The Father, Mother and Son E-Book

Craig G Duncan

• Herausgeber: BookRix
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2020

Beschreibung

An ancestral love story revealed through a philosophy that is handed down between three generations of violent men in the most unexpected way. Their early lives are desperate with no love or care and lacking positive direction. This miss management of parental love produces violent lost characters, who act out their daily lives in a familiar way to what they know. Their insane upbringing, coupled by their actions, finally comes to a head when they’re imprisoned. A convicted murderer hands his vocational council on life down to a young Mac and the result is the transformation of his character. This sacred oral form of communication has been received in this way since the birth of time, bringing peace to the troubled mind of the individual. Mac the main character takes decades before the message is revealed and understood but Lip a much shorter time. As this knowledge is passed on, we see it grow and evolve with each man before accumulating and manifesting in the trial of Lip. Accused of three deaths, he shows age and wisdom beyond his years in his dual with all around him. Their wish is to kill or imprison him for the rest of his natural life. We follow him through the depths of despair and madness before direction appears giving guidance from his tortuous ways. At first it comes in the form of vengeance and retribution, whilst walking his vengeful path he begins the search for his own killer having no desire to live in a world without love. We follow him as he traverses the lines between sanity and insanity that will surprise you and make you question which was insane – the accused on trial or his accusers. This ancient way of living breaks their recognisable moulds and destroys their devilish characters before transcending them into something unrecognisable in the modern world. This rare energy is only spoken about but very rarely experienced in religion and not acknowledged outside the rules and stipulations of these devout organisations. Yet these men have come through all the demands and tribulations of life, to stand alone without the dual conscious of a disturbed mind.

Leseprobe

Craig G Duncan

The Father, Mother and Son

BookRix GmbH & Co. KG81371 Munich

Chapter 1

Mac.  

I was being held in a brightly lit room deep underground with a dozen others, waiting to be sentenced for various crimes at Liverpool Crown Court. Its 1983 I’ve just turned twenty one with the occasion spent in a remand prison accused of two cash in transit robberies. My childhood friend and I were found guilty by a twelve man jury the previous Friday and brought back for sentencing by the judge from the trial who we knew well by reputation. He was a no nonsense judge that surely sent children to prison for stealing a slice of bread in a previous life. The holding cell I occupied was full with inmates yet I was in a world of my own making and sat wondering how long my prison sentence would be, whilst looking at the different faces and obvious thoughts that where being expressed. Some looked terrified but others where calm, relaxed and on a well-worn path. The new ones to the system stood out like daffodils at the side of the road on a cold spring morning and amongst them, the regulars talking between themselves and hoping for a decent judge. My backside ached from the hours of sitting on a concrete bench that wrapped itself around three of the four walls and all painted a magnolia colour, adding to the illumination with a fourth wall made of steel bars and tough clear plastic.

Smigger’s loud voice smothered the many quiet conversations that filled the room. He was demanding breakfast from the prison guards, while also informing the other convicts that nobody was going up to court until we’d all been fed. I observed the other prisoners waiting for a response but none came. They’d all be happy if we received food but no one wanted to take the justice system on before going in front of a judge for sentencing. My friend never backed down in any type confrontation no matter what the perceived outcome may be leading the two of us into many scrapes. We came as a package everyone knew this including the police and the reason behind why I was waiting for a jail sentence of between five and eight years. Our defending barrister informed me of my likely punishment after our guilty verdict and gave me some inkling into my future as he seen it. Before I had a chance to start this sentence, he said that my next visit to jail would be in double figures or life.

“I’ve seen it all before and I see it in you both.” 

I took no notice of his future predictions. I did not rate his performance in court very well and my marks out of ten would be very low so his mystic powers on my future status quo wouldn’t be great either. A prison guard opened the locked door with a key attached to a long chain and a sheet of paper in his hand.

“Tony McFerrin and Stephen Roebottom court one.”

 Our eyes connected across the crowded cell, I couldn’t help myself and started laughing. I think it was nerves because I hadn’t laughed at Smigger’s name since primary school, but in the time and space of that moment my mind flooded with memories of being in class and the teacher introducing the new boy to us all and sitting him next to me. I made fun of his name as he sat down. He reacted by punching me in the ribs so I returned the gesture with an elbow to his, before we realised what we were doing a fight had broken out in front of Miss Hughes. The noise levels rose up with the two of us being urged on to fight by the rest of the class and she struggled to separate us. The headmaster heard the commotion. A towering man to a pair of eight – year – old boys and physically picked us up off the floor and dragged us both to his office. Where we received the capital punishment the school gave out and that was a leather slipper brought forcibly down on our hands. Looking back it seems ironic that violence was punished with more violence. Mr Probert the headmaster made us sit outside his office for the rest of the day and this is where our friendship began. He warned the two of us of the consequences if we made any sound, it wasn’t long before Smigger had me laughing with his antics and getting me into more trouble. He was always impersonating people, mimicking their habitual mannerisms, bodily movements and voice. Replicating them to a very good likeness whether he liked you or not. When in a happy jovial mood, then it was all done in a playful way but other times he would use it to goad people into fighting him. Our first morning together was spent in that dismal corridor, where the slightest sound echoed of the smooth green walls and bounced between the floor and high ceilings. Bored and cold, Smigger set his stage up and explained that a good upper cut would bring the flabby mountain of a man crashing to the floor.

