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Island Paradise – Part 2: Chapter 13

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By Joshua Ryan

Chapter 13: What Everyone’s Wearing on Palmerston Road

When you first get your collar, it feels so heavy, it’s almost like you’re an animal wearing one of those wooden yokes you see in pictures of, like, primitive places or whatever.  Of course you get used to it pretty fast.  But when they first put it on you, it’s a big thrill.  I mean, it’s not like, hmmm, this is a new piece of clothing, I wonder how I’m gonna like it, maybe I’ll take it off.  Your collar is fuckin ATTACHED to you!  And you’re gonna be wearin it for the rest of your life!  So like I said, big thrill!

“What’s this?” Malcolm said, looking down at my cock.  Which was sticking straight up.

“Dunno,” I said.  “Guess it likes my number.”

“He really is a smartass,” Jojo said.

“Whatever,” Malcolm said.  “Now sit on that chair.”

Too bad, I thought.  Nobody likes my dick.  Anyway, there were some old wooden chairs in the room, and I sat down on one of them.  Behind me, something switched on.  Something electric.  Something that made a loud whirring noise.  “Hold still,” Malcolm said.  “I’m gonna buzz you off.”

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Island Paradise – Part 2: Chapter 12

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By Joshua Ryan

Chapter 12: Your Neck Needs a Little Something . . . .

The officers didn’t say anything, they just unlocked a big wooden door and a door made out of bars—wow! bars!—and took me along a little sidewalk, and there was a building like an old garage and it had bars across the front and they put me in there and locked it up and went away.  Oh, they also took the cuffs off, cuz now I was in a cage and maybe I didn’t need them.  Maybe some other dude did!  Anyway, now I’m in this thing like a cage, and of course I’m lookin out through the bars to see what I can see.

First thing that grabs you is a big hunk of concrete, like a runway for a plane, a small plane of course, because it didn’t look like a mile long or anything.  Then there were a lot of wooden buildings lined up around it, mostly sort of long and narrow, though most of them I couldn’t see very much of, because of the bars and I had to crane my neck.  It looked kind of like that old army base I saw from the freeway, but everything was painted brown and it obviously wasn’t supposed to be some kind of exhibit of fighting spirit or pride or whatever, and actually if the roofs hadn’t been so straight and clean you would have said that maybe it was abandoned.

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Island Paradise – Part 2: Chapter 11

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By Joshua Ryan

Chapter 11: Come On In—We’re Open

The place didn’t look like much.  It looked sorta like a motel and sorta like a grade school—one story, flat roof, glass doors, dorky lookin sign . . . .  But there were lots of plants around, so you couldn’t see everything.  I guess I was too nervous to be disappointed, but I’d expected something more impressive.  I looked at my phone.  I was 20 minutes early.

So what now?  Would I get in trouble if I was early?  Disobeying orders!  OK, I’d wait.  I’d spend my last few minutes just hanging out, thinking.

I looked around.  There was a bus stop on the corner, and a bench with nobody on it.  I sat down there and looked back at the SLP building across the street.  I could see some more of it now.   Behind the office building or whatever, there was a long concrete wall, with razor wire on top.  I hadn’t seen much razor wire in my life, just in bad neighborhoods I guess.  It was used to keep people out of places.  Like junk yards.  Or the back of some storage place.  But the stuff I was looking at–that was obviously to keep people in.  People like me!  Once I went through those doors, I’d be inside the razor wire.

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Island Paradise – Part 2: Chapter 10

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By Joshua Ryan

Chapter 10: So Long!

That was on a Friday, so maybe that’s why I didn’t hear from SLPOUTREACH until Monday.  Which is when I read:

“SLP Participant Barlow:  You have completed Step 4.  Permission to proceed to Step 5 will be transmitted within the next three weeks.”

I was all serious serious serious when I opened the email, cuz I expected to see some big heavy statement, and then I felt like, “Oh.  OK.  What do I do now?”  I didn’t really have anything to do except to keep going to school, which at least got me out of seeing my parents.  I read in a book about some guy that was gonna be executed, and they gave him X amount of time to “put his affairs in order.”  But I didn’t have any affairs; I just went back to school.

