Being Murdered

The Time I Was Killed In Prison

It was the late 1990's and I was still at the beginning of my sentence in a high-security state penitentiary. I may have been an 18-year-old maniac/moron yet even then, the appropriateness of a murderer being 'murdered' wasn't lost on me. However, what came before and after is far more interesting than that moment itself.

My time in prison started off better than many I would come to witness over the years. Not by some design or plan on my part but rather through sheer luck and the grace of Convicts who saw something in me worth raising up. Unfortunately for me though you don't earn your name through a single fight or through association. I was on the right track but I was not yet established. A Young Blood isn't one of the fellas yet and my blood was very young.

Like many my age I was brash, shortsighted, and overconfident. I still viewed losing a fight as the other guy getting lucky and I actually believed it. I was quick to escalate things unnecessarily and worse yet, I had a sharp enough mind to make my words into weapons to provoke the same in others. Yet none of the wisdom to temper myself. That would prove to be literally my fatal flaw.

I went after anyone for any reason like a dog that snaps at strangers during a walk. I didn't understand it back then but I was afraid of the men around me. They were grown and strong and loud and bigger than life. Which meant I had to beat all of them. Show them I'm no coward, that I "ain't no bitch" as I'm embarrassed to admit I said too often. While wild aggression is undeniably effective on normal people in the real world, it had limited benefits in my new home. In fact, it was my greatest liability. A guy walking around with his chest puffed out in prison will quickly find himself facing the man who's going to deflate him. I was no exception.

Many encounters and skirmishes lead to that unique moment. Looking back I'm ashamed I couldn't see or accept it. Individuals and even groups confronted me. Telling me I needed to calm my wild ass down, to watch my mouth. Being told 'fuck around and find out' was a term back then too. Even the men who were on my side tried to explain things to me, what I was doing wrong, attempting to teach me. All I heard was they thought I couldn't handle it, that they were trying to tell me how to act and what to do. Thank God I'll never be that young again.

Then one day I went too far. An old Black man, in his 70s, was standing at the hot water fountain with his cup of instant coffee in hand. I cut in front of him with my own as he told me, "it ain't hot yet" referring to the hot water heater. I told him to shut up and he said, and I'll never forget, "I was trying to speak to you, not at you, youngin". God damn me for taking that the wrong way. Angry that he spoke to me after I told him not to, I slapped that man, grabbed his shirt, and got into his face. Saying something to the effect of "I ain't about to listen to no shit from some old pedophile mother fucker, now sit your ass down" and I shoved him hard into the table behind him. Hard enough he fell to the floor. Hard enough I badly hurt his back. God damn me.

Unbeknownst to me, that immediately triggered the events that followed. That old man I had disrespected and attacked wasn't the creature I accused him of being. He was an OG in one of the primary gangs and was almost 40 years into his triple life sentence. Because I myself was not established, there would be no parlay, no meetings of men to settle damages. No one-on-one fights or even a proper jumping to teach me a lesson. Within minutes of my actions even the Convicts who were trying to teach me gave their blessing to the members of this gang to handle their business. As one of my brothers told me later, admitting to their involvement, "you dug your own hole in that one" In hindsight, it made sense. I wasn't actually affiliated with anyone.

I was completely oblivious to what was going on around me as I walked over to the laundry room to collect my bag. How could I have ever been so naive, so dumb? I noticed these things, these clues, yet paid them no mind whatsoever. The prison block behind me had fallen completely silent. The guards were mysteriously missing from the front desk. Even the man I spoke to in that room looked at everything except me. What was coming couldn't have been more obvious had the Grim Reaper himself walked up and asked me for a cigarette.

I remember nothing of what followed. This part of the story I can only share because others shared it with me.

He was standing in the prison block laundry room, this young man, with his back to the door. Unseen, one of this gang's enforcers quickly crept up from behind. He was unaware of the danger and because of this could make no attempt to defend himself. He simply stood there making idle small talk with another inmate who made certain to not alert him to the man approaching. With a padlock clipped to the buckle of a belt, this enforcer swung with the precision and confidence of an experienced killer. Not downward to bounce off the hard helmet-like top of his head, but rather sideways and slightly upwards to strike exactly where the spine meets the skull. That small, soft, and vulnerable indentation. Curved perfectly to receive his sentenced execution.

I died instantly.

Accounts vary depending on who told me what happened however everyone agreed I was dead when my head bounced off the tile flooring. Though I'll never know if it was designed to end that quickly or if he got an unbelievably lucky shot. I imagine he told the story as he meant for it to go precisely as I did. That said, this had been a clean kill. The kind that leaves little evidence for the state to work with in an investigation. My murderer quickly searched for my pulse and, using a mirror he’d brought with him, checked my breath to make certain I was dead before hurrying away. He had simply turned me off like an old VCR. Everyone cleared out except the laundry

porter who watched me die. His role was now to pretend to fetch help having witnessed me 'mysteriously collapse for no reason'. His account of how long I remained dead was one of the few I have to share. He ran to get the guards who were magically back at their post and they all raced back to me. It's important to keep up appearances, to put on the appropriate show. One guard checked me for signs of life before hitting his alarm. I was told he called over his radio, "we've got a body".

