Chapter 57 Zeth
Zeth
Four Years Ago
Chino
“This food tastes like shit, Man.”
“Mm. Yeah, I’d say there’s a pretty high ratio of shit to food in here.”
“Fuck a high ratio, dude. This stuff all be shit. That brown mushy stuff be dog shit. That bread be horse shit. And that pudding is bird shit, dude, straight up. I seen the wrecking crews scraping that stuff off the roof.”
I prod the brown slab of reconstituted meat on my tray with my plastic fork, eyeing it dubiously.
Marco sees me do it. He makes a derisive tchhh sound through his teeth.
“Zee, man, that’s the worst shit on there.
That’s Colossus’s own personal brand of shit.
He’s back there in that kitchen laying tracks all day long.
That’s why none of us eat the meat loaf, motherfucker. ”
This is how mealtimes play out every day in prison.
We complain about the food, and then we eat it anyway because we have no choice.
But meat loaf day is especially bad. Colossus, the huge Russian guy who was convicted of killing his wife and kids, also happens to be the cook, and he delights in burning everything he sends out of the kitchen. His dry meat loaf is disgusting.
The canteen hums with chatter and raucous banter between the inmates, everyone segregated into their appropriate racial stereotypes.
It doesn’t matter if you’re not a neo-Nazi, a gangbanger, a coke dealer, or Mafioso on the outside.
Inside walls such as these, your heritage is your creed.
The system is based on hate. The Black gangs hate the white gangs.
The Italian gangs hate the Mexican gangs and the Black gangs.
The Mexican gangs hate the white gangs, and the white gangs hate everybody, including other white gangs if they piss each other off.
Cast adrift in the middle of this sea of hatred, I sit at a table with Marco, who just so happens to be Black, and Leroy, who just so happens to be Mexican.
There’s an empty chair next to Leroy, awaiting the fourth member of our group: Cade.
Cade’s white like me, but neither of us is “white” (read: evil) enough to join the Klu.
They call the four of us the UN—a term that even the guards find funny.
We’re outcasts. We eat together, shit together, shower together, run the yard together.
The only time we’re not watching each other’s backs is at lockup, when it’s just us and the guy we bunk with.
Our cellmates know better than to go toe to toe with any of us at close quarters, though.
“Where’s your boy?” Leroy hacks at his food with the side of his fork. You get good at that when the only tool you’re given to cut through Colossus’s food is a blunt plastic fork.
Marco chews, open-mouthed, fork hanging loosely from his hand. “Dunno. He’s out, though. Hadley saw him in with the nurse an hour ago.”
This is news. News that makes no sense. “The nurse? Why?”
“He got busted up talking back to one of the guards on his way outta the SHU. They were gonna throw his ass straight back in there, I think, but they done needed the cell for Barteaux. Crazy motherfucker shivved himself again.”
Usually, you worry about other people shivving you in prison. Not Barteaux. “That is the third time he’s done that.”
“I know, man.” Leroy laughs. “Dude reckons he’s gonna get his ass transferred outta here if the administration thinks he’s being targeted. Someone really oughta tell the guy not to keep stabbing himself in front of the cameras.”
Marco pauses laughing, pointing down to the far end of the canteen. “Ho. Hold up. I see our guy.”
Sure enough, there’s Cade making his way through the tables, tray in hand.
He’s a big guy, almost as big as me. Dark haired and covered in tattoos.
We could be brothers, but we’re not. He got sent away to serve a bullet—a year’s sentence—for a crime he won’t talk about.
Day one of his stretch, I saved his ass from a severe beating being served up to him by the Klu, and ever since then we’ve been friends.
When Cade rocks up and slaps his tray down on the table, Leroy prods his finger into the seam of angry-looking stitches running from Cade’s temple down to his cheekbone.
“What’d I tell you about the clavo, knucklehead?
You don’t wanna be keeping that shit in your cell, man.
They gonna put your name above the fucking SHU, the rate they keep throwing your ass in there. ”
Cade’s a repeat offender for contraband, or clavo if you’re Leroy. So far, he’s been thrown in solitary for weed, a knuckle-duster, and a cell phone. Fuck knows how he got that in here. Cade scowls, smacking Leroy’s hand away.
“Fuck you, man.”
I pass him a pack of smokes, raising an eyebrow. “What was it this time?”
Cade opens the pack and takes three, tucking them into the top pocket of his jumpsuit for later. “Lewd images of a graphic and sexual nature,” he recites, spooning food into his mouth.
Marco erupts into hails of laughter. “Porn? You got busted for a week for lookin’ at pussy?”
Cade just shrugs it off, swallowing down his meal. “They’ll screw me for anything. You know that.”
“Yeah, man, we do. They still riding you hard?” Marco asks.
Cade casts a suspicious glance around the tables, eyes narrow.
He blows out a deep breath. Ever since he’s been in here, he’s been the target of attacks from the Aryans, the Mexicans, and the prison guards, although no one is saying why.
Least of all Cade. The prison admin wants him to spill his guts over something, and the gangs are afraid he will.
So far, he’s refused to even tell us why his life is being threatened on a daily basis.
“Offered me WITSEC this time,” he admits.
Leroy thumps his arm. “Damn, dude. You know they give you a salary for life when you join WITSEC? Free money. You don’t gotta do nothing for the rest of your days!”
“Apart from look over your shoulder,” I say.
Cade gives me a nod—I understand. The others are petty criminals.
Leroy broke into a hardware store and stole a power drill.
That crime would have landed him in Lompoc instead of a super-max if the stupid fucker hadn’t bludgeoned the security guard who caught him half to death.
Same story with Marco. He was a small-time dealer on the outside, probably would have scored twelve months in minimum security if he hadn’t assaulted a cop trying to escape.
These guys have no idea what it’s like working in organized crime.
I do. Cade does, too. He doesn’t need to tell me he’s in some deep shit.
WITSEC is nowhere near as safe as the cops and politicians make it out to be.
There’s always a way. A person to be threatened.
A computer to be hacked. And then you’re dead.
We eat our food, and we don’t talk about it anymore.
In the end, worrying about a flawed witness protection system doesn’t really matter.
Cade doesn’t get to join WITSEC. He doesn’t even make it out of Chino.
Three weeks later, during one of the rare moments the UN isn’t in session, an Aryan named Spider stabs my friend three times in the back.
Kidneys. Liver. Lungs. A professional hit.
The guards carry his limp body down the gangway, past the open door of my cell, where I’m doing chin-ups, leaving a river of blood behind them. He doesn’t come back.
The official line is that Cade Preston died of his injuries.