By PrisonCub

I was guided into a concrete block room with a cubicle made of the same metal as the toilet in my cell.  A black phone receiver was connected to a metal cord that fed into the wall.  A shelf stretched across the cubicle and in the middle of the shelf was a metal ring that was bolted to it.  On the floor directly under the shelf was another metal ring except this one was bolted to the concrete floor.

I was un-cuffed from the restraint belt, but the belt itself was left around my waist.  A was seated on a metal chair that was turned around backwards.  My leg irons were padlocked to the ring on the floor.  There was a set of handcuffs attached to the ring mounted to the shelf.  The chain connecting the two cuffs was about 24 inches long.  It effectively restrained me but allowed me to hold the phone receiver.

[[WARNING: This story contains extreme elements that some readers might find objectionable. Continue reading at your own risk.]]

My attorney must have been the man sitting on the other side of the tempered glass.  I vaguely recognized him from the trial.  He pointed to the receiver and I picked up.  “How are you doing?” he said.

How am I doing?  Is he fucking kidding?  Let’s see, I have been stripped and shaved.  Put in a uniform and had every possible dignity taken from me.  Every fucking time I hear someone coming down the cellblock I assume they are about to hang me.  Let’s see, I am just fucking great!

“I guess I am ok,” was what came out.

“We have been working on your case since you were incarcerated.  We have filed a writ of habeas corpus and every possible appeal.  All of them have failed.  I really hate to tell you this but your execution date has been set.  You are one of two men to be executed simultaneously on August 12 between 00:01 and 02:00 hours.  That is 14 days from now.  All grounds for appeal have been exhausted with the exception of a direct grant of clemency from the Governor.  You will receive a copy of the death warrant before the end of the week.”

Every part of my body was quaking in fear.  I felt clammy and violently ill.  My head was spinning and throbbing.  I could hear a high-pitched ringing in my ears.  The room became black and white and I could see bright flashes of light in front of my eyes.  I pitched forward in the chair and my head landed on the shelf in front of me.  Everything went black.

My lawyer called out for a guard.  “Stupid little fag client passed out when I told him he was going to hang.”

“Fucking great,” the responding guard said.  He walked in and gave me a kick with his boot.  I felt the pain of the kick and started to come around.  “Get back on your chair, convict.”  He picked me up by my arm and put me on the metal chair.

“Like I said, you will receive the death warrant from my office this week.  I will come in sometime between now and the hanging to make your final arrangements.  We will take care of your belongings and drafting a will.  You can also decide how to dispose of your body and some other minor things.”  He stood and called out, “Guard.”

The guard came into my portion of the visiting room.  “You can take him back to his cage.  The few things that I have left to do we can complete in a week or so.”

And the lawyer walked out.  He fucking tells me I am going to die.  Tells me all hope is essentially lost and then walks out without so much as an “I am sorry” or “what can I do to help.”  Holy fucking shit.  I was unhooked from the floor and the desk and restrained as usual.  I was taken back across the prison yard.  The guard laughed when I winced as he pulled me.

We were moved through the various doors and back into the intake area.  The restraints were completely removed and I was ordered to strip.  When I was naked, a guard I had never seen scooped up the visitation uniform and put it into a hamper.  He then handcuffed my hands in front and shackled me in leg irons.

“Shower,” was all he said.  I walked to the intake shower and the cell door was locked.  I used the disinfectant soap and scrubbed down as best I could.  The pressure of the water increased and the disinfectant was rinsed off of me.  The water stopped and I looked to the cage door only to see the warden standing there.

“Step out of the cell, inmate,” the warden said.  The cell door was opened and I stepped out.  The new guard led me to the mug shot wall and locked the cuffs onto the chain leading to the ceiling.  The clicking that I remembered from the first intake day began and my hands were raised up and over my head.  I was hoisted until my toes were barely touching the floor.  I was facing the concrete block wall and could see the lines of the height chart.

The warden was about 50 years old.  He had brown hair with a few flecks of gray.  He was obviously in good shape and looked great in a suit.  I saw him take of his jacket and unbutton the collar of his shirt.  He removed his tie, dress shirt and t-shirt.  His chest was hairy and not well groomed.  He was very well defined and clearly worked out.  My eyes were drifting down toward his crotch when I felt a hand force my head up.

