By Joshua Ryan

When you’re dreaming, you don’t have to plan; one thing usually just leads to more of the same kind of thing. That’s one of the reasons why I kept feeling like I was still in a dream. I used to start each morning by waiting for the prisoners to come from the Durant Unit; now I was starting the afternoon by waiting to go to the Durant Unit and become a prisoner. I was even dressed the same way I always was. My clothes had gotten a little rumpled. There was some dirt on my sleeve that I couldn’t rub off. But the clothes were still all right. That was one good thing about going through it all in one day.

The lawyer left, and an officer came by and gave me a sandwich and a diet coke. So that was the same as usual, too. Then there was nothing going on in the dream, so I took off my coat and tie and put my head down on the table, and I fell asleep. You might think that was surprising. But that’s what happened. I’d gotten up early that day, and a lot of things had happened. I even started another dream.

I was in college again, and I was walking into a locker room, and the baseball team was there. I never went out for sports in college; I wasn’t the type, and I was never very good at baseball, anyway. But Larry Rakowski lived in my dorm, and Larry was my hero, and Larry was on the baseball team. Larry was the strongest, cutest, sweetest guy I knew. I angled to meet Larry and then to be with Larry. One night Larry and I went to a party together in his “beast,” which is what he called his car. It was a sportscar that he’d bought the summer before. He got the money by working on the assembly line in a factory. I’d spent the summer satisfying the college’s language requirement with an intensive course in French. I don’t know how Larry satisfied the language requirement, or if he ever did. The party was a frat bash, and I was totally out of place and Larry knew it, and he stayed next to me all night so I’d always have someone to talk to. I loved Larry Rakowski, and Larry Rakowski was hugely, incredibly, inevitably straight. So in my dream I went to the locker room, and I was looking for Larry. You know what those places are like — white cinderblock walls and shiny wooden benches without any backs and little puddles of water all over the tiles and guys hanging out in their jocks, shootin the shit and pretending not to look at each other’s dicks. And there was Larry, wearing his blue baseball uniform with the big white numbers and his blue and white baseball cap, and he stood up when I came in and I thought, great! Larry still knows me! And he looked at me, like, what the FUCK are YOU doin HERE? So I said, “Help me, Larry! I’m scared! They’re gonna take me to prison, Larry!” But Larry just smiled and asked me, “Why not?” Which was a question I couldn’t answer. He looked at me for a while, and I was trying to think, but I couldn’t. Then he said, “Come here, faggot!” And he reached into his pants and pulled out his prick, and it was enormous and hard and beautiful and wet . . .

And that was the end, because right then another officer came into the room and woke me up. “Wanta take a leak, kid? Might be your last chance . . . Judge is almost ready for you.”

So it was really true. They were doing it all today. “All right,” I said. “Where is it?” He led me down the hall to this tiny little john they had, and by then my hardon was gone, and I took a leak in the john and turned on the tap and splashed some water on my face and looked at myself in the mirror and wished that I’d had my comb with me, while I had the mirror there, but I didn’t. Then he led me back into the room and I put my coat and tie on, and I waited. I wished I could have fallen asleep, but I couldn’t do it the second time. The door opened. “OK,” the officer said. “Your turn, kid.”

The courtroom wasn’t far away. I was obviously the last case. Besides the officer, there was nobody in the courtroom except my lawyer, and a bailiff, and a woman in a dark red suit who, I guessed, must have been the Assistant District Attorney. The bailiff showed me where to stand. Then the judge came in. He sat down and looked at some papers. He was a middle-aged man with a puffy red face, but it was strange, how small the face looked on top of that pyramid of long black robes. Black, the color of death.

He turned several pages. Then he looked impatient and glanced at his watch.

“Jason Scott Rossetti.”

The lawyer touched my arm.

“Yes. Yes, Your Honor.”

“I wish to say, Mr. Rossetti, that in view of the scandalous nature of your crime, and the strength of the evidence against you, you have done well to heed the advice of counsel in submitting a guilty plea.”

The lawyer touched my arm again.

“Yes, Your Honor.”