 “I’m going to knock him out and you can stand over him and count a slow ten seconds, giving him every chance to stand and recover so we can enjoy the experience of him falling from his great height once again,” Smigger expressed this while throwing an upper cut to an imaginary figure.

 If any other boy of eight had made that statement to me, I would’ve laughed but with him it was plain to see it was only a matter of time. It was another five years before his statement of intent actually happened to our high school headmaster, who often used corporal punishment on us both.

Smigger hated his surname and it’s easy to see why, it was only ever spoken by people in authority from his mother who lived life according to the Catholic Church and all the way up to the judge that was about to deny us our freedom. All our associates knew us as Mac and Smigger.

 We stepped out of the lift that had brought us up from our underground cell into a wooden and Perspex dock above ground, whilst being escorted and flanked by three prison guards. The room had various people standing around their allotted work spaces, just chatting and giving the court room a relaxed atmosphere but I was full with anticipation. This took the form of a nervous excitement and I wasn’t able to keep my feet still whilst waiting for his honour to show up. My mind filled with ancient fears and I wondered how it must have felt back in the day when a judge could don his black cap and sentence you to hang, before a familiar voice sitting in the public gallery broke the strangle hold of my wandering mind. I turn to see my mother, Beverly and Tina at the back of the court. We have a brief chat all can hear before the words.

 “All stand,” rings out.

 Silence invades the room as the man with his godly power enters the court with a belief that he’s above all in mind and status. He stands next to his high back red leather chair, wearing matching robes with the queen’s coat of arms displayed on the wall directly behind him, expressing his stately splendour and pomp to us all. He surveys his domain and we all stand in silent obedience, the court clerks motionless in their school masters cloaks waiting for his honour to sit before carrying out the menial but necessary court actions. The judge seated he peers over his glasses in our direction with an irrevocable look on his face that said payback time, only diverting his eyes to read out the reasons for our long custodial sentence that he says he has no option but to give!

 “You installed fear in men going about their daily business so the punishment must fit the crime. I have taken your age into consideration and decided to be lenient in this case and sentence you both to seven years imprisonment, where you will learn to fear the Queen’s justice so let this be a lesson to you both because I will not be so lenient next time. If you come before this court again on similar charges, I have no option but to send you both to prison for the rest of your natural life,” said the contemptuous judge.

 I asked myself, did my barrister share a private conversation with the judge? I imagined them sitting in some bar drinking and discussing their up and coming cases. I’ve never been one for coincidence and their words seemed strongly connected, but it made no difference because I committed the crimes and those actions brought this reaction so I had no choice but to do the time.

I’d been observing the judge throughout the weeklong trial and mostly out of boredom so he became my entertainment. I enjoyed watching his little daft mannerisms like patting his mouth when he yawned. Maybe he wasn’t a stern judge in another life and might have been a Red Indian born to a nineteen forties B-movie, where he also acquired his hang them high attitude. If ever our eyes met he was silently offended that I didn’t yield to his self-acclaimed superiority, this widened the gap between us making it easy for him to sentence the both of us to a long prison term, although my intention was never to antagonise him. He played the stern judge in court and donned the mask of the law but there was no light to his eyes, they were dulled by years of dishing out nothing but doom and gloom. I wondered if the old judge wiled his quiet hours away looking back on the decades of his life, through the eyes of a good gin or scotch. One afternoon after lunch break, he returned with a gleeful look and glazed eyes that replaced his usual miserable face but for him it was ok to break rules. After sentencing I turn to face my mother and her thoughts were clearly on view for all to read so I gave her a comforting smile, hiding my true feelings and mouthed everything will be ok.

The next few hours passed quickly. We got fed and gained visits behind a wall of glass from family before an open visit from our solicitor. The barrister never bothered coming down to see us after sentencing but our defence council assured us, the length of sentence could be appealed because no weapons or force had been involved in either of the robberies. They were simple thefts, but with the amount of money involved and the brazen way they were carried out both of us were charged with robbery. There was no actual confrontation or threats made for the cash. We favoured shopping centres, where the two guards carrying the money would have a fair walk back to their security van and safety with lots of them being overweight and middle aged. I always came from behind to snatch the cash box and most of the time it was over in less than a couple of seconds. All they would have is a fleeting image of the back of me before I disappeared and made my way to our vehicle. Smigger always positioned himself slightly ahead of us all and ready to react if anything went wrong and if all went smoothly, then we met at the car or motorbike and off we went. We’d been practising and perfecting our craft over the previous eight years.

You often hear people say. They can look back on their lives and see when everything changed for the better or worse. It was the long hot summer of 1976, when things changed for us. We’d spent it swimming in an unused dock or hanging around the local shops and this is where Smigger often displayed his theatrical side. On this particular day, the audience was small and consisted of one individual to watch his antics on the locals who passed by so he joined me in the street auditorium. The hard seats were made up from a stone pavement and smaller stones glued to the wall of the bank. Not a penny between us, we discussed are next move before I noticed a male going into the bank with a strange looking bag and pointed it out to Smigger. We had no idea what it could’ve been and when the man re-emerged the bag was notably smaller. Smigger asked him what it was. Being no more than twelve years of age at that time he happily showed us the security bag. It was a thick plastic with thin wire running through it and a strong zip that had a small padlock.