“The inmate will not look at the warden.”  He took my head and slammed it into the concrete wall.  He reached over and picked up a green garden hose with a rubber attachment on the end.

“The inmate will be clean, both inside and out.”

Clean both inside and out I thought?  What the fuck is this guy talking about?  I felt a pressure on my ass and the son of a bitch shoved the rubber tipped hose up my ass.  “Oh my God!  Oh my God!  Please don’t do that.  Please!!!!!”

The water started to flow into me and I instantly cramped.  The pain was overwhelming.  The water was not cold, but felt like ice inside me.  The rubber tip touched deep inside my ass and I pissed involuntarily.  My muscles cramped and released and finally voided anything that was inside of me.  Over and over again I could feel myself being filled with water.  And again and again the release as my muscles let go.  The contents of my gut washed with the water down the drain.

The warden took off his suit pants and put them onto a chair.  He was not groomed and his cock seemed to grow out of a hairy jungle.  He took his stiff cock in his hand.  Pre cum glistened in the florescent light and he ran his dick up and down my ass crack.  “Now you’re clean in the inside and the outside.”  He put his hands roughly on my hips and started to thrust himself into me.  It was not a gentle fuck.  It was not even a bull queer fuck.  It was an angry rape.  I was a hole for him to use.  I was nothing more and nothing less than a chunk of warm meat for his use.

And in that horrible moment, chained to the ceiling of an intake room at the State Penitentiary Death Row, completely stripped of any dignity that I might have had, I regained my dignity.  I could not keep this bastard from fucking me.  I could not keep him from judicially hanging me.  But, I did not have to be anything less than a man.  I did not remember committing a crime.  I had spent months living in isolation.  Deprived of basic human rights.  I now had this disgusting asshole shoving his prick in my ass.

He thrust deeper and deeper into my ass.  “Aren’t you going to whimper and cry, boy?”  I said nothing.  I felt him cum deep inside of me and he shuddered with a brief orgasm.

“You are going to have to do better than that, convict.”

I felt nothing but contempt and disgust.

“No Sir. I do not!”  I said without thinking.

The Warden spun me around, grabbed my face with his hands and looked into my eyes.

“You know I am going to drag you from your cage to the gallows next week?  I am going to strap a harness on you and put a rope around your neck.  I am going to put a bag over your head and let you stand there in terror until I personally adjust the length of the drop.  And you know that it is going to be a short drop.  No broken neck for you.  No easy way out.  You will strangle in front of witnesses after 15 or 16 minutes of agony and I am the man that will push the button that sends you to hell!”

And at that moment everything changed.  I realized that ever since I had been dragged into the penitentiary I had been dehumanized.  I was never referred to as you.  It was not my neck in the noose, or me going to a cell or my life being ended. The Warden was so angry that he had personalized me.  He had given me my soul back.  I realized that I was condemned to die.  What else could they do to me?

“Yes Sir, I realize that you are planning to execute me,” I said without the slightest emotion.

I waited for a quotation of the rules forbidding me to say anything but “Yes Sir” and “No Sir.”  It did not happen.  The Warden put on his pants, tucked in his shirt and turned to leave the room.  Just as he got to the door, he turned and ordered to Guard to get me dressed and back on the row.

The Guard ordered me back into the shower room.  When I was done, the trustee from my first intake day appeared in the room.  I was seated in the restraint chair and my head and face were shaved.  My denim uniform was obviously fresh from the prison laundry and was folded and laying on the floor next to the chair.  I got dressed and was handcuffed in the usual way.  I was led back to my cell on death row.

DEATH WATCH

The days passed quickly now.  Ten days before my execution date a clock was mounted to the concrete wall across from my cell along with a calendar with a red circle drawn around execution day. As each day passed a large X was drawn across that day.  A chair and small desk was brought into the death row corridor and a guard watched me every moment of the day and night.  He kept a log of every word I said.  He noted when I ate and how much.  He noted when I took a piss or shit.  He noted if I slept and if I had any dreams.

Seven days before my execution date, two things happened.  The Death Warrant arrived from my attorney’s office.  It was signed by the Governor and was accompanied by a letter from the State Board of Pardons that indicated that no reprieve would be forthcoming.  I found the last line of the letter to be somewhat macabre.  It said, “The inmate should prepare for death in whatever spiritual way possible.”  What a fucked up thing for a government agency to write in an official document.  The creepiest thing that happened was that a noose appeared on the concrete floor in front of the guard’s desk.

