Condemned

Four hours until midnight. Then it’ll all be over. Thank God. 

Death Watch officially begins seven days before the execution. That’s a long week. 

It’s been forever since I’ve seen my family. Once this is done, we’ll make up for lost time. 

The decision to schedule the first execution of the year at precisely 12:01 a.m.—midnight leaves a nagging doubt as to what day it actually is—puts quite the crimp on the holiday plans. Hard to enjoy eggnog around the tree with the fam when you know what’s about to go down. 

One minute after the ball drops in Times Square, a three-drug combo of midazolam, vecuronium bromide, and potassium chloride will be making its merry way through the veins of SK987, followed by unconsciousness, paralysis, and heart stoppage, in that order—assuming all goes according to plan. Another scumbag gone to meet his Maker. 

Most of the time it’s just the two of us. In a special little area reserved for the most special inmates. The only thing separating us is the bars. They’ve recently been painted. Powder blue. You can still smell the paint. 

When you view a person through bars, they look different. Sure, the bars provide a physical barrier, for security, but that’s only for starters. There’s a lot more than steel separating us. You find bars on cages. And cages house animals. 

You don’t feel too much remorse over putting an animal in a cage. Animals probably don’t even know they’re in a cage. Plus, it’s for their own good—keeps them from running off and getting into trouble. Or if it’s a ferocious beast, keeps them from killing again.

Six people are dead because of that animal on the other side of the bars. A mass murderer if there ever was one. But without the benefit of the bars, you might never know it. Well, that and the monkey suit. Take that off and he could be the random guy standing behind you in Wal-Mart. 

Adolf Eichmann didn’t look like a mass murderer either. The term “banality of evil” was coined in his honor. He looked more like an insurance salesman than the architect of the Holocaust, a butcher of millions. Just following orders, he said.

He doesn’t fool me though. I know what he’s done. If there were an electronic malfunction and the door to the cell suddenly swung open, and it was just him and me, I have no doubt the body count would rise to seven. It doesn’t matter that I’m physically bigger and stronger than him. His heart is black. Evil is not constrained by the physical. He’s operating on a whole other level.

All he does is read. Who could concentrate on a book at a time like this? He just started it yesterday, and the way he’s going through it he’ll be done by midnight. I caught the title: The Chamber, by John Grisham. Of all the books, why this one? You must have ice water flowing through your veins to read a book about an execution at a time like this. I guess he wants to know what it’s really like. Either that or he’s taunting me.

“Why you reading that book?” I ask. “You do know what it’s about, right?”

He puts the book down. Retrieves the bookmark that was stuck in the back of it, closes it and sets it next to him. Crosses his hands and puts them in his lap, stares at me with those bright blue eyes. Says nothing for a minute or two. Then he smiles. Starts to say something but evidently thinks better of it. Picks up the book and opens it again.

I see through his ruse. His hand shook when he removed the bookmark. It was a slight tremor—most people wouldn’t even notice it—but I did. He was scared. I smile. I won’t allow myself to feel pity for him. I know who he is. I know what he’s done. And what he is capable of still doing.

I’ve tried putting myself in his shoes, to imagine what it must be like to rack up the bodies and then go about your day. You still went to bed at night. Got dressed in the morning. Ate and drank and went to the bathroom. Did all the things necessary to take care of yourself. How often do you think about what you’ve done? Every day? Every hour? Every minute?

Do you think about your six victims on a rotating basis? Feel remorse about one for a while, and then move on to the next one? Or is it just a general feeling where they’re all lumped together? 

I imagine the first one must be the hardest. So maybe you dwell on that one the most. The sixth victim barely merits a passing thought. 

But I doubt that was the case with this specimen. More likely than not, he felt no remorse at all—a true psychopath. 

But then again, who am I to judge? We all have demons we wrestle with. And sometimes the demons win. The state gets to decide which sins are punishable by death, though. But that only condemns the actions, not the motives. If the heart remains hard, evil hasn’t been vanquished.

As the minutes tick by, he’s getting close to the end. Turning the pages faster than before. Sitting up a little straighter in his chair. Must be really getting off on the climax, envisioning what it’s like for a condemned man to take his last breath before all goes black and the Great Unknown takes him in.

A buzzer goes off. We both jump. It reminds me of the buzzer at a high school basketball game. We know what’s coming. Time for the final preparations before we all belt out Auld Lang Syne. 

He closes his book—he never made it to the last page. 

I stand and so does he. I take a deep breath and he does too. I see what he’s doing, mimicking my actions. A prick to the bitter end. Just to be sure, I run my hand through my hair. He does the same. I was right about him. You can’t hide your true nature.

The man behind the bars saunters over. “Ready to rock and roll, SK987?” 

“It’s Gregory,” I say softly. I grip the bars, stare at the floor. 

I tried hard to muster some bravado here at the end. But I know what I am: a condemned man with no arguments. 

He shakes his head and turns away. Two more guards walk in. The atmosphere is tight with tension. One of them, a beefy bulwark of a man with dark features, finally speaks. “Any chance the governor will call?” 

“Not a chance,” the other man says. He wears glasses and is half the size of his partner. “You don’t get a reprieve if you murder your whole family. On New Year’s Eve to boot. Timing couldn’t be more perfect. You don’t go messing around with that kind of mojo.”

The big man nods. Eyes his two companions. “This makes, what, our sixth time doing this?” 

“Seventh,” the smaller guard says. “Lucky number seven.” He studies the clock on the wall. “Looks like it’s time.”

My guard walks over to my cell. I meet his eyes this time. I mouth a silent prayer and make the sign of the cross. 

Soon, very soon, I’ll be free.