“If you’d asked before I went in, I would have shown you more money than you’ve ever seen,” he boasted.

“How much?” we sang in unison.

“Two thousand pounds,” he replied.

This was the mid-seventies and we couldn’t imagine that much money. We sat there for the rest of the day watching people going in and out the bank with various bags of cash. Some were careful and hid theirs away but others were openly carrying them and it was these we christened swingers. The bank became our regular haunt and we started watching the swingers, not out of curiosity but intention and our purpose was to relieve them of what they had for the least amount of risk. We observed where they parked their cars and it was always the same routine, the closest side street to the bank and this is where we picked our first victim. He was an overweight, Chinese man about fifty years of age and he swung his chip shop takings in a blue cloth bank bag.

It was the morning of my thirteenth birthday and a day I will remember for more reasons than my age. I’d woken to a card on the mantelpiece off my mother and my body filled with nervous anticipation about the day ahead. Smigger knocked with his customary whistle and we made our way into school to get our morning mark and then bunked off, which was pretty much our normal and daily routine. We changed out of our school uniforms in Smigger’s bedroom and made the short walk to a side street close to the bank. Where we waited for a familiar figure to drive into the Edwardian terraced street, it wasn’t long before he arrived and headed for the bank that was less than a minute’s walk. Smigger wouldn’t shut up but I couldn’t speak with nerves, without thinking tunnel vision took charge of my sight and I sprinted towards my victim with bag in focus and took it cleanly from his grasp. My intention was to return to Smigger but my momentum took me past the shop keeper and he reacted much quicker than I imagined, giving chase and screaming for all to help. Before I could disappear three or four workmen answered his cries. The area I knew well so I ran like my very life depended on it, with my speed and youth being energised by fear it carried me safely back to Smigger’s bedroom. I entered his room sweating and out of breath with panic coursing through my veins, only to find a huge smile and a pair of eyes that were full with anticipation and keen to see inside the weighty cloth bag that I carried in my hand. I was the opposite and terrified of the repercussions that might come my way, until I emptied the contents of the bag on to his bed and watched four hundred and twenty five pounds fall out. This was the beginning of our career although I never thought of it as a profession, it only occurred to me when the prosecuting barrister asked for tough sentences because we’re clearly career criminals.

Chapter 2

We arrived at H.M.Prison Walton after a short journey in a sweat box, a small metal cell inside a prison transport bus. It was the first time for the two of us in an adult jail and it seemed no different to the one we’d just left, the only difference that came to my attention was the age because it was Victorian. Our names were called along with several others and directed towards individual, three sided wooden cubicles and told to strip naked. A prison officer was sat at a desk in front of me eye balling my vulnerability, whilst various inmates collected my clothing and placed them in a cardboard box with my name and number on. With the smell of cardboard all around me, I felt awkward standing there naked giving my particulars: five eight, ten stone with no identifying scars or tattoos. I could hear Smigger in the next cubicle giving his details.

“Five eleven, twelve stone.”

“Any permanent scars or inks on your body,” asked the guard.

 No boss, no identifying scars or tattoos but I do have an outstanding feature and would be happy to show it to you or any of your colleagues that maybe unsure about whom I am. Take a look boss its nine and half inches,’ Smigger proudly announced.

Without looking I knew he hold of his penis, he loved being naked and the centre of everybody’s attention. I’ve always been happy to sit back and let him take the spotlight that’s why we get on so well, because I never wanted to be in the light or share his stage. He was blond haired, blue eyed with a loud cheeky nature, but look closely and you could see an unmistakable hint of menace about him. He made light of most situations but on the occasions when he never that’s when his violent nature made an appearance. He loved to fight and would often encourage his enemies to attack him, the adrenalin rushes he received from their blows seem to empower him, but the moment he retaliated with his ivory fists it was over in a flash. I have watched him on multiple occasions leave club doormen unconscious or reeling from his body punches on the floor, not once had I seen anyone stay standing after he hit them, all went down without exception. He carried the reputation of undefeated fighter with a hundred percent knock out rate after many doorway skirmishes. I was the complete opposite in lots of ways: black hair, green eyes, olive skinned and quiet compared to him. I was quite happy to go through life with no confrontations and blend into the background. 

Walton was an old jail and built for half the inmates that resided there, three to a cell on most wings and bucket to urinate in, luckily not many defecated in them because the other two sharing the cell wouldn’t allow it. Locked up twenty three hours a day if unemployed with an hours exercise if wasn’t raining and opened up three times a day for meals and toilet duties. This was called slop out and it gave you fifteen minutes to empty: bowls, urine or wash buckets, get your meal and any illegal business that needed urgent attention. We spent our first night on A-wing with just the two of us in a cell. New to the jail but not to its occupants and around about eight thirty, when all inmates are locked away, someone slid a sealed envelope under our cell door. It was message from an older convict who we both knew. He lived on the same housing estate not far from me and was the number one for B-wing, this meant he assigned cells for new prisoners and we’d both been allocated to his wing. The envelope all so contained tobacco, cigarette papers and split matches. This prison allowed you one visit a month so illegal substances were about, but difficult to get hold of unless you paid well. We’d spent the previous four months on remand in H.M.P.Risley. This jail had a terrible reputation for suicides but one that gave you an open visit with family or friends on a daily basis, because most convicts had not been convicted of any crime and deemed innocent until the trial. We both made the most of this opportunity and arrived at Walton jail well prepared with the two of us parcelled up and the cannabis secreted internally. We had enough resin between us to the get the whole wing high and spent our first night happily getting stoned, talking bigger and more lucrative crimes when released. The cell lights were switched off at ten o’clock and the animals and insects that call this place home took over. The first night I listened to the cockroaches fall from the ceiling on to the hard floor, knowing the silent ones were landing on mine or Smigger’s bed.