If I told you that all of these things failed to illicit fear and even terror I would be lying.  My heart rate was way up from normal.  I admit I would wake up choking and gasping for air.  It was hot in the cellblock and I was soaked nearly all the time.  During the first two days of the week, I failed to stand when a guard entered the cellblock.  My shirt collar was never buttoned.  My shirttail was not tucked in and my sleeves were rolled up.  I did not respond to the guards in the proper fashion.

The evening of the second day of deathwatch a team of 6 Guards dressed completely in black uniforms and body armor entered death row.  They had helmets with face shields, pads covering vital spots on their bodies, heavy boots, and leather gloves.  I thought it was a fucking gift from heaven.  Just the sight of them outside my cell made my dick rock hard.

“X97478.  The rules of this institution are to be obeyed at all times.  X97478 will modify behavior to comply with the rules.  Failure to do so immediately will result in physical contact, extraction from this cell and remediation of X97478’s behavior.”

The cell door slid opened and within seconds all six Cell Extraction Guards had entered.  I fought hard; kicking, punching and head butting as much as possible.  I was sprayed with mace before the guards even got across the threshold.  The shit was pink and foamy.  It stuck to everything.  My eyes and throat were in flames.  Next, the stun gun sent two metal barbs into my chest, right through the prison shirt.  Every muscle tightened and I was reminded of the first day in court.  I fell to the concrete floor.  The rest was an exercise in futility.  I was handcuffed and leg ironed within seconds.

They dragged me into the hallway and stood me up against the concrete wall of the cellblock.  The Deathwatch Guard videotaped every moment of the extraction and now filmed me standing against the wall.  The cell was stripped of its mattress and pillow, any toiletries, the bible, everything.  It was then hosed down until no trace of the pepper mace remained.  This was also videotaped.

Then I was placed in the cellblock shower fully clothed and restrained.  The shower was turned on and water flowed over me.  My eyes continued to burn.  Even my ass crack and cock burned with the presence of the pepper mace.  After 20 minutes or so I was removed from the shower.  One of the white clad trustees came over with fucking needle-nose pliers and pulled out the barbs from the stun gun.  Blood from the wounds mixed with the shower water and stained the blue chambray shirt.

Two of the cell extraction team grabbed my arms and bent me forward so that I was staring at the concrete floor.  A trauma shears, like the ones issued to paramedics, was used to cut off my soaking wet prison pants.  The shredded pants were kicked off to the side.  The same happened with my prison shirt.  It too was quickly dispatched and kicked away.  So, I stood naked and soaking wet.

They never removed the handcuffs or leg irons.  I was returned to the empty cell and seated on the damp concrete floor.  The cell door was locked.  The deathwatch guard sat back down on his chair and started writing notes.

I could not sleep and I could not get comfortable.  Days seemed like hours and the red X’s on the calendar across from my cell became more numerous.  I remained chained in the empty cell.  A paper cup with a straw was used to provide me water.  A metal plate with food chopped into pieces was placed just inside the cell.  I ate what I could from the plate like a dog.  I sat down to piss on the cold metal of the toilet and tried to catch my dick on the rim.  Sometimes my dick slipped off and I pissed on the floor.  I shit into the toilet but had no way to wipe.

The morning of the day of my execution, the cell door opened.  I was picked up off the floor and led back to intake.  The leg irons and cuffs were removed and I was led into the intake shower.  I cleaned myself like a real man.

The cell door opened and I was allowed out into the room.  My third and unused uniform was neatly pressed and folded on a chair.  I dutifully put on the uniform.  The blue chambray shirt with my number over the pocket was first.  I buttoned each white button up and fastened the collar button.  The collar was much looser now than when I first arrived.  Pants came next.  Same stripe down the leg, same stencil and number.  The pants were so stiff with sizing that they chafed my thighs.  The button fly was difficult to secure but I did it.  There was plenty of room to tuck in my shirt.  My head and face were shaved to almost glassy smoothness.  A pair of brown leather prison boots sat on the floor.  No laces of course, but I slipped the stiff leather onto my feet.  I put on a brand new denim cadet hat and slipped on an unlined chore coat.  The Guard did not force me to button it up.

