P.M. Lunch
After we line up and shuffle to the mess hall, we each get handed a plastic tray through a slot in the wall, with a meal that barely passes for food—salad you wouldn’t feed to a pet rabbit, a taco shell dripping with mushy meat, and a bruised banana or mealy apple. Sitting at the table assigned to our dorm, everyone crams it down and trades whatever they don’t want while the guards pace back and forth. We don’t get much time before we’re ordered to clear up, passing our trays through another slot on the way out.
2:00 P.M. Quiet time
Every afternoon the dayroom shuts for an hour or so, which means no TV, no playing cards, and no phone calls. The COs call it “quiet time,” like we’re all in kindergarten. We can read, write, nap, or talk quietly, but there’s no milling around. I don’t mind—it gives me a chance to read. You can have books sent to you, or occasionally the “library” opens, which is really a bunch of tables with donated books in the old gym. It was weird coming across all these writers I’ve photographed, like Dave Eggers and Jonathan Franzen, but in here meeting James Patterson or John Grisham would be a lot more impressive—their books are always in demand.
3:30 P.M. Another count
By midafternoon we’re next to our beds for the third count of the day. If the CO marching up and down the dorm doesn’t come up with the right number, he has to start all over and do it again. Sometimes the numbers don’t add up and there’s a shutdown of the entire jail. It’s one of those things you get used to, the annoyance of stopping whatever you’re doing while a guard mutters numbers and we all wait—five times a day.
5:00 P.M. Dinner
Another trip to the mess hall, but at least it means we’re getting closer to the end of the day. My request for a vegetarian meal hasn’t been approved, so I keep trading my meat for whatever vegetables other guys don’t want. It’s never enough, so I end up eating too much bread to fill myself up. We all have to bring our green plastic cups to every meal—if yours gets stolen or lost it can be a nightmare trying to get a new one. That’s one of the many ways this place makes you feel like a child.
6:30 P.M. Evening mayhem
As the day progresses, boredom turns into frustration and then anger as the noise level gets louder. I can’t believe how much everyone around me seems to be alright with this shit—laughing and joking while I’m practically tearing my hair out. I wish I had someone to talk to, but I guess I look pretty rough from kicking dope so people seem to be avoiding me. Mostly I just pace back and forth or sit on my bed staring at everyone else, hating myself for letting this happen.
11:00 P.M. Last count, lights-out
The last of the day’s many counts, but at least it brings an end to the mindless conversations around me. Once the lights go out, it usually takes me a long time to fall asleep, so I lie there looking around at all these grown men curled up in single beds, trying not to think about how I ended up here. I remember years ago telling myself, I’m not going to lose Susan, I’m not going to fuck up my photography career, I’m not going to lose my house, I’m not going to get locked up. But all those things happened and now here I am.
If this is what I have to get through for the next hundred-plus days, I can’t imagine how the fuck I’m gonna make it.
THINGS START TO look up when I bump into an old friend, Marco, in the yard. He’s a wiry Hispanic guy who grew up in Brooklyn—we used to buy from the same dealers and hang out in the same spots in the hood. As we wander around talking about who else we’ve seen on the island and what news we’ve heard from the outside, he mentions he’s got a job in the kitchen. I beg him to hook me up.
“You’ve got to get me in there. I’ve been working in the mental health dorm occasionally, but it’s really boring and I’m only on call. I need a job that’ll take my mind off this shithole.”
“I can try,” Marco says. “But my boss is tough—and you’ll have to tell him you’re doing a bullet.”
“What the fuck’s a bullet?”
“A year, dumb-ass. If you’re only doing a short bid they don’t want to hire you. It’s too much of a hassle to train you.”
It takes three days before Marco manages to sneak me into the kitchen during lunch. His boss is a quiet guy with a pained expression on his face—as if he’s the one dealing with being locked up. The so-called interview is easy: Marco’s bragging about what a great worker I am and how I went to college. I get the job, starting a couple of days later when another guy goes home.