“And I wish to congratulate both defense and prosecution on their role in expediting this case, which is not one that I would wish to occupy long stretches of my docket. As you know, I believe in the maxim, ‘Justice delayed is justice denied,’ and I would not want my courtroom to be used as a venue for the display of evidence that can best be regarded as pornographic. I am writing a letter of commendation to you both — a commendation that may, conceivably, be of some assistance at your next professional review. I am happy to tell you that, as a result of your efforts in the disposition of the current case, this court has become the first in the county to have no arrears on its docket. I thank you.”

“Thank YOU, Your Honor!” both of the lawyers said, and my lawyer turned and smiled at the ADA.

“Jason Scott Rossetti,” the judge said, looking at me again. “This court has learned that you enjoy the company of convicts. You will now have a lot to enjoy. I hereby sentence you to be removed to an institution of the State Department of Corrections, where you will be confined at hard labor for the term of not less than twenty years and not more than the remainder of your natural life.”

He didn’t say anything more; he just looked down and started writing something on the papers in front of him. “Well, that’s it,” my lawyer said. “Good luck, Jason.” Then he turned and said something to the ADA, and the officer walked over and pulled a pair of handcuffs off his belt. “Hands behind your back,” he said. I could hear him closing the cuffs. “Come on,” he said, and he led me out of the courtroom.

When we got to the hallway, he stopped and asked, “Did you have anything with you, kid? Any property?” He was an old guy with white hair. “My briefcase,” I said, automatically. “It’s in the room . . .” Then I thought, what am I gonna do with a briefcase? I couldn’t even remember what was inside it — some stuff about that latest marketing report, maybe . . . No, it was the workup for the Wednesday meeting. Nothing important; I wouldn’t be there. It was too late, though: the officer was already taking me into the room where I’d left the case. I thought he was gonna pick it up and carry it for me, like the policemen had done, but I was wrong. I was now a convicted felon, and I had to carry everything myself. “Grab it,” he said, holding it behind my ass, and I grabbed it with one of the hands that he’d cuffed back there. Then he started me down the hallway, with the briefcase banging against my legs and butt. We passed a couple of girls who looked like secretaries. One of them nudged the other, and they both began to laugh.

I was glad when he piled me into an elevator and took me down to the basement. We were in a long corridor with ventilation ducts hanging from the ceiling and a set of double doors way at the end, and another old guy standing beside the doors. I shuffled down the corridor. “Last one for the day, Teddy,” the first officer said. “OK, Bill,” the other one said, “take care! Happy new year! Enjoy!” “That’s what I mean to do, once I deliver this.” “You know it!” He pushed a button, and the doors swung out. Beyond the doors was a loading dock. The first officer led me through the doorway, and we stood outside on the concrete.

You couldn’t see the street, only concrete walls and a ramp leading up somewhere, but somehow it was obvious that you had left the Justice Center and had moved on to some other place. Maybe because it was so cold down there. My arms started shivering, and my briefcase started hitting my behind again. The officer didn’t pay any attention. He just stood there, waiting. That must mean they were going to take me soon. There was one vehicle parked at the dock. It was a white van with thick bars on the windows and black letters on the side: DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS, DURANT UNIT. That must be it.

Two men were leaning against the van. They were wearing black hats and gray jackets. One of the men was black. The other man was white. They were smoking cigars, blowing the smoke out slowly, then flicking the ashes off and sticking the stubs back into their mouths. They did that for a while. Then they sauntered over to the officer and me. The black one was carrying a bunch of chains.

“This the one, Bill?” the white man said. He was about my age, but his body was twice as thick.

“That’s right, Steve. Only one we got for you.”

“I mean, is he the one that . . . ”

“Yep. He’s the one that likes to be with cons.”

“Well, ain’t that somethin!” the black one said. “Know what, kid? You’re unique! You’re the only one in the world who feels like that!” He was shorter than the white one, but he was even more muscular. He was standing with his hands on his hips and his cigar in the corner of his mouth. The chains were dangling from his right hand. “Ain’t that somethin!”

The white one took the cigar out of his mouth and slowly, meditatively, blew the smoke in my face. “You know what, Andre? I think this is somethin that the other cons gonna like in return.”

“I think you’re right, man.”

“I KNOW I’m right. Dude, just look at that suit.”

“Clothes make the man.”

