vagabondprophet:

Solitary Refinement Chapter 4

Dear Joshua                                         July 15th 2017

    Hey dude so I heard what you said about Kal. Ya he freaks me out but I can’t just ask to get a different cell mate, or get put in a different block. It’s not that simple man you don’t get it. Remember how you always wanted me to go with you when you were trying to pick up girls at the bar? You said it was because I was all skinny and gangly (for the love of God work on your sensitivity) and made you look good by comparison. Well it’s kind of like that. If people here see me always moving away from guys bigger than me towards guys smaller than me it’ll say something about me. It makes me look a coward. I swear Kal can smell fear, like a damned hound.

    I talked to another guy in the mess hall yesterday. He was sitting with a few guys and he yelled at me to come over. His name is Trevor and he’s really little, like super short and skinny but everybody he’s with seems to listen to him. He asked me how I was getting on with Kal and I said not great, just that I’d tried to avoid interacting with him as much as I can and sometimes he seems mad and other times he simply smiles at me. I’m yet to hear him speak a word.

I asked what he was in for and I’ll never forget what Trevor said, “Well you see he used to be a landlord, and let’s just say any female tenant he’s had moved out of the building and even out of town a few months after moving in. Apparently he doesn’t understand the word no.”

Trevor said he could keep me safe if I just stick with them, eat with them, do work in the yard with them that sort of thing. People see you have others watching your back they leave you alone. We’re all in this together just trying to survive.That’s the hope anyways. I like Trevor he gives me a good vibe, clean haircut great smile. The kind of guy that you’d trust to water your plants and feed your pets while you go on vacation. I don’t know what he’s in for but he really doesn’t seem like the kind of guy who would hurt anybody.

He told me about a lot of other guys though, I don’t know how he knows so damn much. I like knowing what crimes people did, it makes me feel like I can maybe judge a little more carefully how I should talk to them. There’s a guy named Ziggy who killed his wife when he found her with another man. Don’t lie to Ziggy, that’s the rule I’m told. His last cellmate is still healing from broken bones in a different area of the prison after lying about stealing his last cigarette. His new mate is a guy named Zach who is in for multiple car thefts. They get along fine for now.

Two doors down from Ziggy and Zach is a fellow named Robert. Robert the cyber thief. This guy can hack just about anything I’m told. He developed a program that made all of the shipping and handling fees paid to Amazon.com on Black Friday last year go to his own personal bank account. It was a lot more than he expected, it turned a few heads.

I feel a lot better now that I know Trevor and his friends are looking out for me though. There are some nasty dudes in here and it sure is good to know I don’t have to worry about all of them.

It’s funny I used to worry about things like cancer, high blood pressure, cholesterol, and lowering my sodium intake. I used to consciously worry about how my kidneys are doing because I should drink more water than I do. My fears have completely changed. Getting stabbed was really low on my list of daily fears before, not the case anymore.

Have you checked on Liz and the kids? Sorry to bug you about it but I’m worried about them she still hasn’t replied to anything I’ve sent. I am going to give her a bit of space before I try to contact her again. I guess that means I’ll be chatting with you a lot more. When you reply to this can you tell me something normal? I want to know something normal. Like the price of gas or how your co-workers are annoying. I really appreciate you talking with me Josh, seriously you don’t even know.