I thought working in the kitchen would involve more real cooking, but in reality it’s mostly dishing up things that have been prepared somewhere else. It’s still busier than I expected, with guys wheeling racks of food around and trolleys coming and going and the constant clatter of metal pans being dropped. My two shifts consist of loading hundreds of dirty trays into slots in a conveyor belt that feeds into a huge dishwasher that belches steam and sprays hot water the whole time. It’s exhausting, and I’m only making about twenty dollars working seven days a week—a long way from getting paid thousands of dollars a day to shoot big advertising campaigns, with catered meals.
But working two shifts a day eats up a lot of time, and it helps me make friends in the dorm. All the kitchen workers sneak food out, jamming a piece of chicken or some fruit into a rubber glove, stuffing it down their pants, and tying the fingers around the waistband of their boxers. I usually share whatever I bring back, so before long I’m mixing with the other guys in my dorm, even playing in some of the card games at night. The first time I was asked to play on one of the card teams, I finally felt like I’d been accepted—which was a weird feeling, realizing I was starting to get comfortable in jail.
Marco and I only work together during the lunch shift, and for those few hours we manage to take ourselves out of Rikers. He grew up surrounded by drugs and criminality, cycling in and out of jail ever since he was sixteen, but he’s a different person when he’s not getting high, telling me how much he misses his kid and how badly he wants to change. We talk constantly as we work, taking turns lifting and loading the trays—making plans for getting out, starting over, staying clean.
“If you fucking relapse when you get out of here, I’m going to kick your ass,” he says, punching my arm so hard I drop a tray into the dish machine, causing it to jam and shudder to a halt. When I look at Marco, I know he’s talking about himself as much as me.
“Trust me,” I tell him, yanking the tray out and restarting the machine. “I’m done with all that—it brought me nothing but misery.”
But the truth is, I’m pretty fucking worried about how I’m going to keep away from everyone who’s gonna be all over me once I’m out. At least Marco has a halfway house set up—I’ve got no place to live except in the projects, surrounded by people desperate to get me back on the pipe.
Usually I don’t think too much about what I’m gonna do, but now it’s on my mind as I walk back to the dorm—down the long corridor, through the heavy doors, and up the stairs. Thinking of all the people I used to know, friends who aren’t junkies or crackheads, I can’t imagine how they’d react if I suddenly popped up saying I needed a place to stay. I haven’t seen or even talked to most of them in years.
The only person I’ve talked to is Anna. I called her a few weeks ago, after finally plucking up the courage. Considering how I expected her to react, she’s been pretty good about all this—paying the fees for my storage unit, putting money on my commissary account, and letting my brother and sister know what happened. But she hasn’t told Liam yet, so it kills me to think he has no idea where I am or why I haven’t been around. I’m desperate to talk to him, but Anna wants me to wait until she speaks to him first.
It makes me sick picturing him hearing that I’m in jail. I can’t imagine how he’s gonna feel about me—I just wish I could tell him myself. I wrote Anna a couple of long letters, trying to explain how I ended up here, my whole trajectory even going way back to our divorce, when Liam was young. That’s one of the hardest things about being in here, just dealing with how far I let myself fall. I’d become all the worst things anyone ever said or thought about me.
Once you’ve detoxed and can think straight, you’ve got to face up to all the shit you did and all the people you’ve hurt, with no way to escape the guilt and shame. Mostly I try to keep busy so I don’t dwell on it too much—which is why I’m taking every shift I can get in the kitchen. But it still rears up at me every so often, the things I saw and the people I was around and the life I basically accepted. You can’t ever erase any of that.
“ANOTHER DAY, ANOTHER tray,” one of the COs tells me as I walk into the kitchen for the lunch shift. She’s taken to calling me “Lucky Charm”—like the cereal—because she thinks I’m Irish.
“Why don’t you tell her you’re Scottish?” asks my friend Jimmy, an Irish American guy who’s just about the only person I’ve met in here who isn’t a drug dealer, junkie, or wannabe gangster.
