Okay. So I write about controversial social issues. All of my characters are diverse in race, age, creed, and sexual orientation. And here I go again. :o)
Not many would know the emotional impact that society has over a quiet, sensitive gay person because they are the ones who are rarely seen or heard and live in ongoing fear of the hatred against them just for being alive. Send that type of person into a difficult, life-altering situation and what comes out of it is a story never expected and one that many would never dare to admit… The truth about it is that it could happen to almost anyone.
Warning: Adult Language. Violence & Sexual Situations implied
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“Torn: Sixty Days of Calaboose”
(A Fictional Memoir – Contemporary Psychological Drama)
“It is said that a mind is a terrible thing to waste…
For some, it is also a very terrifying thing to lose…”
Accused of a crime for revenge, a sensitive, feminine male struggles to keep his sanity while incarcerated in a small town county jail fully inhabited by a variety of unpredictable strangers. In the midst of constant fear, lies, prejudice, and madness, he finds more…
Excerpt:
The United Rural Farmers Detention Center (U.R.F.D.C.) located on the center-south side of downtown was a new place with an old name and a reputation that preceded it for many generations. In the whole county, name recognition was everything from Judges, Lawyers, business owners, city officials and more. The U.R.F. had its share as well, all the way up the chain of Command, and just like everyone else in the county, some of them also had a few brushes with the law, but none of their names would ever follow the word “inmate.” That was just one of the stories that would pop into Adrian’s mind as he sat cuffed to a metal bench, waiting his turn to be processed. Another horrific tale that would come to mind was the stories of beatings, abuse of authority, and even rape. Being asked for a contact name in case of rape was actually one of the questions on the inmate registration form. Adrian insisted to leave that section blank because if something like that happened, what good would it do him to call any of his people and tell them that.
While the entrance attendant was re-working his booking papers, Adrian was un-cuffed and handed over to a guard and led to the nearest holding tank down the hall. On the way, the guard, a stocky young guy with glasses and a crooked smile asked Adrian a personal question.
“You really thirty-eight,” he asked point blank and staring.
“Yes,” Adrian said soft and plain.
“Humph. You don’t look it,” the guard decided to say. Adrian wasn’t sure if he should thank him for the compliment or worry he was fishing for a date. Instead, he simply nodded his head forward and moved on to where he was being led.
When the guard had him delivered to the holding cell, he had the look on his face like he wanted to ask something else. The question was easy to figure considering Adrian’s obvious sexual orientation, but the guard only opened his mouth, closed it again, and smiled crookedly as he relocked the cell. Thinking on it later, Adrian had a whole new fear settled in his mind because he realized what the guard was clearly seeing was how feminine he looked. He was tall and thin, hair and nails were long, and his voice was as soft as any woman he knew. The fact that he favored his mother, with his father’s American Indian-mixed skin, he grew up often confused with being female, which was as close to being one as he could possibly feel. Looking the way he did, the problems he thought he could soon have were far worse than he wanted to imagine. The guard was probably thinking just that, he felt, but had the decency enough not to say it out load.
In the holding tank with a couple of other guys which eventually turned into six, Adrian hardly knew what to say or think. He just sat there with his mind reeling over what was going on. In time, the guys started to talk. Most were in there for weekend sit outs, but no other details other than simple stuff really. When it came around to his turn, he just told them the truth. To his surprise, the guys were very sympathetic but seriously warned him not to say anything about his charges once he was completely booked in. He was not sure on that, maybe because he was a little naïve, and didn’t consider what they had said until later on, mainly because he really didn’t believe he was going to be in there that long. He wasn’t being delusional, he just felt that once his family was contacted and the situation was investigated for real, the whole thing would be over and he could go on back home. Once they checked his record and found it was clean, the case would fall back on the accuser and some real serious charges would fall on her for making up such a bogus claim.
After hours of sitting in the holding tank, almost certain on how thing were bound to soon end, Adrian was pulled from the cell and taken to a skinny dark-haired male nurse who checked his vitals and gave him a TB Test. Not knowing what that whole thing was about, from the nurse’s station he was brought before the arraignment judge, a severe looking older Hispanic woman, with a no-nonsense attitude. When she called his name he stepped up to the desk before her. As she glared at him over to the top of her small specs he noticed she had blonde streaks in her short cut hair, and the rest was a light brown. After staring at him for a minute, she pushed a bail bonding form in front of him. He tried to read it all before she opened her mouth to speak.
“Sign it,” she said stern. “And I don’t want to hear anything you have to say.”
From the way she spoke to him, he thought it was like he had tried to spit in her face. By the time he was back in the holding cell, his mind was reeling from what the bonding paper said.
“Sixty thousand dollars,” he thought. “What in the hell!” He would hear later that the bond for that type of charge he was on was actually nearly three times as much. The fact that he had been given a bond also meant that he was actually being charged with a crime. The idea of his getting out of there suddenly seemed to be falling out of reach, but he wasn’t giving up hope. Some kind of agreement would surely be reached. After all, he was innocent.
An hour or so later, Adrian was taken from the holding tank, but this time by this huge Mexican dude, weighing in well over 400 pounds, with his stomach hanging over his belt. Without much talk, he took Adrian to a little room where he was stripped, sprayed with something that looked like a bug spraying container, showered and dressed in an orange button-up jumper. After that, the huge guard stepped outside of the room and said something in the effect of a sexual innuendo about him to a female passing in the hall.
“I thought I was escorting a man,” he said sounding puzzled. “Looked again and I thought he was a woman.”
“Did it turn you on,” she asked with a heavy laugh. No response followed her words, but when he came back into the room Adrian was happy to be fully dressed. He was used to that sort of talk about him his whole life. Speaking on it never did him any good. If anything, it usually only made things worse.
Following the Guard, Adrian was led to an elevator where they traveled upstairs to pick up a thin, plastic mattress and clear plastic bin to keep his personal belongings and other stuff in. On that floor he was also given a thick plastic vanilla cup, a bright orange spoon/fork thing, and a crappy ID badge with a mug shot photo in it. Adrian was mortified with the whole process but followed suit just as he was instructed to do. He was supposed to carry all that crap but he just dragged it back into the elevator, rode up another floor, and down the hall to where he was being led. He was totally unprepared for this final destination, but once there, he finally realized that up to this point he had been absolutely wrong about everything, and life as he knew it was never gonna be the same ever again…
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