I knew that the SLP would come through with my orders, and I would do what they told me.  Maybe you’re wondering, hey, you’re an American, how could they, like, enforce this commitment you signed?  I mean, how could they come and get you, if you changed your mind?   You’re right—they couldn’t.  I had time on my hands, so I looked it up.  Under “extradition.”  The only way they could get me was if I actually went to St. B.  But that’s what I’d agreed to do.

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Island Paradise – Part 2: Chapter 09

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By Joshua Ryan

Chapter 9: Someone Up There Likes Me

The answer was obvious: I’d keep up with my classes and try my best to keep up with my fantasies– same as always, because I was never gonna wind up on St. Bevons as a slappie anyhow.  If I got rejected, big fuckin deal.  But of course that’s not the way I felt.  I wanted them to accept me!  Cmon, after all those Steps, isn’t that what you’d want?

So the next few days were pretty miserable and anxious.  Finally I had to make a rule that I’d check my mail only twice a day, instead of jumping into my phone every minute.  That’s why it took me about eight hours to find the new message from SLPOUTREACH: “Joel Barlow:  We are pleased to inform you that on review of your Application, Documents, and Interview, you have been accepted for admission to the State Labour Program.  You are now permitted to proceed to Step 4.  THIS STEP MUST BE COMPLETED WITHIN 30 DAYS OF THE DATE OF THIS MESSAGE, OR YOUR ACCEPTANCE WILL BE CANCELED.  Use the following password.”

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Island Paradise – Part 2: Chapter 08

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By Joshua Ryan

Chapter 8:  The Audition Is the Most Important Thing

I waited two fuckin weeks at Step 2!  I couldn’t explain why I was so anxious, but every day that went by, I was thinking how come? and getting depressed and not being able to jerk and then jerkin like crazy just for relief . . . .  Like I didn’t have enough to worry about before!  Then I started thinking, yeah, they’ve definitely rejected me—they must not like my looks.  And why should they?  But why don’t they let me know?  Will they send me a message or will they just ignore me?  That’s probably what they’re doing now.  So that was shit!  I didn’t even know when to stop waiting!

Then, whoa!  Another “Personal” from SLPOUTREACH: “Joel Barlow: Your Documents have been accepted.”

Fuck, man!

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Island Paradise – Part 2: Chapter 07

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By Joshua Ryan

Chapter 7: Carefully Review Your Vocational Options

Next morning, I dunno, I actually felt better about goin to class.  You know when somebody says you should “get a life”?  But now it was like, yeah, I do have a life.  You can’t see it, cuz it’s outside of all this annoying shit I’m doin around here, but I do have it.  And my life could actually end up in a different place.  It probably won’t, but it could!  Just reading that SLP stuff—that was so hot!  In high school the English teacher talked about “escape literature,” which was supposed to be bad, but I didn’t think so.  Would I like to escape?  Hell yes!  Give me more of that stuff to read.

So that night I started reading through the Volunteering thing again, and doing it real slow this time, just to enjoy all the fantasies.  I noticed a lotta shit that I didn’t see before.  Like in the INTERVIEW step, when you read over what they said, they didn’t say they’d be asking what was your opinion about anything.  They didn’t say they were gonna “counsel” you or “advise” you or make some “suggestions” to you, the way people always did with me.  Especially my dad.  Have I told you I wished he’d been more of a man?  But anyways, they were inviting you to the interview so they could find out whether you would fit in, and then they would TELL you.  Also, when you got to the end of a Step where you were supposed to click the button to submit whatever kind of stuff they wanted from you, there was something like, “You will be notified whether you have permission to advance to the next Step.”  In other words, you weren’t in charge, they were.

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Island Paradise – Part 2: Chapter 06

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By Joshua Ryan

Chapter 6: That’s Five Small Steps for a Man

So wow, and it only took me half the night.  If this is what “research” is like, forget it.  But here I was in the SLP arm of the Bureau of Such and Such, and I started dissecting it (clever medical image, right?):  Home, Mission Statement, Goals, Officials, Statistics, Invest in the SLP . . . .  Finally, there it was: Volunteer for the SLP.

So what did I see when I clicked on that?  Big headline, brown letters (natch!):

COMMIT TO SERVE

DO YOU HAVE WHAT IT TAKES?

 

Yes, that’s the question, isn’t it!  Patrick thought I didn’t.  Even I thought I didn’t.  But how would I find out?

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