It’s been a while since I posted any fiction.  Here’s a very short story I wrote this morning…

The guards stepped in to restore order after the unspoken order had already been restored.  Hmongs and Laotians presided over cell block B and over prisoner 4287554.  Joey DiMarco had been inside long enough to know the unspoken operations.  The schedule was always the same in minimum security: breakfast, work, lunch, work, exercise, dinner and lockdown.  Minor uprisings screwed with the order of things.  A new inmate challenged the unspoken order; everyone was penalized.

“It’s always the Italians,” Joey said quietly to the block wall.  Prisoner 4287554 had taken a vow of semi-silence, speaking only when spoken to; his vow did not keep him from talking to himself.  During times of unrest, especially now, when the commotion was caused by a fellow-Italian, Joey worried in whispers.  118 days until he was lying in bed with Vanessa.  She wanted to get pregnant right away, then she wanted to get married.  The smallest disturbances made the pages of the calendar stick together.

Dao was American born and spoke perfect English, better than Joey.  In the unspoken order, this was Dao’s cellblock.  “Your Italian buddy will be learning a lesson,” Dao snorted from the adjacent cell.  “Will you be speaking tonight, DiMarco?  Dao wants to ask you some questions.”  Joey had noticed Dao’s pattern of speech long before now: statement, question, followed by another statement; all in rapid succession.  Joey had determined this was Dao’s way of controlling the course of conversation.  He really didn’t care as long as the earth kept spinning and somewhere on the other side of the block the sunrise signaled the passing of another day.

“Whaddya gonna teach him?  We got nothing in common, me and him.  I don’t care what happens.”

“Dao has plans for him.  You want to hear them?  Tell me what you think about this…”  Joey was tired of Dao referring to himself in the first-person.  At first he was taken aback by the way Dao spoke so loudly about the future.  More than 400 days ago the Asian had foretold an impending suicide.  That was a couple days before McInnus was found dead, hanging from a jumpsuit noose in the bathroom.  Everyone knew it wasn’t a suicide.  Dao had told everyone what would happen.

He spoke now about the beating of the man the Asians were calling ‘Mobster.’  Joey didn’t care.  His thoughts flittered between freedom and Vanessa and McInnus and the few words he managed to catch from Dao’s speech.  The Asian laughter rang inside his skull.  They’re always laughing, he thought.  “… so it will look like an accident,” he heard Dao prophecy.

“I wonder why they laugh so much?  I never laugh.  Joey DiMarco does not laugh,” he thought while he prepared a speech of his own.  “… after the mop bucket is spilled…” then there was something about a kitchen shelf and broken plate.  Vanessa was probably so tan, like something baked in an oven.  “…head bounced on the counter…”  She tasted like orange juice.

“Don’t do it, Dao.  You’ll get more time.”  Dao laughed an Asian laugh.  “Why you guys always laughing?”

“In two weeks, it will happen.  You’ll see.  A big accident.”

A buzzer signaled a new morning.  Lights whirred to life.  “I dreamed about Vanessa last night.  She cheating on you, and she gain a lot of weight,” Dao exploded with delight.  Joey thought he sounded very oriental this morning; he always did when he was regaining control, reordering his cellblock.  “You don’t tell Dao, what not to do.  Something bad will happen to you too.  Karma, baby!” more snickering.

It was Friday, mail day; 117 days left.  Vanessa had sent a somewhat provocative photo of herself in a bathing suit.  The picture was wrapped up in a note that would never be read.  Jagged, white seams grew from her brown hips and near her arm pits.  She was drinking a tropical drink with an umbrella, three more empty glasses were on a table in the picture’s background.  An ashtray, some Marlboros and aviator sunglasses were visible on the fore of the table.  Vanessa didn’t smoke; her sunglasses were on her head.

That night Dao slipped on a spilled mop bucket and reached for an overhanging shelf.  The shelf and its contents came down with a crash.  He knocked himself unconsious on the stainless countertop and his neck was fatally pierced by a broken plate.  A pair of guards asked Joey some questions about the incident.  He showed them the picture of his ballooning girlfriend.  He laughed in a peculiarly Asian manner.  “Karma, baby,” he offered flatly.

Genesis 40 and 41