Early the following morning the lights went on and the door opened six inches, ‘slop out’ was the morning chorus. No blue skies or birds tweeting just jangling keys and conversations. I stepped out on to the landing with a toothbrush in my mouth, still cleaning my teeth and taking in my new environment. There were five landings, two above and two below that housed the servery lads, offices and stores. Up above, the landings were caged off with the fours and fives catering for vulnerable prisoners and the threes for new arrivals. Freshly painted cream walls framed old heavy metal cell doors that were thick with years of green paint, each one with a spy hole, sliding and brass key lock. The landings were made from metal and painted the same bright green, which had worn off under foot and the top handrail. They were just wide enough for two averaged sized Victorian people to pass by each other, but not the larger inmates of today. They ran along the interior walls with an extensive opening in between, covered with a safety mesh to stop any individual falling to his death. You also have an open area on both sides of the landing, the size of two cells knocked together to provide space for a: slop out basin, urinal, water tap for drinking and washing; plus a toilet with a small door that gave you very little privacy. Two toilets per landing, one on either side and shared by up to forty men. The hub of any wing is the two’s, which is ground level and has a highly polished concrete floor that was always being brushed or moped by cleaners that also worked and served meals on the servery. The cells had a strong stench of urine, whilst the two’s had the unmistakable odour of bleach and disinfectant. The servery lads and any old or infirm prisoners were housed on the two’s landing along with the guards office and break room. I looked up and recognised an individual I’d met a few months earlier while on remand in Grisly Risley, a young lad of the same age from Wales.

“What are you doing up there?” I inquired but he ignored my request and returned to his cell.

 Smigger emerged, still half asleep and I explained who I’d just seen. He shouted to another convict on the same landings.

“A lad, go to that cell and ask him to come out onto the landing so I can speak to him,” his tone was more curious than threatening.

He returned our interest by firing a volley of obscenities our way and spat at us both. I expected Smigger to lose it but he kept his calm.

“A lad, I’m doing a long time and at some point we’ll meet and there won’t be a cage or gang of screws to protect you,” his tone was still calm but full of menace.

We’d been processed by mid-day and where sat on the one’s landing with our kit waiting to be moved over to B-wing, when we felt something drip on us and in tandem we looked up. A group of four or five inmates were spitting on us so we moved under cover and to opposite side of the one’s. They were thirty feet above us in a protected environment. We didn’t kick off or make a fuss because it would have drawn attention to us and that wasn’t needed. We had a large amount of cannabis resin on us and now it wasn’t internal with some already cut in deals for friends and tobacco. A booming voice interrupted the rain of spit.

“Get those maggots back in their cells,” his loud authoritarian voice shouted to landing guards on the fours.

The senior officer for the wing had been watching what was going on, he was a large middle aged man with a fearsome reputation that took his responsibilities seriously and protected the vulnerable prisoners that consisted of rapists, child molesters and grasses. He gave them protection from the rest of the inmates but the way he spoke to them, I imagined they didn’t have it easy. He looked down from the two’s at us and his eyes were still reflecting his words that echoed only moments before. We’re all maggots to him.

We got escorted through the locked dividing gates and onto B-wing, our new home for the foreseeable future and again placed together in a cell on the threes. The wing was no different to A-wing minus the vulnerable prisoners and cage. It was quiet with the majority of inmates locked up and eating their midday meal, but it wasn’t long before a familiar voice was at the door. Eddy the number one for the wing. He was a tall thin red haired man with a nasty scar on his face from a bottle attack that occurred years previously and he was doing twelve months for ringing cars. He was able to move about on the landings when no one else could, apart from the guards and was opened up longer than any other prisoner on the wing. He also had access to tea making facilities that another trustee used to make the guards hot drinks and offered us a hot cup of sugary tea with him having access to this treat at all times. Eddy arrived back a few minutes later with a jug of hot tea and a piece of plastic shaped like a cone so he could pour the hot liquid through the spy hole and into our cups. No payment had been discussed, but he was clearly offering his services so I passed him what he’d really came for and that was a small piece of hash. Eddy who was known locally by his nick name, ‘catch yer later,’ his favourite saying was gone. B-wing is a working wing with most inmates placed in the nodding shops, where you have to do mundane jobs like putting house hold electrical plugs together. You do a large amount for a very small wage of about two or three pounds a week. I had no intention of doing this job or any other. Couple of day went by and we settled in, Smigger had two cleaners on the wing doing the selling and collecting. We gave enough cannabis resin for one joint and a couple of spots and in return we received half ounce of tobacco or whatever foodstuffs and sweets they could buy out of their weekly wages that equated to the same amount of cash.