I was escorted unchained into a small, concrete room.  The door closed behind me and a second door opened.  I stepped through into a chain link cage that was outside.

“One hour recreation time before we start the final process, X97478,” came a voice from the loudspeaker.

I wandered around the empty cage staring out into the prison yard.  The sun was beating down and I was sweating a lot.  All of my problems left me and I closed my eyes and felt the sun on my face.  I felt like a real man again.  It was glorious.  I paced the cage in the heat of the day without a care in the world.  I enjoyed the clouds overhead and the birds chirping.  I was even fascinated by a dandelion growing between the concrete slabs that made up the floor.

The Guards finally came for me.  It was obvious they expected trouble, but I did not feel the need.  I put my hands on my shaved head as they secured the belt around my waist and cuffed my hands.  The leg iron went on my ankles above the boots and I was led back inside.  I was walked back to death row and placed in the cell.  The mattress had been returned and the Bible now sat on the mattress.

“Your family is here to see you now,” the Guard said.

My family?  I assumed my family had disowned me long ago.  I received no letters.  They were not in the courtroom the day this all happened.  No one had visited me in all of these months.  My family was the last thing I was thinking of today.  They were a walking, talking cliché.

I saw my father first.  J. Ellerton Caruthers the 3rd was a tall and fit man.  He exercised 6 days a week at his club in the city.  He was graying at the temples but still had a full head of hair.  He worked for my Grandfather’s publishing company as a VP.  Met the boss’s daughter and married her.  Dad followed the old Preppy Handbook to the letter and made it work.  He never made it known, but his father John Caruthers, Jr. had been an auto mechanic.  Dad was wearing what looked like L.L. Bean travel clothing; perfectly pressed khaki pants, belt and shoes matching, a blue Brooks Brothers cotton shirt open at the collar and a matching khaki sport coat.

He would have asked my mother this morning what was appropriate to wear to visit one’s son on death row.  She would have replied that anything denim or worn was inappropriate and that after 29 years of marriage and 51 years on this earth that he should be able to decide these things for himself!

She looked for all the world like Mary Tyler Moore from the movie Ordinary People.  Amanda Elizabeth Astor-Caruthers was her name.  God help me, Astor as in John Jacob Astor of New York.  Even though grandfather was the illegitimate child of an Astor first-cousin or some fucking thing, he had still inherited sufficient money to establish himself in the publishing business and make a name for himself. His daughter had perfect brown hair, perfect blouse, perfect skirt, perfect shoes and perfect life until my arrest.  She managed two houses, two sons and still found time for the club.  My mother was, unfortunately, a raging bitch!

And finally, my baby brother, Pete, dressed straight out of the J. Crew catalog.  He was the athlete and the ladies man.  I never had the guts to tell my mother that he also smoked pot, stole money and fucked both guys and girls with not much regard for morality of any kind.  My dad knew all of Pete’s shit, but it would have been instantly his fault, so Dad just stayed silent and quietly paid Pete’s bills.

All three of them stood in upper middle class American splendor before me.

“Where is Grandfather” were the first words out of my mouth.

“He expired at the summer house in Galveston,” my mother replied.

“He expired?”  We were talking about her father and she said it with such coldness.  It also meant that she had finally inherited and could now order everyone around.  “So you finally have the money?” I asked my mother.

“Stop being so crude,” she said.

“Jack you look fucking cool in that outfit dude.”  My brother had not changed a bit.  “I have like a hundred questions for you buddy, but first is what the polyester count is in that prison shirt.  That is just nasty!   Can you leave me that outfit in your will Jack?  I bet I could sell it on EBay!”

“Peter Caruthers,” my mother said, “be quiet!”  My dad was wiping tears from his eyes as he gazed over me in my cell.

My mother did not flinch as she said, “We have but a few minutes, Jackson, and we all wanted to say our goodbyes.  We will of course have you buried on the family plot, near your grandfather.  Private services are appropriate given the circumstances.  I will leave orders to have a tombstone erected in a few years, but right now I think an unmarked grave is appropriate.  No one really needs to know with the exception of Reverend Fullbright from Westminster Presbyterian on Riverside.  He will officiate for me and won’t talk about it.”