“It’s better than Braveheart,” I tell him. “That’s what everyone was calling me when I first got here. I hated that film.”
Jimmy laughs and makes one of his many Seinfeld references before heading off to his job with the cleanup crew. It was such a relief to meet him when I got moved to 5 upper, the kitchen workers’ dorm. He got busted out on Long Island for driving with a suspended license—the judge gave him a year, all over some unpaid traffic tickets—but he and some other guys ended up getting transferred to Rikers because of overcrowding in the local jail. Some of them seem freaked out to be here, but not Jimmy. He doesn’t let things get to him—unlike me.
“You’re quiet, but you sure don’t take shit,” he told me, right after I moved in and had to stand up to this asshole who wanted one of my apples. I told the guy to fuck off and he got up in my face about it, but eventually he backed down. I knew he wasn’t going to risk losing his good time by getting in a fight with me—and if I gave him an apple, he would’ve been back the next day wanting my phone calls or my sneakers, and they cost me ten honey buns.
One of the kids who works in intake had stolen them and I was the highest bidder—the Jackie Chan slippers they give you were killing my feet. Sometimes I feel bad picturing some poor guy getting released and finding out his sneakers are missing, but that’s how things work in this place. If a dirty cop doesn’t pocket your cash when he busts you, chances are you’ll lose a watch or a ring or something else while you’re going through the system.
But Jimmy doesn’t let any of this stuff faze him—I think people respect him for that. He doesn’t give a fuck about where anyone’s been or what they’ve done, just as long as they don’t bother him. Ever since meeting him, time has gone faster and there have even been moments I’ve almost forgotten I’m in jail. I actually look forward to coming back to the dorm and chilling out after a hard day’s work.
Tonight after my dinner shift, I take a shower, put on a fresh T-shirt and pants, wash my other set in the sink, and head to the dayroom with Jimmy. Even when he’s talking to me or playing cards, he’s got one eye on whatever’s going on in the rest of the dorm.
“Looks like the evening show has started,” he says, nodding toward the guys working out down by “the projects”—what everyone calls the area by the bathroom. Jimmy got my bed moved to the “Upper East Side”—the corner farthest from the toilets, with the only fan. The strip running through the dorm is “Broadway,” and the section next to the CO’s bubble is “Police Plaza.” There are always guys with their shirts off doing press-ups by the bathroom, trying to impress the trannies—but pretending they’re not.
“Did you see the one that got brought in today?” I ask him. “I swear he looks so much like a woman I did a double take in the bathroom.”
“Big lips, purple hair?” Jimmy says, sitting down at one of the tables and dealing a hand of rummy. “Yeah, I saw her. We’ve sure had a weird mix pass through this dorm lately.”
It’s true—gangbangers, trannies, skinheads, suburbanites, old farts, young punks, and guys from just about every corner of the globe. But the person everyone’s talking about is the jail’s new celebrity, Lil Wayne. He’s up in protective custody—kept away from anyone who might want to hurt him. Rumor has it he’s been buying up everybody’s phone time and rapping to some producer, making beats for a Rikers album. I don’t buy it, but every time I’ve delivered meals to his dorm he’s been on the phone.
As Jimmy lays down another run—he almost always beats me—we talk about his kids and how his ex-wife is dealing with him being locked up. When he asks me about Liam, I tell him how much it hurts that I let him slip out of my life, and how worried I am that he won’t be able to forgive me. There were times I saw him when I was really fucked up, but he always treated me like I was his dad—he didn’t ever act out or confront me. That’s what’s on my mind all the time lately: how much I must’ve hurt him and how I’m gonna deal with that when I see him.
“You’ve got to keep yourself clean if you want to have a relationship with your son,” Jimmy says. “If you relapse, it’s not gonna happen.”
“I know,” I tell him. Jimmy doesn’t let me get away with feeling sorry for myself. That’s how he is—no bullshit, no whining. Man up and move on.