The first week was similar to Risley for the two of us because work was not forced upon you, but now convicted they expected us to work. We hid anywhere out of sight yet immediately obvious if you took the time to look, but the brain can be a great deceiver to blind routine. When the guards opened the cells up for work detail, they’d check the spy hole first to save time and effort, if the cell appeared empty they left it locked and if we didn’t get caught the count would be right. We looked after Eddy and it was he whom the guards relied on and went to for numbers on the wing. Once the work detail left, we’d remerge from behind the door or under the bed like children and carry on with the day, which consisted of Smigger providing entertainment and me listening to his expansive ideas on life! It wasn’t long before the call of a bigger stage and audience was needed for Smigger to feel alive. I always felt secure and happy in my own space so it was blessing in disguise or was it, when my friend told me he was going into work but I could not be persuaded. Once you reported into work, there was no hiding and you’d have to go in all week and every week.

I usually got a shout of one the cleaners if there were any burglars on the wing, these were security staff that raided inmate’s cells when out or in looking for illegal substances. I’d smoked a joint after the midday meal and another before Smigger left for work. Shortly afterwards I fell asleep on my bunk only to be woken from my afternoon siesta by three burglars in my cell. They searched me and found a small piece of resin worth maybe five pounds to the outside world and when satisfied there was no more to be found, I was blocked and charged. The segregation unit was the ones on H-wing, where you received no privileges and despair hung heavy in the air. The following morning the assistant governor added ninety days to my sentence, fined me two weeks wages and placed me on closed visits. That was maximum they could give without involving an outside court and a very standard sentence for a wide range of offences. Luck was with me, they couldn’t move me off the wing because the jail was full and Eddy made sure no one got my bunk. I arrived back while everyone was still in work and returned bringing the atmosphere of the block with me and feeling rather blue inside. Sitting alone it suddenly dawned on me that I was in this closed depressive environment for at least the next four years and could see no end to it. Not long after, my mind started to look for those responsible for my imprisonment and it landed firmly at Smigger’s door. Until we received our committal papers (evidence against us) we had no idea how the police knew it was us. The day of this particular offence, the police were out in force trying to stem the flow of cash in transit robberies. There had been a number of incidents in recent months were weapons had been used on the guards and the local press was making a fuss. I’d snatched a cash box off two guards and the younger of the two reacted quickly and gave chase. Smigger stepped into his path and the guard fell to the floor. That should have been it over and done with, but he couldn’t help himself gave him a mouthful of verbal.

“Don’t get back up or I’ll put you to sleep” Smigger insisted.

It was his brawn we needed not his helpful words. He met me on a local canal bank, where we broke the box open and made our escape on a motorbike and headed to a lock up garage that we rented. We placed the bike inside with some outer clothing, before phoning a local taxi firm and arriving back at Smigger’s house an hour or so after the offence had been committed. We both managed to get inside without our radar picking anything up, both feeling relaxed and on safe familiar territory but we’d let our guard fall too soon. Simultaneously we heard the front and back doors being kicked in and his small bedroom flooded with a sea of blue uniforms and suits screaming at us not to move. One smiling face in particular stood out from the crowd, detective John Smith. A police officer that had taken a great interest in us when younger, over a car he could never catch us in but this had not stopped him trashing our homes looking for evidence. He often told us that this day would come and here he was gloating in his success. They caught us with just over nineteen thousand pounds in used bank notes. The police had arrived moments after the robbery with photos of local thieves and Smigger’s picture was one amongst many but recognised. The habitual habit of returning to his bedroom to count our illicit gains, which had brought so much joy over the years had been replaced with despair and turned the joyful event sour. It was clear to police they had their culprits. There was hardly any evidence against me, except by association and the second offence was modus operandi so they needed a guilty conviction on the first one. All they had was a few statements saying they’d seem a man in a dark tracksuit running with a cap on and carrying a box close to his chest that loosely fitted my description. We never spoke about it while on remand, but I often wondered if I was in Smigger shoes would I have admitted it and saved us both going to trial, knowing if one’s convicted there’s good chance the other will follow. A plea bargain would have been my thoughts and one the police would have jumped at in the Police Station to guarantee them a victory and no costly trial. 

Smigger arrived back from work and we spoke for a moment through the spy hole. He asked what happened and I gave him the barest facts I could muster before I sat back down. While sitting there I could hear his constant chattering from behind the door and it never stopped like an echo inside my head. He wasn’t in the cell but already beating my brain up with no escape in sight. In the past I could pick myself and leave his company for a few hours but now that opportunity was denied. A winding tight energy filled and gripped the inside of my torso, a familiar feeling and there was only one outlet that eased this ache. I come from a large family of eight siblings with me being the seventh and second to youngest child. My older siblings would wind me up like tin plate toy and set me off, I could feel the mechanism getting tighter and tighter. I knew the spring was about to be released and someone was going to feel it.

“Lad you need a joint,” Smigger remarked with a knowing grin as he entered the cell.

I said nothing and he disappeared back out of the cell before coming back to tell me they’d just shouted the threes landing down for food. We made our way together but said very little, while he talked business with lads of the wing. After food we waited until the metal trays where put out and collected from the cell doorways before the final count of the day was over. Tapping on the ceiling got Eddies attention and our stash of resin was brought up to us, with him being the wings number one and a trustee he would not be suspected by the prison staff. Smigger cut a couple of deals, plus a piece big enough to last the evening and Eddy got his nightly joint. I lay on my bunk and inhaled deeply, after a few puffs the tightness eased and my friend’s voice wasn’t so loud anymore. We smoked a few joints over two or three hours and his constant chattering reached a point, where it slowed and we both sank into our own worlds far from prison. The jail was quiet with everyone locked up for the night. I’d forgotten how I’d been feeling earlier on before the words just left my mouth without any thought and I called him a selfish cunt of a man.

