“Ghetto Robespierre”

I’m taking attendance for the creative writing class I’m teaching. I notice we’re a person short.

“Where’s Preacher?” I ask Cliff. They lock in the same unit, and are always seen together.

“Ehh, he had to lock up.”

“What happened? He didn’t strike me as a dope fiend.”

“He wasn’t. These…” I can tell he wants to use a racial slur “…guys went after him.”

“Oh, what unit are you in again?”

“E.”

“I know what you’re talking about,” I say. I turn to Joe. “I’d heard about these guys in my recovery group. Apparently, they’re blowing down on all the white guys on store day and fucking up the vibes. Dude said he had to sleep with one eye open and a knife underneath his pillow.”

I turn to Cliff.”So what happened to Preacher?”

Here’s the story he told:

Preacher mostly kept to himself. He went to church, read the Bible, and went to weight pit with Cliff. Unfortunate bunk circumstances had him housed in the same cube with Turtle, a notorious racist built like Terry Crews.

Turtle often went on diatribes about white people. Since he was an old head, he had several youngin’s under his wing. 

One of these guys, Mook, put these teachings into practice. 

On store day, Mook accosted Preacher, and demanded he hand over everything.

Preacher, to his credit, refused, willing to accept the consequences. Mook, who wasnt that big, entered the cube and swung on Preacher. 

Preacher fought back, landed a couple punches, and eventually, prevailed. Mook scurried away defeated. Preacher thought that that was the end of the matter.

In the days after, Mook regrouped and recruited accomplices. A profitable idea spawned in his little brain. They bought and whittled themselves weapons out of any scraps of metal they could locate. 

Once equipped, they blew down on Preacher again, knives out. His courage faltered at the sight of tetanus-inducing steel, and left the cube without a word. They took everything–TV, tablet, sweats, food, and coffee–save for his state-issued clothing.

He locked up immediately, not feeling safe in his own bunk. Rightly so. They would’ve come after him every time he bought new stuff.

Basking in the easy success of intimidation thru numbers, Mook and his gang of roving marauders broadened their horizons. 

Next store day, Mook walks up and down the hallways, yelling, “I’m about to take all yo white boys shit.”

By white boys, he doesn’t intend to pilfer from literally every white guy. He’s not political like Turtle. He just means the ones he thinks won’t fight back or cause an issue. The ones for whom there are no repercussions for waving a shiv at.

This upped the ante from the personal to the tribal. Mike, the guy from my recovery group, started going to sleep armed. 

Mook and his cronies blow down on one white guy then another, carefully selecting their prey. They come armed with knives, but in reality, they don’t want smoke. They don’t truly want to use the bangers. Things could get messy and complicated, very quickly, and they’re all supposed to go home in 18 months. 

Their victims are uniformly white, mostly goofy. Almost none worked out. Preacher, who lifted weights, was the exception, and he only caught their ire because he stood up to Mook the first time around.

For two weeks, everyone walks on eggshells, awaiting the next attack.

Eventually, the guards figure out what’s happening. At the beginning of his shift, the unit regular heads straight to Mook’s bunk, and takes everything he owns except for a couple of state issued drawers.

Mook doesn’t complain. He waits in the day room, and sucks his teeth menacingly. 

He goes on the offensive the next shift, retaking what he’s lost. 

The regular takes it all over again the following day. 

The cycle goes on for a week, until all of his accomplices are transferred out of the unit. His group of marauders has been reduced to one.

Mook is suddenly more levelheaded. He doesn’t steal any longer. He doesn’t threaten white boys. Mostly, he keeps to himself until he’s sent to another facility.

This reign of terror came to an uncharacteristically peaceful end. These pillaging gangs erupt once or twice a year, so I’ve seen much more dramatic demises. Like political purges and the historical Reign of Terror, the instigators eventually receive violent retribution or the same kind of punishment that they inflicted on innocent people.

Just last summer, the same exact thing happened in the same unit. Eventually, they got greedy and fucked with the wrong white boy. This particular white boy abided by the convict code. He made vows on “his diamond” (a gang-related tattoo), and didn’t care about getting flopped.

His revenge was coolly planned, and expertly executed. Without a warning, he waited until his attacker went to sleep at night, and then boiled coconut oil in the microwave, walked into dawg’s cube, and threw it on dawg’s face, melting it off.

When horrible people do horrible things and meet a horrible fate, that’s the universe restoring balance. Mook’s bad karma has yet to resolve itself.