Just as I’m dealing another hand—after finally winning for a change—a young Jamaican guy comes up and asks, “Yo, Jim, can I get one of your calls? It’s my mom’s birthday and I already used my phone time talking to my girl.”
“Sure,” he says. “Let me finish this game and I’ll set you up.”
We each get a couple of phone calls a day, but Jimmy rarely uses his so he’s always trading them or giving them away. That’s one of the reasons everybody likes him—the Mexicans make food for him, he’s always getting asked to be on somebody’s card team, even the big gangsters come to him for advice. The other night, one of the older Crips was almost in tears, upset about all the young gangbangers running around with their bullshit and swagger, disrespecting people.
That’s the crazy thing about Rikers—some people act like it’s cool to be here, bragging about whatever they did on the outside. It’s like a finishing school for criminals. If you got busted for dealing, you’re guaranteed to meet a better connect. If you’re in for shoplifting, you’ll learn how to beat the store detectors. If you boosted cars, someone will teach you how not to get caught. Everybody comes out of here even more embedded in a life of crime—and it doesn’t seem like there’s any attempt to give people better options.
JUST BEFORE AFTERNOON count on the Fourth of July, two mess hall guys wheel a cart into the dorm and start handing out small tubs of ice cream with a Stars and Stripes flag on the lid. We all hurry to line up like they’re giving out hundred-dollar bills. Everything you take for granted on the outside has a whole different value in here, so pretty soon people are trading their ice cream for phone calls or envelopes or stamps. I give mine to a kid I know who’s just come in, only to see him trade it for a stamp. I don’t mind—I’ll get more in the kitchen later—but I tell him he should’ve gotten a stamp and an envelope. It won’t take him long to figure out what things are worth.
Since our dorm is on the far west side of the island, we can see the sky above Manhattan, so everyone is talking about watching the fireworks once the sun goes down. Last year I watched them from the roof of the projects, high on dope—so broke I was getting drugs on credit, promising dealers I’d pay them back once my house sold. But it took forever to close, so it got pretty scary with dealers threatening me, adding interest to the money I already owed. Everybody was coming after me—drug dealers, banks, credit card companies, fucking Time Warner—and by that point I’d pushed away anybody who could’ve helped me. The last person who even tried was Susan. Apparently she emailed Anna a few weeks ago, asking where I was.
I told Anna it was okay to let her know I’m at Rikers, but I’m surprised Susan still cares about me. The last time we saw each other was just after I’d gone out to Coney Island Hospital to detox—one of many attempts to get clean—and when I got home, there was a foreclosure notice stapled to my door. It seemed like it was a done deal, but Susan convinced me I should try to sell, so I pulled it together enough to clean the place up, plant some flowers in the yard, and throw a coat of paint on the walls. I remember she came over the day of the open house, but it took a while to actually sell, so I was really drowning in debt by the end of last year. After everything she’d done to help me, I couldn’t ask her to lend me money, and I didn’t want her to know how bad off I was. Seeing her was always a painful reminder that I’d lost her—I didn’t want to put myself through that again. Then once the closing finally happened, all my promises to myself that I’d get clean went out the window. The worst thing in the world for a junkie or a crackhead is having money.
I’d thought about going back to London or Scotland, but I’d lost my passport and my green card, and trying to replace them felt too risky. I still had open warrants, so I doubt I could’ve gotten out of the country anyway. I was basically trapped at Joe’s place, with no one to turn to and nowhere else I could go. I thought that was just the way it was going to be, and I was going to see it through until I ran out of money. Then I got arrested and dumped here, and now I’ve got to figure out what I’m gonna do once I get released.
Jimmy and I have been talking about getting an apartment together, maybe somewhere in a different part of Brooklyn. He knows people who can help us find a place—it’s tough if you’ve got a criminal record—and I’ve got money for the deposit, so hopefully it’ll work out. He wants me to go into business with him, scrapping cars, since I’ll have my driver’s license and he won’t get his back for a while. I told him I’d think about it—I doubt I’ll get work as a photographer. But I can’t wait to be able to take pictures again.