“Why?” He asked with amusement in his voice.

“That’s simple to answer you’d rather have your friend banged up with you than face a jail sentence on your own. That’s why,” I retorted whilst jumping down from the top bunk. I was now sitting opposite him and could see into his glazed eyes as they searched for the meaning of my words.

  “Can you remember what we promised each other when we were kids? I’ll remind you of an oath that we both made to one another – if things go wrong on a graft and one of us gets caught and there’s not much evidence against the other one, then he would own up so at least one of us stays out or was that just me making that promise.”

“You’ve gone jail crazy already. You got caught in my house with the exact amount of money stolen an hour earlier.”

“There was nothing to connect me to that money except you. It was found in your house, no one picked me out of any of the identity parades and the money was untraceable used notes. If I’d been arrested on my own an hour after the robbery with the cash on me, they would never have got a conviction out of me unless it was that cunt Smith and his box tricks or maybe a so called friend and being with him at the wrong time,” I said it with a conviction of truth.

He went for me and swung his legs to stand up from the bottom bunk. I propelled myself forward from my sitting position and used the momentum of my straightening legs to channel the energy through my torso and up into my neck before swinging my head. The sound of breaking cartilage reached my ears with an explosion of pain in my skull that stunned me. I reacted with my hands out of instinct and rained a flurry punches to the side of his face and head. My bony knuckles beat upon the armour of his skull that felt solid and comfortable with the blows it was receiving and I couldn’t stop the power of his counter attack. Now his low centre of gravity propelled him forward and into my midriff. His granite like skull connected just beneath my rib cage, taking the oxygen from my lungs and my feet from the ground. We landed together on the table, which gave way under the impact but I can’t remember the blow that knocked me unconscious. I never saw it coming and it was my first experience of being completely knocked out. I’d never been great with my fists as the speed and power I generated in my skull served me well in the first throws of battle, but not much else it seems. His knockout blow left a gaping hole on the side of my temple just above the right eye and Smigger sitting across my midriff holding me down. No matter how much I struggled to break free from him and his bloodied nose dripping onto my face, I couldn’t match his strength and it was feeling that I did not enjoy. Physically he was above me but that was all, I had everything that he could not see or grasp. He released his grip and pulled me up with a smile, I couldn’t help myself and smiled back. 

The cell was in right mess but that could be cleaned up pretty easily but it wasn’t going to be so easy for the pair of us, in a right state physically but mentally we were now fine with each other. A broken nose and two swollen eyes on Smigger that would be black and very obvious in the morning, plus I had a large open wound to my temple that needed stitching with swelling to my cheek bone and eye. Eddie must have heard the ruckus and was banging on the ceiling to get our attention. I spoke to him quietly from the cell window and told him all was well. We both knew, when opened up in the morning the prison telegraph would inform the jail of our confrontation behind closed doors and my recent charges. This would have the story tellers creating all sorts of reasons why? There was nothing we could do about this, you couldn’t stop it and besides no one would openly say anything to us. It was the screws that would be the problem because they’d want to know how our injuries came about. We came up with a story that I’d woken in the middle of the night to find Smigger attacking me whilst still asleep. This may sound crazy but if you knew his back ground it was very plausible. His earliest memories are filled with dark accounts of not one but both parents constantly beating him. He revealed frightening scenes of his childhood to me over the years and some with jest in his tales or others with power as he fought back, but most were covered in a deep sadness that I felt every time he divulged his experiences to me. Thankfully the events faded as we grew but he did tell me often that he’d wake in the middle of the night to find one or both parents beating him in drunken rages. When only a small child he learnt to pull the bed over to his bedroom door to block entry, it didn’t stop the beatings but gave him warning of what was to come. As he grew in strength and size, he began to retaliate and would often find himself waking in the middle of the night to a full on fight with one or both parents and this was before his conscious mind brought all his senses on line. The brain had learned to prioritise and instigate a defence system in the process of waking the body. My memories took me back to being a ten year old boy and Smigger’s mother taking a broom handle to me for back chatting her. It was the first and last time for me, because when my mother saw my bruised and battered body she took a broom handle to her.

Chapter 3

The morning came with the sun, our pale and bruised faces where on show to its full glare as we ventured down for breakfast and came out of the shadows. When Jonesy, the friendly landing screw to the chosen few, he loved to talk gangster to Smigger, saw us I’m sure I seen his bottom lip quiver and I remember thinking at the time why would he be upset? I was taken to hospital for an x-ray and thirteen stitches. Unlucky was the words I heard in my head every time someone asked how many and wondered if there more to come or was my luck about to change. I didn’t have long to wait to find out and was back on the wing by late morning and taken into the office for my version of the story. When both sides of the tale matched up there very little they could do, they’d convinced themselves it was Smigger’s resin and he got violent because I lost it. They’d concocted their own story and their version of events that seemed to fit the situation, but the truth was known to us and we had plenty with more on the way. They offered to move me to another wing, if I would inform on Smigger and make a statement against him. I told them, we’d always been good friends and this was not intentional by him or me. If the jail was not so over crowed I don’t think they would’ve put us back together after that incident but they did, yet our joy was short lived because they checked on us constantly through the night and spoilt are nightly smokes of hash. Come morning they opened us up for work and told me I wasn’t going in, which suited me fine but yet again it was short lived. Two guards opened me up about an hour later and told me to pack my kit. I was moving to I-wing the furthest from where I was and also long term wing. 