“Huh! This ain’t no man. You seen that tape.”

“I seen it.”

“Look, it’s blushing. I never knew these faggots got ashamed. What’s your name, little blushing faggot?”

“J- . . . Jason . . . Rossetti.”

“Well, Mr. Rose -etti, all of us enjoyed that video. And just to show you how much we enjoyed it, we’re gonna give you a little present. In recognition of your performance, you have been selected to receive a complete set of steel restraints.”

“That’s right, Steve,” the black one said. “And I’m sure he’ll enjoy his present, too. So — let’s get him fitted out, shall we? Bill, will you please release Mr. Rose -etti from these courthouse cuffs, and will you please take his . . . baggage?”

“Sure thing, Andre.” The officer set my briefcase on the concrete and unlocked my handcuffs. Then another cloud of smoke hit my face, and I started to choke.

“Sensitive boy, Andre,” the white one said. “Please make sure that this jewelry doesn’t irritate his wrists and ankles.”

“By all means, Steve. Kneel down, please, Mr. Rose -etti.”

I knelt down. The pavement stabbed through my thin little trousers, cold as ice. Click. Click. The black man had chained my feet together. There was cold steel grabbing my ankles. “Stand up,” he said. “Put your hands out in front of you.” I stood, and he pulled a chain up between my legs. On one end, it was connected to my ankle chain; on the other end, it was connected to a pair of handcuffs. He snapped the cuffs on my wrists. Click. Click. My hands were chained again. Only now my hands and my legs were chained together .

“He looks so much prettier that way, don’t he?” the white one said, blowing another cloud of smoke.

“Now he’s stylin,” the black one said. “And so, if you will kindly step this way, Mr. Rose -etti, we will put you in your taxi.”

The chain between my legs couldn’t have been more than a foot and a half long, and the chain from my leg irons to my handcuffs wasn’t long enough to let me stand up straight. All I could do was shamble along, bent over at the waist.

“Wait!” the black one said. “Don’t forget your briefcase!” So the officer put the briefcase back in my hands. This time I had to hold it in front of me, and when it banged against me, it banged against my knees.

“Sign for the property, boys,” the officer said, holding out a pen and a yellow slip of paper.

“Sure thing, Bill,” the white one said, and he signed the slip. “See ya next time. Happy new year!”

“Drive safe, boys,” the officer said. Then he walked away, and Steve and Andre walked me over to the van.

It wasn’t easy to get inside it, rigged out like that. One of them shoved the door back, and the two of them stood on each side of me and lifted me in. They were incredibly buff guys. Inside the van there was a line of steel benches. They threw my briefcase onto the first bench and sat me down next to it. Once I was in place, the black one reached in, grabbed the chain between my wrists, and locked it to the bench, between my legs. Now I was secure for transport..

The door slammed, and I thought we were going to start, but the guards still hadn’t finished their smokes. I could see them through the steel mesh that separated the prisoners’ compartment from the cab. They were leaning against the hood of the van, smoking and talking. I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but from time to time they turned and looked back at me, and when they did that, they laughed.

I wished I could fall asleep again. I wished I could drift off someplace . . . someplace where I could dream, or dream a dream within a dream, some place from which I never would return. . . .

But I couldn’t. The chains wouldn’t let me. Twenty years to life! Twenty years to life! I was chained like a used appliance inside the back of a delivery van, and I was being delivered to . . . twenty years to life! I thought I was gonna be sick. Sick with fear. Sick with the smell of gray steel and tobacco smoke and the nervous sweat of the convicts who’d ridden that van before . . . Sick with the shame of being Jason Rossetti, convicted felon, and with the excitement of going to prison.

The guards threw down their stubs. The black one opened the cab on the shotgun side and eased himself into the big leather seat. “Ready for your next performance, Mr. Rose -etti?” he said. I looked at him through the mesh. I couldn’t think of anything to say. The cigar smell was overpowering.

“Hey! Steve! Rossetti don’t look so good.”

The white one, Steve, was climbing in on the driver’s side.

“He’ll look better — once we get him to Durant.”

“That’s right, man. Out at Durant, they know how these guys should look. Let’s roll.”

The engine turned over. The van started moving. I was on my way to the penitentiary.

 

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