Serenity Now!

This is from the memoir I wrote about my meth addiction and recovery.  I’m currently seeking representation.

“Squat and cough,” she says. This series of routine procedures is more humiliating than the arrest. I’m stripped of all my dignity-–all my identity. As a bail bondsman I’m well known around the jail. I have status in the underworld, too. All kinds of people know me and I have power, but standing here naked, it’s just me and I hate myself. I’m ashamed of my nakedness and ashamed that I’m crying. Stripped of all facades, all the outer layers that protect me, I’m vulnerable and exposed. The officer looks at me as if I’m a slug–something she’d rather not see, but here I am anyway.

When I finally get my blue jail uniform I stop crying, grateful to be covered again. A guard leads me and two other women down a long hall. One of them is talking non-stop to the guard. She’s obviously been here before. The guard leads us through locked doors and down corridors glaring obscenely from the overhead fluorescents. I have no idea what to expect in county jail. I’ve worked for Jill–writing bail bonds–for three years, so I know my way around, but it’s different on this side. Walking down the concrete corridor feels like walking into the abyss.

“Do not show fear,” I tell myself. “And for fuck’s sake, don’t cry.” Jesus. I can’t cry. That would be even more humiliating than being strip-searched.

We stop at a door, and a guard, on the inside, buzzes us in. The lights are dim in the dormitory. It’s the middle of the night, but everyone is awake. There are two levels of double bunk beds. I have no idea how many women are here. I can feel their eyes sizing me up. I look past the sea of faces. I know some of them recognize me either from bonding them out or because I’ve sold meth to them.

The guard is male, and he’s telling the three of us the rules, though I barely hear his voice. We each get a plastic cup with a toothbrush, trial size bar of soap, plastic spoon, sweatshirt, blanket and a sheet. He assigns us a bunk and points me to mine.

“Jesus. This is even worse than I imagined,” I think looking down at the skeleton of metal that is my bed. I start to put my sheet on it, when a woman comes over and stops me.

“This is it,” I think. “I just got here and I already have to deal with a bull-dyke.”

“You need to get your mattress,” she says. “Hey!” She yells at the guard. “She didn’t get no mattress!”

“It’s okay,” I tell her. “I can get it.” But she’s already dragging a thin, worn mattress up the stairs. She smiles at me and I can see she’s only got one front tooth. Great. Now I’m probably in debt to her.

She shows me how to slip the mattress into the sheet the same way I’d slide a sandwich into a baggie, and before retreating to her bunk a few feet away tells me if I need anything just ask her. Despite the guard’s intermittent warnings to shut up and go to sleep, the hushed chatter is constant. I take off my oversized Keds sneakers. They’ve removed the laces: they don’t want anyone hanging herself in here, although I don’t know how it would be possible. There’s absolutely no privacy. Even the toilet is exposed with only a half wall on one side so the male guards can’t watch the women drop their pants and squat down on the cold plastic.

I fold the sweatshirt into a makeshift pillow and lie down. I’m still in shock from the arrest. I can’t get my mind around the fact that I’m actually in jail. Lying there with my face in my arms, all I can think about is my son. I wish I were at home. I wish I could crawl into bed with him until morning. It’s so cold here, and I feel so alone. How easy it would be to get lost in the system–erased from the outside world, forgotten with no one to remember me and no home ever again. Home. The word has never sounded so sweet. My tears flow silently into my make-shift pillow, and I drift into sleep thinking, “My God. What have I done?”

…to be continued…