I’d love to be able to photograph what it’s like in here. Not just the shitty parts about being locked up, but there are times when you can still appreciate the way flashes of lightning illuminate the dorm or the sun comes through the slats of the windows. Like tonight—the sunset is casting these bands of orange and yellow light across the walls and the shadows of people passing by make it look almost like a painting. There’s a breeze coming in, so the dorm has cooled down and everyone is in a pretty upbeat mood waiting for the sky to get dark. Once the fireworks start, even though they’re way off in the distance, we all crowd into the corner where you can see them, the occasional burst of color leaving long trails in the sky. It almost feels like we’re out there enjoying it with everyone else, except we’re not having barbecues or drinking beer or lying on blankets in the grass, so pretty soon the reality of where we are kicks back in. As people drift off after the fireworks end, you can tell the mood has changed. It’s quieter than usual when the CO shouts, “Lights out—it’s bedtime. No talking!”
THE FIRST TIME I get a call for a visit I’m at work in the kitchen. “MacIndoe!” the CO yells. “You’ve got a visitor. Find someone to cover for you and get back to your dorm.”
They never tell you who the visitor is, but there’s only one person it could be: Tracy. She’s been writing to me and told me she was going to visit sometime, but I thought maybe she’d changed her mind. I don’t particularly want anyone to see me in jail—and I’m really not sure how I feel about seeing her.
After I got arrested, I blamed Tracy for a lot of the shit that had happened to me, especially since I was on my way to meet her when I got stopped by the cops. I was glad that she was finally out of my life, so when I got her first letter, I was angry at her for tracking me down. But she kept writing to me and I hadn’t been in touch with anyone except Anna and the odd phone call with Joe, so I was feeling pretty isolated at that point. Eventually I wrote her back, she sent me her number, and then I called her. And that’s how Tracy got back into my life—after me vowing I’d never see her again.
Once I get to the dorm, I’m escorted with about eight other guys to the visiting area, where dozens of inmates are waiting in a long corridor, a few complaining about being there for hours. A guard hands me a basket and tells me to change out of my uniform into a gray jumpsuit and a pair of plastic flip-flops, then tells me to take a seat and wait for my name to be called.
Some people sit there silently, clearly bored, others are going on and on about who their visitor is, the talk rising and falling with the noise from an old telly mounted on the wall. As names are called, prisoners come back and change into their uniforms—a few waiting to pick up packages left by their families, which have to go through a separate search. I sit there so long I’m starting to think Tracy must’ve left when a CO finally calls my name and number.
He leads me into another area where I get strip-searched in front of other inmates. An overweight guard orders: “Lift your balls…turn around…squat…pull your ass apart…spread your toes…open your mouth…stick out your tongue….” As I’m going through all these humiliating motions, all I can think is: What the fuck do they think I’m going to smuggle OUT of jail?
After I get dressed, I’m led into the visiting area—a big open room with a play space for kids and a bunch of tables. I spot Tracy, give her a hug, and sit down opposite her at a small table. She told me she’d been to rehab and moved into a halfway house, and she does look a lot healthier. She’s got some color in her cheeks and she’s not as painfully thin.
But I’m still wary of her, so I don’t really know what to say.
“How are you doing?” she asks, a huge smile spreading across her face.
“I’m alright—apart from being in jail.”
“Well, it’s good to see you, you look great.”
“I doubt that.” Even with the crappy mirrors in here, I know my hair has gotten thinner and I’ve put on weight. “But you look ten times better than the last time I saw you.”
“Getting clean has been really good for me,” she says. “I’m such a different person now. It’s like I’m learning how to live again, focusing on what’s important—I really wanted you to see how much I’ve changed.”
