My First Year in Prison Ch. 20

"If you are referring to the mass shooting, yes. You would be correct."

I had no idea where he was going with this so I chose to be neutral.

"What else could I be talking about?" He marked a pause. "Human beings are complex creatures. Who knows what twisted, defective, broken cell in his brain made Kim snap?"

I swallowed my saliva; I did not want to say anything that I would regret. The warden continued.

"If you want my opinion, the kid was a looney from the start and everything that happened is just an unfortunate and unpredictable turn of events. Don't you think so?"

"I... I don't know, Sir. As you said, human beings are complex and I think a lot of factors came into play and..."

He cut me off.

"You did lose your license to practice though, so who can say your expert opinion would be more valid than mine?"

This time I could not help myself. The words came out in my mouth by themselves:

"What the fuck do you want from me then? Why asking those questions if you don't want me to answer them?"

"Wow. Calm down here. This is precisely because of those kinds of irrational reactions that I wanted to talk with you. With everything that is going on, I need inmates I can count on, who won't be reckless or dangerous."

"I'm not irrational... nor dangerous." I whispered under my breath.

I cannot say for sure that the warden heard me. In any event, he did not pay the slightest attention to this comment.

"As you know, this is only human to look for someone to blame every time something terrible happens. We just cannot satisfy ourselves with the fact that there may have been an accident, we have to name a victim and a culprit. I mean, this is why many of your have ended locked up behind bars, society needs an offender, a bad guy."

"I'm not sure I'm following where you are going with this... Sir."

"In our case like in many others, the judicial system follows his unstoppable course to find culprits and once again, we had to bother ourselves with paperwork, hearings, trials, enquiries, to find one, or several, persons responsible for an unfortunate accident."

After that last sentence, the warden remained silent for a while. One of his usual techniques to make me uncomfortable. I made sure that I did not break the silence; I did not want him to feel like he was successfully playing me. When he realized I would not budge, he had to continue with his ridiculous speech.

"Braxton, I was informed that you will be requested to attend an official hearing shortly. They have really outdone themselves this time, this is going to be a whole thing, televised and all."

"A hearing about the shooting?"

"Jesus, Braxton, I thought you were smarter than the others. Of course, the shooting! What else? There's a witch hunt taking place as we speak and I simply wanted to make sure that you were clever enough to know where your interest lies in this."

"My interest? Again, I don't follow. You... You want me to lie in my testimony?"

He stood up immediately, banging his fist on the table. I jumped.

"Never. Again. Say. That. I. Am. Asking. You. To. Lie."

"Sorry... I'm sorry, Sir."

The bang on the table. The bang of the gun. Fuck me, I was trembling in my chair like an idiot. I was still fully traumatized. When the warden realized how distraught I was, he sat back down.

"It's the exact opposite, Tyler. I want you to tell the truth! You are a white, well-educated, man. Your voice will be heard. You have been thrown in a pit filled with savages and those savages have lost their minds and have put you in danger. This is only right that you can tell your truth. So, what happened that day? Tell me."

I was still shaking and clearly not in a state to retell the event of the worst day of my life.

"Everything happened so fast, Sir. I don't know... And I don't think that I can..."

"Come on, it's not that difficult. Let me sum it up for you. The inmates you are locked up with started a fight on a foolish pretext in the cafeteria. During this fight, things escalated quickly and one of the inmates, visibly suffering from a mental illness, took a gun from a guard. Is that correct?"

"I guess but..."

"You don't guess, you know, Braxton. The guy snapped; he shot six inmates randomly before killing himself. Correct?"

There was so much more to this. I had not realized it but I had started crying while the warden was talking to me. I hated being this weak.

"Correct..." I mumbled.

I was not actually agreeing with him but I needed to get away from this man and his creepy office before I threw up.

The warden smiled.

"So, we are aligned and that's all there is to say."

In another of his classic moves, the warden moved from his desk to come and stand behind me. He held my shoulders.

"You have less than four weeks left before you can go back to your family, Tyler. This parenthesis in your life is almost over. Now, I don't think you want to make any wave before leaving this place, right? Anything that could jeopardize you going back home?"

I did not respond. Once again, he had me.

"We have let a lot of things slide. We are not blind; we are fully aware of the gross and disgusting things you are doing with Jensen, but we have decided to..."

I cut him off:

"Gross things? Are not they the same thing you were asking from me a few months ago?"

He slapped me. I shut up immediately, regretting my outburst once again.

"Do not test my patience or my limits, Braxton. I have granted you that early release because I don't think you belong to this place with the other savages. A single mistake and I could make the judge go back on that order. I could have you locked up in here for years, probably all of your life if I wanted to do so. So now, I think here's the time to be a little grateful. Am I clear?"

He was quite literally twisting my wrist at that point.

"It is clear, Sir." I said, being semi-surprised that I was still able to talk despite the fact that I was utterly terrified.

"Perfect then." He finally let go of me. "Just keep your testimony short and simple, then. Do not make any wave and I will be happy to see you leave this place in just a few weeks."

I did not move at first but then he specified, "we're done here", and I understood it was my cue to leave.

It was true. An inmate had killed other inmates. Kim had probably gone crazy. Xander had not been murdered by a guard. Still, I held the prison responsible and this meeting only comforted my opinion. If Deen had made this warning to me, that could only mean that he knew damn well that his own prison had played an important role in the killing of seven persons. Negligence, errors, faults, corruptions, frauds, rapes... you name it, but this facility had to respond of its actions.

I had been wanting to go after the system for weeks at this point, and as I was walking back to my cell, I was more determined than ever. The warden had made a terrible mistake there. Maybe if he had not pressured me like that, I would have back down, but now, more than anything in the world, I wanted to take the opportunity of this testimony to bring him down.

He wanted me to say the truth. I would.

He wanted me not to make waves. I would do much worse than that.

Maybe I was terrified by the sound of gunshots, maybe I was afraid of conflict, but I was not a coward. At least, I no longer was.

[TO BE CONTINUED]

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Four more chapters before the end, guys! I hope you enjoy this crazy ride. As usual, please let me know your feedback.