Detailed Planning

“ I have got a plan” Sunday announced to his teeth picking buddy while gleaning from ear to ear. “ What is it?” His friend asked a rat- like a man that has this annoying habit of picking his teeth even when he drinks water. Sunday eyed him and eyed the toothpick, sighed and shake his head. “What is your problem?” Why that stick in your hand as if you are in perennial banquet or something”

“Just forget this stick and let me hear your plan”

“ At times, I wonder if I am not dealing with the wrong guy. A bad habit like that is damn give away for any intelligent assimilation”

“ Assimilation?- you want to blend with the crowd? Is it the plan?”

He eyed him annoyingly and sighed loudly “No wonder they gave you 13 years for 8 years crime. I heard you were picking your teeth in the court that the chief judge decided to add to your sentence for you to have ample time to pick your teeth here”

“ If you know it is the reason, why complain then? I am reforming. Following judges heart desires is part of my reformation plan. You complaining for what?”

Sunday was given ten years sentence, his friend Sunday thirteen. Both were fresh meat in prison parlance. They had been only five months into their prison life. Sunday has no plan of seeing off his sentence whether eight or ten. He had been told by the judge that if his behavior is good, he will stay only eight years. Eight years might be only to the judge to him, it is a century. 

  Observing the officers that would decide whether his behavior is good or not, he concluded he doesn’t have good chance. Most players in that regards is performing far better than him. The show he had been putting on is below what he is witnessing from others. Not easy to play good guys characters. He wonders how those that live such lives manage it for years. 

He had read in books, magazines, and a little brain-washing booklet he saw in the detention house, he quickly decided to practice from there but those maggots with him there will not allow him to practice for five hours without throwing accusations or punches just to maintain space and sanity. A prison is a jungle place. Imagine being forced to use your own money to buy things for your fellow captive just to avoid physical pain. That side of good guy and good behavior is the part he found too difficult to practice. 

Humans are funny animals. Gentleman is good to play only 80 percent. The other 20, is for you to show them that anything can happen if they cross certain lines. The officers don’t understand this theory. 

Now in prison, there Is ample space than in detention houses but with many diverse characters and diverse officers. It is funny to see these criminals in action each morning and night in the name of prayers to Jesus and Mohammed. Even foreigners are not left out. God and Allah were sounding like thunder inside there each day. The noise is the type you encounter during break in primary schools. 

He was lucky that he is in the room with three inmates that reasons like him. One was among the thunder guys group but he cares not what you do or say as long as you don’t complain during his thunder time.  

One officer have tried all the tricks in his book to make that Jesus guy in his room his eyes and ears in that room but failed each time. How do you control a man that believe that Jesus is the only way out of prison?

Charles is play it safe guy. He had insinuated on the possibility of their room mates succumbing under pressure of threat or favour. 

“Maybe we should be talking in privacy. Being careful pays and hurt no one” Charles had said. 

“He doesn’t have problem” Sunday had replied. It was the officers way of bettering his situation. People has different plans of how to get to the top of any society they are in. That officer planting moles in each room is his own plan. Charles has relaxed after that assurance from Sunday. After staying five months with him, he knew him as a man that has knowledge of humans. He had not failed to noticed that all his good guy's behavior is his own game plan. Everyone has their own plan of making a quick exist from the prison. 

  Those with Prayer as their plan, those with kowtowing as their plan and those with combination of both.

The third category is where Sunday and his friends belong to. While kowtowing when necessary, at the same time looking out for perfect opportunity. He believes that combining two and three will always throw the officers and their dogs off their plans. No venture, No gain is his way of quieting his inner demon each time it starts complaining of him being too soft. 

  “ I have got a plan” he repeated to his friend 

“Let us hear it” 

“ All the books, all the history, all the magazines I read about the successfully escapes from prison each time follows a particular trend. From look of things, authorities are yet to get wise to the trend. That is exactly what I have in mind. Rainy season trend. All happened during rainy season”

 “ But we are still in dry season, how is it going to work?”

“ That is exactly where the uniqueness of the plan rest”

He bent low and lower his voice while narrating in detail how it is going to work, and time involved.

  Afterward, he eyed their faces and saw the smile on each, that was when he knew that his days are numbered in Shanger prison.

  Dreamers can be successful as planners too. When genuine Jesus apostle is also interested for the first time in five months in his speech, heaven is interested. He smiled to all again as he repeated to himself. “I have got a plan”