As she’s talking about how great recovery has been for her, I try to block out the fact that she’s out there, free and happy about turning her life around, with no idea what it’s like for me in here. So I’m trying to appreciate being out of the dorm and seeing different faces, only half-listening to her go on and on about why I should get into a program.
“I really think you should sign up for some kind of rehab when you get out,” she says. “You’re not going to be able to do this on your own.”
I know she means well, but sitting here in a jail jumpsuit, it’s hard to listen to her tell me what to do—especially since I was on my way to meet her when I got arrested.
“Listen, after spending the summer in jail, the last thing I want is to be locked down in some program, being told what to do and when I can do it. Maybe I’ll go to some meetings, but I’m not gonna spend another four months stuck somewhere talking about how much I fucked up when what I really need to do is get on with my life.”
Tracy just looks at me for a minute, not saying anything, but it’s obvious she doesn’t want to let it go. “So what are you going to do when you get out? You can’t go back to the projects—you know they’ll drag you down just like they did before.”
“I’m not going back there. I’ve got a friend in here who’s going to help me get an apartment.”
I’m starting to get irritated—I really don’t want to get grilled about my plans or what she wants from me, so I change the subject and point out a guy I know who’s talking to his parents. The dad’s wearing a suit and tie and the mom’s dressed like she just came from church. This kid went to a good school in Manhattan but he acts like he grew up in the ghetto. It’s strange seeing people with their families, realizing that they have these other lives outside of jail.
We’re only allowed an hour for visits, so considering how long I waited, it goes by pretty fast. I tell Tracy about my daily routine and all the different people I’ve met in Rikers. She tells me about the women in her program and how hard she’s trying to turn her life around. She’s made it clear that she wants to get back together when I get out of here, but as much as I want the best for her, I can’t see that happening. Our relationship went south pretty much right after I met her, but I’d already let her move in, thinking she’d help cover my mortgage—which she didn’t for most of the time she was there. “I can forgive, but I can’t forget,” I’ve told her, but she doesn’t want to hear it, and I don’t have it in me to be totally blunt.
Once the CO comes over and says, “Time’s up!” I give Tracy a quick hug and thank her for coming to see me.
“I’ll try and come again,” she says. “Hang in there, you’re gonna be fine. Call me later, okay? I’ll write you!”
After our visit, I have to strip for another cavity search, which is even more thorough this time. Since I missed dinner, I get a sandwich instead, but I just pick at it. I’m too caught up thinking about the wreckage of the last few years to eat.
BY MID-JULY, THE summer heat has turned this place into a pressure cooker—it’s got to be nearly a hundred degrees some days. The smallest thing seems to set people off. If it’s not the phones, it’s the TV, and if it’s not the TV then it’s the fucking fan. With all the fights breaking out, the whole jail seems to be ringing with alarms all day.
Today they brought in a kid who’s a Blood—fuck knows how that happened ’cause usually the gang unit checks everyone out, so they can keep people from rival gangs separated in different dorms. All afternoon this kid’s been swaggering around, throwing gang signs at all the young Crips, winding everyone up. I was sure all hell was going to break loose, but some of the older guys were able to keep things under control.
Then around nine thirty, just as I’m asking Jimmy if I can borrow his reading glasses—he managed to work through the bureaucracy and get a pair—I hear shouts coming from the bathroom. Everyone runs toward the wall separating the showers from the rest of the dorm, watching through the windows. There are about half a dozen guys going at it, pummeling each other and shouting insults. Two COs are in the middle of it, trying to get some order, but they’re all slipping and sliding on the wet floor. I’m waiting for the pin to get pulled or security to burst in, but before that happens they manage to break it up. All we get is a lecture about keeping tempers in check so they don’t have to come down hard on us, like in some of the rowdier dorms.
But the next morning, we’re woken up by the sound of a dozen guards marching in.
“Okay, fellas—get dressed, sit on the end of your bed, face the window, NO SHOES,” one of them orders.