“Are you fucking kidding?  I am about to walk onto a gallows and have my neck stretched.  They are going to kill me for a crime I do not remember.  I at least get tears from Dad.  I get polyester and EBay from my closet faggot brother Pete and funeral arrangements from my tight assed fake mother!  I am so sorry to have embarrassed you in some way.  Please understand that I prefer to leave this world as a man with my dignity intact.  Please leave!”

My head was spinning as the Guard led my family away.  Grandfather having died was the toughest for me.  I had told him I was gay years ago.  He had told me that mother would not be accepting and that Dad would do whatever she said.  He told me he would always take care of me.  Well he was gone now and far from being able to care for me.  I sat down on the cot and cried hard for the first time.

I declined a last meal.  I could never figure the point of it.  At 11:00 p.m. I heard the cellblock door open and the Warden appeared at my cell.  My breathing was nearly a pant.  My heart pounded and sweat poured from me.  The brand new uniform stuck to me and everything in my soul wanted to scream.

I stood steadfast as the black leather harness was secured to my torso.  The straps on the harness pulled down my shoulders.  My hands were strapped into the cuffs on the waist belt and instantly turned red from reduced blood flow.  The Warden checked the buttons on the collar of my shirt and my cuffs to make certain they were buttoned.  He smoothed down the ass of my prison pants so I apparently looked good.

The Protestant Chaplain came in next.  He explained that my mother had told him that I was raised Presbyterian.  He said his Methodist background was close to that.  My fucking mother had talked to the prison chaplain!  God help me.  I told the Chaplain that while I had faith, I did not ascribe to organized religion.  He acknowledged me and I tried to shake his hand.  The straps held me back.  He kindly reached over and shook my hand.  He wished me “Godspeed.”

The Warden walked toward me holding three more black leather straps.  He set the two shorter ones down on the cell cot.  The longer one he doubled on itself and whipped my ass with one, hard swat.  I winced and tried to pull away.  He spun me around expertly and placed the strap around my arms at the elbows.  He pulled it tight and my elbows were pulled nearly together.  My chest jutted out.  He turned me around to face him and the Death Watch Guard read the death warrant.  All the time the warrant was being read, the warden was caressing my crotch through the buttons of my stiff denim pants.  My balls had pulled up tight to my cock and the dampness of pre cum was wetting the inside of the denim.

I was turned and walked into the cellblock hallway.  My shoes were removed and my feet were on the cool concrete.  I was escorted firmly down the hall.  The remaining convicts all were standing at attention at their cell doors.  Collars were buttoned.  Hands were on top of their shaved heads.  At the end of the hall, the door opened into the gallows room.  It was brightly lit.  Two nooses hung from the hooks in the ceiling.  I questioned that for a moment and then remember that it was to be a double hanging.

I did not see the second convict anywhere.  I was led to the far side of the gallows and stood on the white box.  The two remaining black leather straps were placed around my ankles and my thighs.  I nearly fell over as they were tightened.  My cock and balls were now pinched between my tightly strapped legs.

“Does the condemned have anything to say before the sentence of the court is carried out?”

“My name is Jackson Wade Caruthers,” I said with pride.  “I am a gay man.  I stand falsely accused and condemned for a crime I did not commit.  I bear no resentment to anyone in this room with the exception of the Warden.  I wish to die with dignity.”

The black twill hood was pulled over my head and the rope was secured behind my left ear.  I felt two guards holding me by the armpits.  The hood billowed in and out with my every breath.  My cock was engorged with blood and straining against the buttons of my pants.  My ears had a high-pitched whining sound and every heartbeat resounded in my ears.

I heard the door to the cellblock open and the sounds of the second man being brought into the room.

“Does the condemned have anything to say before the sentence of the court is carried out?”

I heard the man gasping for air out of fear.  You could hear that he was struggling.  “I do you son of a bitch, I do have something to say.  I am not a goddamn number.  I am a human being.  My name is Jon Sampson.  I never killed my partner and I don’t know why I am here.”

I heard them drag him next to me.  I heard the straps tightened and I heard him breathing heavily.  “Please God.  Please help me!”

“Jon…….?”  My voice was interrupted by the crash of the trap door.  I felt my body hurtling downward and being stopped short by the rope around my neck.  It was not as bad as I had imagined though I instantly had a migraine and felt my throat being constricted by the rope.  My hands were grasping and my feet were trying to kick.  I had enough presence of mind to know that my neck had not been broken.