“Why,” I asked with thick disdain written in the word.

“Smigger is unpredictable danger to other prisoners,” the guard retorted.

“When did that become news, can’t remember it happening lately can you,” I spoke with venom on my tongue.

“Just get your stuff together, the governor has reclassified this cell into a single and that’s the end of matter. I-wing because there is nowhere else and to answer your question, no we didn’t know he battered people in his sleep, his daily habits we all know well but his nocturnal habits are complete surprise,” he said with contempt in voice.

The other guard became impatient and told me to hurry up. The child in me reacted like a child and took my time, whilst my mind raced away to find the answer to get me out of this predicament but it found none. Eventually their threats grew in strength and ferocity, which gave me the choice of block or I-wing. Their words still echoing in my ears I picked my kit up and walked out of the cell under my own steam and made my way a long G-wing with two escorts. It was no different to the wing I’d just left but I-wing was like leaving a Victorian jail and stepping into a different time zone. A new twentieth century jail and some people say time travel doesn’t exist. Well it did in Walton Jail in the eighties. No clever boffin or fancy time machine needed, nothing more than a simple key and some brain dead key turners that have great difficulty getting a count right but great at turning a key and opening a cell door for you. The shell of the wing was no different in structure, but the interior had recently been brought up to date and the first wing to be modernised since the jail was built. Every other cell had been split in two and each space converted into a small loo with hand and face basin. Today we call them en-suites and each cell had its own access way with a door so you could go to the toilet in peace without a line of men watching and urging you to finish. My unwanted escorts ordered me stop where I was, whilst they shouted down to I-wings number one for my cell number and landing. A small wall mounted card took my attention to a cell where I happened to be standing. I read the information that every cell had because they were all occupied and contained the barest facts on their occupants: name, prison number, age, religion, which is defined by the colour of the card and the length of your sentence. The one I was looking at was a lifer and aged fifty five with no religion, curiously I looked in to see what a lifer looked like and not sure what I was expecting to see. I was left disappointed because no one was in. The shout came back, ‘forty one on the threes,’ I’d know soon enough this was my new home foreseeable future.

I stepped in and noticed how clean it was with no lingering smell of urine and for the first time in months, I opened a door that led to a small and mostly private bathroom. It still had a window facing the landing for guards to look through and before I unpacked my kit, I sat in peace and relieved myself of the heavy burden of carrying stodgy food around in my bowls. Just a simple act, but I could never go on command and timing my bowl movements to a fifteen minute slop out was not working. I made my bunk up that was on the opposite wall to my cell mates with a single wooden cupboard separating our sleeping quarters by its width, but with enough room to stand exit the bed. Two small tables with chairs occupied the space at the end of each bunk and completed the cell furniture. The only thing that stood out was his purple bed cover almost everyone had green ones. For a lifer the cell seemed empty and quite sparse, there was nothing to indicate a long term prisoner occupied the space that I was stood in other than his bed wear. Not even a photo or card displayed so I had no clue who I would be sharing the cell with, although stark it was also clean and inviting. Looking through the horizontal slit in the modern cell door at the returning inmates, told me it was nearly lunch time because the wing filled with noise from multiple conversations and footsteps. The familiar sound of heavy locks turning filled my ears and the door opened, stepping out onto the landing I looked around without recognising any faces. Minutes later they shouted the threes landing down for food and before I had a chance to get a feeling for the wing, I was back in the cell with my midday meal and new pad mate. I introduced myself. He stood from his eating position and turned around with a warm smile and shook my hand.

“Abdul Baari,” he said with a quiet but reassuring tone to his voice.

He immediately sat back down and carried on eating his meal of mashed potatoes, meatless stew of some sort and peas. I followed his lead and sat with my back to his, listening to the only sound coming from the landing as the guards recounted for a second time before heading off for their own midday meal. My mind started filling in the huge gaps in our short conversation so I pondered his name in the silence that surrounded our meal. It sounded foreign from some distant shore, along with his accent and skin tone pointing to the East maybe India. He was about an inch or so smaller than me in height and at least a stone lighter with black hair that was clearly thinning. Strangely I thought he looked quite similar to me just an older version. I was keen to ask about his life, which seemed so out of character for me yet I patiently waited for him to finish. I’d eaten my food in less than half the time and was eager to talk, but he stood up took his metal tray and utensils to the sink and washed them, this act surprised me. Every prisoner placed the metal tray outside the cell door when opened up for the cleaners to pick up and wash.

“I like to sleep after my meal before returning to work,” Abdul said quietly and promptly went to sleep.