The search guys lead us into the dayroom, where we have to stand with our hands on our heads while they bring us out one by one and rifle through our stuff. Pulling off bedsheets, looking under mattresses, leafing through books and magazines, tossing things everywhere, then they take us each into the bathroom to frisk us for contraband or weapons. The whole time, other guards are looking under and around everything with flashlights and little mirrors on sticks—behind the TV, on top of window ledges, under the beds. I’m used to getting treated like dirt, but today I’m not in the mood to deal with this shit, lying on my bed facedown with my hands behind my back while everyone else goes through the same routine.
After the search, sanitation comes in and sweeps whatever got tossed on the floor into garbage containers—magazines, family photos, food we bought from commissary, books. They don’t give a fuck, it’s all gone. Once they leave, the atmosphere in the dorm is even more toxic.
“This is just gonna set people off again,” Jimmy says. “Let’s get out of here—they’re gonna call yard soon.”
Once we get outside, Jimmy and I walk around in circles for a bit, but it’s hot and sticky so we end up lying on the grass looking up at the sky, trying to pretend we’re anywhere else.
“I’m fed up being surrounded by the lowest common denominator mentality in here,” I tell him. “Inmates who are too fucking stupid to stay under the radar, asshole guards who overact just ’cause they can, medical staff that don’t give a shit about us—this whole place is totally dysfunctional.”
“Don’t let it get to you. One more month and you’re done.”
“Yeah, and then what? You’re not getting out until six weeks after me and I really don’t know how I’m gonna deal with everything on my own.”
“Listen, you’re a smart guy, you’ve got a little cash put aside, you just have to get out there and hustle. Most of these nitwits only know how to make money in the criminal world—you’ve done well in the real world. You just need to stay away from anyone who’s going to drag you back down.”
I know Jimmy’s right, especially about who I need to avoid. Some of my stuff is still at Joe’s place—if it hasn’t been stolen by now—so I’m worried about going back to the projects to pick it up.
“The thing is, I’m not sure how much I trust myself to stay on the right side of the tracks,” I admit.
“If you can keep your shit together in here, Graham, you can hold on a few more weeks till I’m out.”
Jimmy’s not an addict, so he doesn’t quite get that a lot can happen in a few weeks—or days. But what really scares me is the idea that I might be vulnerable for the rest of my life. The thought of having to deal with being in recovery every day, forever, is totally fucking with my head right now.
ONE MORNING I wake up from a drug dream that’s so realistic it takes me a few minutes to realize where I am. I’ve had a few of these nightmares since I’ve been here, but this one lasted all night long. Every time I woke up I’d fall back into the same scene—smoking crack and shooting up in some random apartment with a bunch of junkies I didn’t know.
The feeling that I’ve actually done drugs lingers with me as I lie in bed. I let it pass, but it felt so fucking real it scares me. The memories coming flooding back, my hands are shaking, and there’s sweat running down my neck. For a while I just lie there, wondering what it would be like to get high right now.
To be honest, it’s been a struggle to stay clean in here. There always seem to be a few people who are fucked up or coming down. Some hide it well, but others are so out of it, nodding off or stuck looking out a window, it can set me off. The cravings come roaring back and I’m salivating just thinking about a hit. Then I’ve got to drag myself back from those thoughts before they overwhelm me.
At first I couldn’t work out how anyone was getting drugs in Rikers, but it didn’t take long to catch on. Someone offered me methadone—they call it “keep” in here—which he got from one of the guys on the program. After a while it was pretty obvious who’s got what: cigarettes, lighters, weed, pills, dope. Rumor has it most of the contraband comes in through workers or guards, but inmates usually end up selling it. A guy I know told me he had a bunch of Percocet so well hidden he’d beaten two searches, but then he got moved so he needed to find some way to get his stash to his new dorm.
