she said. “Why? Why would people do that?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t know why they don’t do it alone, either. Or in private.”
“Yes,” she said. “Maybe it’s the drugs.”
I didn’t answer for a minute or so. Then I said, “Maybe it’s the way they live.”
She stood up, looked at me with a look of surprise, and reached out and held my right arm. “Yes,” she said, “that’s probably right.”
DAY EIGHTY-THREE
I am in prison. I have been in prison five days. Just printing the word “prison” itself, on this coarse paper, is painful to me. I have never felt more alone in my life. I do not know how to live without Mary Lou.
There is a small window
in
my cell and if I look out it I can see the long, dirty green buildings of the compound, with their rusted metal roofs and heavily barred windows, under the late-afternoon sun. I have just come back from an afternoon working in the fields, and the blisters on my hands have opened and are wet, and the tight metal bracelets on my wrists sting the chafed skin beneath them. There is a bluish bruise on my side that is bigger than my hand where a moron guard clubbed me for losing time when I stumbled, my first day in the fields; and my feet ache from working in the heavy black shoes that were issued me when I first came here. I can hardly hold the pen that I am writing with, because of the cramping in my hand.
I do not know what has become of Mary Lou. The pains I can stand, for I know they could be worse and they will probably get better; but not knowing if I will ever see Mary Lou again and not knowing what has been done with her are more than I feel I can bear. I must find a way to die.
At first, without Mary Lou and with the shock of what had happened to me, I did not want to write again. Not ever. I was allowed to keep my pen and the pages of my journal, which I stuffed into my jacket pocket without thinking when I was taken away. But I had no fresh paper to write on, and I made no effort to find any. I know I had started my journal with no reader in mind—for I was, then, the only person alive who could read. But I came to realize later that Mary Lou had become my audience. I was writing my journal for
her
. It seemed to me, then, than it was pointless to go on writing in prison, in this horrible place, without her.
I know I would not be writing now if a strange thing had not happened this noon, after I had finished my morning shift at the shoe factory and had gone to wash my face and hands before eating the wretched lunch of bread and protein soup they serve us here and that we are required to eat in silence. It happened in the little steel washroom with its three dirty washstands. I had washed my sore hands as well as I could with cold water and no soap and reached up to pull a paper towel out of the dispenser. As I touched the dispenser, awkwardly because my hands were stiff and cramped from yesterday’s fieldwork, it fell open and a high stack of folded paper towels dropped into my hands. I grabbed them instinctively and then winced with the pain of it. But I held on to them, staring at them, and I realized that I was holding a stack of hundreds of sheets of strong, coarse paper. Paper that could be written on.
So much of what is important in my life seems to happen by accident. I found the reading film and books by accident, and I met Mary Lou by accident, and found
Dictionary
by accident. And the paper I am now writing on fell into my hands by accident. I do not know what to think about this; but I am glad to write again, even if no one will read it and even if I find a way to die tomorrow.
I will stop now. I have dropped the pen too many times. My hand will not hold it.
Mary Lou. Mary Lou. I cannot stand this.
DAY EIGHTY-EIGHT
It is five days since I last wrote. My hands are better now, stronger, and I can hold the pen fairly well. But my back and side still ache.
My feet are better. After
“I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t know why they don’t do it alone, either. Or in private.”
“Yes,” she said. “Maybe it’s the drugs.”
I didn’t answer for a minute or so. Then I said, “Maybe it’s the way they live.”
She stood up, looked at me with a look of surprise, and reached out and held my right arm. “Yes,” she said, “that’s probably right.”
DAY EIGHTY-THREE
I am in prison. I have been in prison five days. Just printing the word “prison” itself, on this coarse paper, is painful to me. I have never felt more alone in my life. I do not know how to live without Mary Lou.
There is a small window
in
my cell and if I look out it I can see the long, dirty green buildings of the compound, with their rusted metal roofs and heavily barred windows, under the late-afternoon sun. I have just come back from an afternoon working in the fields, and the blisters on my hands have opened and are wet, and the tight metal bracelets on my wrists sting the chafed skin beneath them. There is a bluish bruise on my side that is bigger than my hand where a moron guard clubbed me for losing time when I stumbled, my first day in the fields; and my feet ache from working in the heavy black shoes that were issued me when I first came here. I can hardly hold the pen that I am writing with, because of the cramping in my hand.
I do not know what has become of Mary Lou. The pains I can stand, for I know they could be worse and they will probably get better; but not knowing if I will ever see Mary Lou again and not knowing what has been done with her are more than I feel I can bear. I must find a way to die.
At first, without Mary Lou and with the shock of what had happened to me, I did not want to write again. Not ever. I was allowed to keep my pen and the pages of my journal, which I stuffed into my jacket pocket without thinking when I was taken away. But I had no fresh paper to write on, and I made no effort to find any. I know I had started my journal with no reader in mind—for I was, then, the only person alive who could read. But I came to realize later that Mary Lou had become my audience. I was writing my journal for
her
. It seemed to me, then, than it was pointless to go on writing in prison, in this horrible place, without her.
I know I would not be writing now if a strange thing had not happened this noon, after I had finished my morning shift at the shoe factory and had gone to wash my face and hands before eating the wretched lunch of bread and protein soup they serve us here and that we are required to eat in silence. It happened in the little steel washroom with its three dirty washstands. I had washed my sore hands as well as I could with cold water and no soap and reached up to pull a paper towel out of the dispenser. As I touched the dispenser, awkwardly because my hands were stiff and cramped from yesterday’s fieldwork, it fell open and a high stack of folded paper towels dropped into my hands. I grabbed them instinctively and then winced with the pain of it. But I held on to them, staring at them, and I realized that I was holding a stack of hundreds of sheets of strong, coarse paper. Paper that could be written on.
So much of what is important in my life seems to happen by accident. I found the reading film and books by accident, and I met Mary Lou by accident, and found
Dictionary
by accident. And the paper I am now writing on fell into my hands by accident. I do not know what to think about this; but I am glad to write again, even if no one will read it and even if I find a way to die tomorrow.
I will stop now. I have dropped the pen too many times. My hand will not hold it.
Mary Lou. Mary Lou. I cannot stand this.
DAY EIGHTY-EIGHT
It is five days since I last wrote. My hands are better now, stronger, and I can hold the pen fairly well. But my back and side still ache.
My feet are better. After
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