Every struggle I made tightened the noose around my neck.  The whining in my ear grew deafening now.  I felt my body involuntarily struggling against the restraints.  My hips rhythmically moved as if I was fucking the air.  Bright spots of light were shooting across my field of vision.  I could hear the man next to me gasping and struggling.  I lost consciousness during the greatest orgasm of my life.  Piss and cum dribbled down the stiff denim leg of my pants and everything went black.

AFTERMATH

My fucking head was killing me and something smelled terrible.  I woke to find myself laying on a bunch of old mattresses.  They were piss- and cum-soaked.  I looked up to see the mechanism of the trap door of the gallows on the ceiling.  I looked over to see Jonathan Michael Sampson on the mattress beside me.  He was breathing but not moving.  A horrible red rope burn was forming around his neck.  Two nooses were lying on the mattresses.

Jonathan was dressed in a denim uniform identical to mine.  The number X97477 was stenciled on his shirt and pants.  We were both still tightly restrained in the hanging harnesses.

The prison number indicated that he had arrived just before me?  What the fuck?

His head was shaved like mine and he was thinner than I remembered him.  He was incredibly pale.

I glanced around the room to see that just the Warden was present.  No guards.

“Oh my fucking God,” I said out loud.  “I am alive.”

“And you both will stay that way if you shut the fuck up and listen to what I have to say.  Those uniforms and those harnesses will not be taken off until we come to an understanding between you and me.  When I am satisfied that you understand what is going on, I will see to it that you are released.  Do you understand? You were tried and convicted in a courtroom drama set up by your mother.  Your Dad and brother to this day have no idea that this was an elaborate scheme.  Your little friend over there has an equally sick fuck for a dad.  I believe you met him on your day in court.”

I was remembering everything now in intimate detail and was getting more pissed by the minute.  The Warden continued to speak, telling me how easy it was for my family to influence a judge to convict, involve a doctor or two for timely injections and hire real life guards and other to film what they were told was a prison reality show.

He continued, “Obviously there was no show; this was all about your families sending you and Jonathan a message.  And that message was that they are embarrassed by you and want you out of their lives.”

I heard a door open and Jonathan’s father strode into the room.  He stood and laughed as he observed me lying on the floor.

“Prison denim soaked in urine,” he started to say, “and an impassioned speech from the gallows. You almost impressed me, Jack.  I stand in the pulpit of my church every Sunday and cannot come up with such passion.  But your very existence threatens my family and our beliefs.  I will not be here when Jonathan wakes up.  What you tell him is your business.  Just understand that I want nothing to do with either of you.”

With that, The Reverend Dr. Jonathan Michael Sampson, televangelist and Dean of a Theological Seminary that bears his name stood and walked out the door.

The Warden squatted down and patted my crotch.  “So, Jack do you want to be released from this harness and go tend to your boyfriend over there.  If you do, there are two release forms on the table in the back of the room.  One is for you and one is for your ‘friend.’  A signature on those documents releases everyone from liability from this incident.  In exchange, I release you from those harnesses, give you prison release clothes and you walk away free men. What is your decision?”

“I just want to get the fuck as far away from all of you as I can.”  There I said it!

The old me would have said something about a lawsuit and do you know who I am and a lot of shit like that.  All I wanted more than anything was for Jonathan to wake up and spend the rest of his life with me.  “Yes!”

The Warden himself released me from the hanging harness.  He left the leg irons in place.  I walked off of the mattresses and across to the table.  Still wearing the stiff prison denim in which I had been hanged, I picked up a pen for the first time in months and signed my name to the document.

The Warden told me to have a seat on the chair next to the table.  He then walked over to Jonathan and put smelling salts under his nose.  He came back quickly and the same little story was explained to him.  He was more terrified than I had been and it took several attempts to make him understand.  Finally, the warden was convinced. The hanging harness was removed.

Jon stumbled in the leg irons but made it to the table and signed the release.

“Now what?” I asked as Jonathan walked over and caressed my hand gently.

“There are two duffle bags over in the corner,” the Warden said.  “There are two keys attached to yours, Caruthers.  One opens the hearse access door to this room and the other is for your leg irons.  Usually you would leave in a pine box.  I guess not today.”  He turned and left the room.