He showed a total lack of interest in me and I felt really disappointed but unsure why. I assumed he would open up and tell me his story so I could get some insight into his character, but he was like the cell and had no personality. What was also odd in those first few hours I had incredible urge to reveal my story to him. This was so strange and totally out of character for me, because I was the shop on the high street that was always closed and never opens for business. Out of boredom came a conversation within the walls of my own mind and it told me I wasn’t interested in this strange man. Yet something deep within told me that wasn’t true and this secondary advice I knew to be true, because I was already drawn to him by his lack of words. Most people give you their life story or a concocted one in the first few minutes of meeting, especially in a confined space. He woke five minutes before the doors opened for trays out and work detail, washed his hands and gave me a simple cheerio on his way out. I scanned the landing to see what the guards were up too and noticed many convicts banging their own cell doors shut before going to work. I closed ours over so it appeared locked and waited to see if I had a lazy screw on my landing or a keen one. I listened to the many conversations and footsteps until they faded into one individual cleaner picking the metal meal trays up and ventured out to speak to him.

“A lad any chance of getting a message sent to B-wing today?” I asked with hope more than any real conviction.

“Yea no prob, I can pass it on when I go pick the hot trollies up from the kitchens at tea time,” he said it with experience so I passed him an envelope with a small note inside informing Smigger where I was and to attend Sunday Mass. Church in Walton Jail was full most weekends because it was one of the few places you could meet up with lads off other wings. Not many went there to speak to God it was all about the hours exercise on G-wings yard and a chance to meet up and source business or a place to sort it out. The yard on Sunday was the place to do it.

“Why aren’t you in work?” the shout was from a senior guard on the two’s.

“I’m not in work,” I replied with a nonchalant dismissive pose.

“Then why are you out of your cell?” He said with suspicion in his voice. 

“I’m not boss I’m on the way in.”

I returned to my cell and banged the door up feeling pissed off with my situation. I lay there unsure if I was missing Smigger, the weed or both. I couldn’t get to Eddy before I left so my cupboard was bare. I’d only been in Walton a few weeks and already had three months added to my sentence and placed on closed visits but what was worse, I had no resin. A couple of hundred metres away, there was stash that belonged to both of us and it was calling me but I had no way to answer its need to be smoked. My circumstances had changed unexpectedly and my entertaining friend was gone with only boredom left to replace him. My thoughts drifted as the hours passed and I realised how much easier Smigger made my life in jail and felt guilty for the trouble I’d caused us both over the last couple of days, before my mind filled with past memories of our childhood. Were both very different in appearance and personalities, but had bond that tied us together in ways neither of us could see nor understand at the time and it went much deeper than any outward reflection. Family life for us was also different but at the same time very alike. I had eight brothers and sisters with no father and a mother I never got to see because she was forever working. I was brought up by my siblings, who were busy living their own lives and weren’t interested in what their young brother got up to or where he went. Smigger was the only child and could do nothing right in the eyes of his drunken mother who often goaded his father into beating him. We found solace in each other and when trouble came knocking we faced it together. I lay there remembering one such night. I was a sleep in bed before being woken by small stones hitting my bedroom window followed by a whistle I knew well. I crept down stairs and opened the back kitchen door to find Smigger shivering to the cold November night in a pair boxer shorts and nothing else. We sneaked back upstairs to my room, where my younger brother was also sleeping and he recounted his story.

He’d jumped out his bedroom window to escape his father who was attacking him with a belt that carried a heavy brass buckle. We talked for hours and came up with a plan to get rid of his father or least try give him some overdue pay back. The following night we lay in wait in the back entry behind Smigger’s family home, anxiously waiting for his father’s return from the local pub and enter the house through the back door. I was shaking with a mixture of fear and cold, whilst my nostrils filled with the smells of my hiding place and the nauseous odour of cat urine and rotting food waste. I looked up to escape the scene, the dark clouds and wild night up above seemed to be captured in the moment and had the stillness of an oil painting. The fear of what was about to happen filled my mind and all I wanted to do is run away but the love for my friend cancelled these fears out. I’d always wanted a father and it seemed strange that my friend wanted to get rid of his, even though the man was a waste of space, I couldn’t help thinking that something was better than nothing. We heard him before he seen us and stood up to confront him, he must have been forty years of age and a good fourteen stone, our combined ages of twelve or thirteen couldn’t reach his age or his weight. Yet we battered him into a sub-missive and protected pose in minutes, before he started crying and begging for us to stop. I backed away because I could feel his pain deep inside me and it made me feel uncomfortable, but Smigger took years of pent up beatings to him and I just watched. His father told everyone the next day that he’d been mugged on the way home from the pub, but he couldn’t lie to himself and left the family home for good shortly afterwards. The man was a coward who feared his wife and now his son. After that night everything changed, my friend was now the man of the house who gained the upper hand on his mother. I never saw him beat his mother but when she started to kick off in one of her drunken rages he’d point at her. 

“Remember what you used to do to me mother, I’ll do the same to you?” This threat carried an awful secret only they knew.

No matter how drunk she listened to those words and backed down. He never told me exactly what it was she did but he did tell me the reason for the beatings. No more than four or five years of age and being bathed by his mother, when the front door bell interrupted his Sunday bath time and she left him to answer the door. It was the local Catholic Priest Father Finlay. His mother failed to return so he climbed out of the warm wet fun, when it cooled to venture down stairs and look for her. Walking into the front parlour to find them both chatting over a cup of tea in polite and gentile manner but her act was not to last. They both turned around to find him standing in the doorway, naked, dripping wet with an erection. He had no idea why she reacted the way she did or what was wrong, until Father Finlay left the house. In her crazy confused mind, something that he had no control over and natural occurrence had shamed her in front of the Catholic Church and she was going to beat his sinful ways out of him and his tortured childhood began.