Between that moment and the medical team's arrival, Hell had apparently decided it didn't want me yet. Though I didn't regain consciousness I did begin breathing again. Guesses for how long I was dead range from three to ten minutes. I genuinely have no idea how long. I always guessed less. However, for that stretch of time, my assailant was my murderer and the number of killers in the world didn't change.

I didn't wake up until several days later. When I did it was in a bed in the prison infirmary. I don't recall a bright light. My life hadn't flashed before my eyes. I'm afraid to say I encountered nothing to share. However, that's not to say that nothing happened. It was a couple of hours before the staff noticed I had regained consciousness. Enough time for me to remain perfectly still and figure out what was going on. Even then I understood to not draw attention to yourself until you assessed your situation.

During that time, I figured out something was wrong with me yet it wasn't the injury that I had sustained. I'd been harmed enough in life to grasp being injured, that wasn't it. Rather something was missing. To this day I don't have words for it, the closest I've come is to say not all of me came back. I knew that someone had got me yet my mind was quiet about it. I wasn't angry or afraid. I could hear myself thinking and they were most definitely my thoughts yet it was as if it wasn't my voice any longer. At least, not the voice I knew.

I do not mean this metaphorically as in the changes that accompany lessons learned. I wasn't smarter or wiser. I knew that. It was as if a different version of myself was behind the wheel. I felt hollow, and with that saddened. Sadness had never been in my range of emotions and I didn't want it. The more confused I became by this the less I wanted to be awake. It was unnerving, like a hallway that had no echo, unsettling and unnatural.

It should go without saying that I was grilled by prison staff about what happened and what I could remember. I gave them nothing. By that point, other inmates had already told me what happened yet all I ever said was "all I remember is feeling dizzy" I think some believed me and others didn't. I'm certain at least a few wanted to know what I might say out of their own self-preservation, yet they had nothing to worry about. The Game had raised me in such a way that we could've watched a video of him taking my life and I would've said "that ain't me".

Eventually, I found myself back in gen-pop with the men who wanted me dead. I was ready. That ghostly thing haunting me was driving. I was going to give them hell when they came for me but that wouldn't mean I didn't understand. It made sense. I accepted it.

Yet I didn't find a gang of assassins. Instead, I was approached on the open compound by one of my friends. Only him. He walked up to me and said "fuck if you didn't just walk off dyin' dumbass" It was said in humor but neither of us laughed. I knew he was there to collect me. He handed me a cigarette and told me to follow him as we began walking toward the gym. The gym with the blind spot to end all blind spots bathroom. I asked almost rhetorically if he was taking me to be finished off. To his credit, he shrugged and said, "I don't know, maybe" I didn't believe that he didn't know but I walked with him anyway. There was no sense in doing otherwise, I had nowhere to go. I just took a slow drag of that cigarette and nothing had ever tasted better in my life.

When we arrived sure as the sun rises they were there. I was unarmed yet looking at their numbers it wouldn't have mattered had I brought a machine gun. This time it wasn't going to be a stealthy killing, it was going to be a public execution. I had an audience. I stuck my chest out and tried to hide the shaking in my knees as I approached them. Making eye contact all along the way. And there, sitting on the bottom row of the bleachers, the old man I harmed to start all of this.

He looked at me while addressing my friend. "You still speaking for him?" He asked with a hard and cold look on his face. I turned my head to look at him because that meant he had been speaking up for me before then. He said yes, he still spoke for me. That's when the old man addressed me. I remember it clearly. "I know you ain't no punk with the money these boy's spendin' on your crazy White boy ass. Ain't no ass ever been worth that".

This was the day I learned that everything in the joint is business. All things come back to money, everything is part of the hustle, the Game. Even beef has a market value. These men who had taken me in early on were old school Convicts themselves and were well-wired into the prison and its workings. These men spent a penitentiary fortune to buy my life back. With drugs, guards, lines of transport, and just old-fashioned cash in hand they worked out a deal with these men I had wronged.

The old man told me to come over. As I did the guy sitting next to him got up and I took his seat. We just sat there in silence for a minute. Just sitting. After what felt like an eternity the old man said to me, "ain't none of us shit without our boys" he loosely gestured to the group around him and then to the man who had accompanied me, "maybe you need to learn that, youngin'." I nodded in response. "you got problems with any of mine?" He asked obviously referring to what had happened "or do you know how to accept a mother fuckin' gift?" I told him I understood, which I actually did. We sat a moment longer and I asked a question of my own. "You ain't gonna take this wrong if I say 'I get it' because cause I ain't on any of that 'I deserved it shit"? He said it was all good, it's done now.

Later, in my cell, I lay there staring up at the ceiling from the top bunk. I could hear everyone on the block joking and talking. The slam of dominos being played. Music coming from some contraband radio down the range. It all felt, right. It felt natural. That's when I stopped worrying about the day I died in prison and began wondering about the day I was born there.