Buying drugs in Rikers is a lot more complicated than it is on the street, especially if you’re trying to maintain a habit. You’ve got to make all sorts of deals, like finding someone to put money on the seller’s commissary account or getting a friend to pay a dealer on the outside, which gets you credit in here. I don’t know who I’d get to do that even if I wanted to get high—which I don’t. I’ve been clean for almost three months now, and I’m feeling pretty good about that. I’m starting to get that clarity of mind people talk about—which isn’t always a good thing, but just being able to get through the day without that tedious routine of buying and using drugs is pretty fucking brilliant.
IN MID-AUGUST, ABOUT a week before I’m due to be released, I get a letter from my brother. It’s the first I’ve heard from any of my family since I’ve been in Rikers. Anna sent me their addresses and phone numbers, but it’s almost impossible to make international calls from here, and every time I tried to write, I just couldn’t do it. I kept imagining my mum and dad in shock after getting a letter telling them I was in jail, and I had no idea how to explain how everything spiraled out of control. So I’m nervous about opening my brother’s letter and reading what he wrote.
Hope you are doing okay, things are going as well as expected, and that you are getting healthy and stronger. I would have gotten in touch sooner but I had a lot going on. Me and R. have split up, I’m out of the house, and I did not really know what to write.
We all saw Liam a few weeks ago, he was in Dublin for five days with his girlfriend. He’s doing very well and really enjoying college.
Anyway Graham, what we need to know is what’s happening on your release i.e. deportation or not. If you do go back to Scotland please do not turn up on Mum and Dad’s doorstep. I know that sounds very hard, but I think it would be too much for them. This whole episode has taken a terrible toll on them, and I think the shock would totally destroy them. It was for this reason that we decided not to tell them you were in jail. But if you do go back to Scotland, you could get in touch with them and make up some story as to why you are back (without the jail-deported part).
I know this is a short note but we can catch up much better very soon. All the very best, and all my love.
Reading it tears a hole in me—the familiar handwriting and the sort of unemotional distance. I fold up the small piece of paper and just sit on the edge of my bed for a while, trying to let the words sink in.
I used to be so close to my brother. We ran together, shared apartments in Scotland, and had a lot of the same friends growing up, but the last time I saw him was in 2008, when he came to New York to visit me. It was a few months after I’d met Tracy, and things were really going off the rails. I tried so hard to keep it together while he was here, using just enough to keep myself level, but I’m sure he knew something was up. We didn’t talk about it—I don’t think either of us wanted to go there—but it wasn’t like how we usually are together. Once he left for the airport I just felt this emptiness, like it wasn’t ever going to be the same between us. I went straight out and got completely fucked up.
After that we just drifted apart. I can’t even remember the last time we talked. I had no idea he and his wife were breaking up, or that Liam was going over to visit everyone in Dublin. It makes me realize how much I’ve isolated myself, totally shutting out my whole family. Still, it’s a bit harsh that my brother’s telling me not to show up at Mum and Dad’s.
Actually, I’m surprised he thinks I’m getting deported. I know Homeland Security put a detainer on me, so I’ll probably have to meet with immigration before I get released, but everyone in here seems to think I’ll be fine. I’ve got a green card, and I was only convicted of a misdemeanor, but now that the whole thing is looming up on me, I’m starting to worry that the jailhouse rumor mill might be wrong.
The day I’m supposed to be getting released, I’m in outtake, already back in street clothes, thinking I’m minutes from freedom, when two guys from immigration show up and pull me out of line. They shackle my hands, my feet, and my waist and exchange some paperwork with the guards. I’m in shock. I thought I might have to meet with immigration when I got released, but I never expected anything like this.
All the other guys are shouting at me, asking if I’m being extradited, or if I’m a terrorist, while the two agents in black uniforms are going through my bag. They’re pulling out clothes and magazines and books, saying, “You can’t take this…you can’t take this,” throwing everything except my wallet, checkbook, and letters into the garbage.
“But that’s my stuff,” I protest. “I need it.”
“You won’t need any of this where you’re going,” one of them says, then they haul me through outtake and out the door.