I held Jon in my arms forever.  I felt a twinge in my cock against the denim and we briefly became quite passionate.   We quickly decided that all of that could wait for another time and place.

We unlocked each other’s leg irons and threw them on the mattresses.  We both stripped off the denim uniforms and threw them next to the leg irons.  The harnesses were still lying on the mattresses as well.

I walked over to the duffle bag and opened it.  Jon did the same.  Each contained a set of white underwear, a khaki shirt, pants and jacket with Dickies labels and a pair of canvas deck shoes.  We put on the clothes and laughed at each other.  Now we both looked like guards.

At the bottom of my bag was a copy of my mugshot on the first day.  I looked shit scared staring at the camera and dressed in prison denim.  The list of my crimes and sentence were type written on a Criminal History Card.  The word ESCAPED was stamped across the paper.  Jon’s bag contained his mug shot and Criminal History Card.

Obviously they had thought of everything.  If Jon or I ever showed up, we would be arrested for escape and brought right back to this penitentiary to serve our sentences.  Both of us had charges and sentences on our rap sheets that equaled in excess of 75 years at hard labor.

The last item was a sealed envelope with a return address of Kowalski, Simon and Meade Attorney’s at Law.  I remembered that this was my grandfather’s attorney, so I nervously opened the envelope.

Kowalski, Simon and Meade, P.C.

Attorneys at Law

7156 LaSalle Street

Chicago, Illinois

Mr. Jackson Wade Caruthers

Inmate # X97478

State Penitentiary

 

Dear Mr. Caruthers,

While you likely do not remember me, I had the pleasure of meeting you once when you were a small child.  Your grandfather was very proud of you. 

While I realize that you are currently incarcerated, I sincerely hope that circumstance change and this bequest may ultimately provide you some benefit.

Your grandfather was very specific that when this letter was issued that I quote you the following sections of the will.

8. I hereby bequeath to my son-in-law J. Ellerton Caruthers, III  51% of the common stock in the Company known as Astor, Caruthers & Hastings Publishers, Inc.  You have been faithful to your duties at the company for many years and a faithful son-in law.  “Well done, good and faithful servant.”

11. I hereby bequeath to my grandson Peter Ellerton Caruthers the sum of $5,000,000.00 held in a managed trust by the Citizens National Bank & Trust.  The income derived from these assets to be his as long as he is gainfully employed and active in the community.  “To whom much is given, much is required.”

12. I hereby bequeath to my daughter Amanda Elizabeth Caruthers the sum of $1,000,000.00 held in a managed trust by the Citizens National Bank & Trust.  The income derived would be more than sufficient for most anyone.  However, this sum will place an undue burden on my daughter and that is specifically my intent. “To be rather than to seem!”

13. Finally to my grandson Jackson Wade Caruthers, I leave the residue and remainder of my estate wherever situated. “It is with pride that I send you as a whole man into the world.”

Please find enclosed a check in the amount of $23,345,612.18.  This is the residue of Jackson Wade Caruthers, II. Estate bequeathed to you under his Last Will and Testament dated 6th June 1997.  It represents a liquidation of all assets not specifically bequeathed to others including real estate, stocks, bonds and other financial instruments.

Sincerely yours, Charles E. Kowalski, Senior Partner

 

The will was classic grandfather.  I could hear his voice gleefully dictating the document to the attorney.  The little quotes behind each bequest were meant to make you think.  My grandfather had given each of us one last life lesson.

Jonathan and I walked to the double steel garage door at the end of the room.  The key fit and I opened the door.  The stars were bright and the moon was full as we turned to walk down the driveway.

“Want a souvenir?” I asked Jon.  I walked back in and grabbed one of the hanging harnesses and a set of leg irons.  Before I left I also picked up Jon’s prison shirt and pants.

“This stuff really turns me on, Jon,” I said as I slipped the gear into my duffle bag.  I threw the door key on the dirty mattresses.  The door to the prison slowly closed and latched with a click as we walked down the asphalt driveway.

“What do we do now, Jack?” Jon asked.

“We are going to be just fine,” I said as I thought about the check in my pocket.

 

The End

 

Metal would like to thank PrisonCub for this story.