The Night Shift

Before I started working here, I thought the hardest thing about doing time was how long you had to be here. I read somewhere that they use places like this to suck the soul out of you. I’m paraphrasing, and I don’t know how true that article was, but it does feel like this place consumes you every time you walk in here. It takes everything you have to give: energy, clarity, and time. And if you’re lucky enough to walk out. You have little, if anything, left over. 

For some folks, time flies. For others, it stands perfectly still: sixteen and seventeen-year-old boys, trapped in grown men’s bodies, trying to make sense of all the choices that culminated in their arrival here. They’d never admit it, but they are scared, confused, lost, and looking for answers, validation, or both at every turn. I see it on the monitors every night. Young boys masquerade as men in the daytime and seek refuge in their pillows, books, and letters at night, hoping that somebody still cared about them somewhere beyond these walls. Ain’t that a trip? Wasn’t it their inability to care that got them here?

By the time I start my shift, they’re usually settled in their cells for the night. And at eleven thirty, whether they were ready or not, it was lights out. Well, it’s more like lights dim. The lights couldn’t be entirely out because we had to keep an eye on them. For this unit, it was just me in the security tower. I sat in a hexagon-shaped room with windows that were more like two-way mirrors on all sides, but two. One side was a wall for the monitors, and the other was for the door. Through the monitors, I had a live feed into each room, the dining hall, the breakfast hall, and the recreation area. My task was two-fold: watch them and report anything suspicious. If action needed to be taken, we had a rapid response team. Some nights, sitting behind these monitors, I felt like a god. The most privacy they had all day was in those cells. They prayed, cried, read, wrote, paced, exercised, pulled out their hair, pulled on other things, and here I was watching. At first, it made me uncomfortable; I mean, I thought surely I was violating their privacy. It bothered me so much I talked to the other guards about it. But after some time, I thought, how can I violate something they never had?

Some of them were hyperaware that they were being watched. Others either didn’t know or didn’t care. There was one guy, Walter, who spent at least a few hours during the night just staring at the camera in the corner of his cell. He wouldn’t do anything else but stand there and watch the camera. Like he could see me, see him. On time, he stared for so long that I tapped on the monitor, like you would a fish tank, because I thought maybe it was broken. He stood there in the middle of his cell, not doing anything. Just staring. 

Another guy, Mike, would pace and pray back and forth. He’d lay down for a couple of hours, then get up to kneel and pray and then pace. He’d repeat this about three or four times throughout the night. I wondered what he prayed about or who he prayed to. Did he pray so much because he was seeking forgiveness? Or was guilt eating him up? 

Most of them slept. Or at least they tried to. The rooms were unbearably small and cold, and the beds were purposely uncomfortable. It was punishment, after all. Still, a handful of them remained awake for most of the night, and as I watched them, I wondered how many of them felt the weight of it all in that room with them.  

Tonight, as I went through my shift, I was drawn to cell number thirteen on monitor six. This guy was new. I had not seen him two days ago, the last time I was on this shift. He sat in the corner of his cell, with his back facing the camera, and hunched over. It was clear he was doing something. I couldn’t tell what it was. Periodically, he would look over his shoulder and sometimes up at the camera. I figured it was nerves. The first few nights in here are the hardest. At night, the silence is deafening, and during the day, the lights are loud. But since it was the closest thing these guys had to sunlight in here, they had no choice but to absorb it. 

I leaned closer to the screen, trying to get a better look and somehow look around him. But still, nothing. 

“Hey, Chris. Time for your break. Benny sent me in to relieve you.” I jumped. Utterly unaware that someone had walked in. 

“Damn, man, you scared me. When you’d get in here? I responded to James, holding my chest. 

“I keep telling you, man, you’re too obsessed with these damn monitors.” He replied, walking up to me and motioning for me to get up so he could sit down in front of the monitors. “And don’t take too long either. You get thirty minutes. Not thirty-one. Not thirty-two. I don’t want to be in here any longer than I have to be. I hate this room, man. It creeps me out.” 

“Yea, yea, yea. I got it.” I answered and bent down to grab my lunch box from under the desk. “I’ll be back on time.” 

I made my way to the staff break room, stopping every few minutes to be buzzed out of one area and into another. I don’t know why I couldn’t just take my break in the security tower. By the time I reached the break room, I only had twenty minutes left to eat. I settled at one of the tables, took out my sandwich, and thought about that man hunched in his cell.  

When I returned to the security tower, I walked into the room to find James reading a book and swinging gently in the chair. “What are you doing, man?” I asked, sounding more upset than I wanted to let on. “You’re supposed to be watching the monitors,” I said, pointing to them. 

“I was. They’re fine. It’s just a job, man. Get over yourself.” He responded, patting my shoulder on his way out.

When I heard the door click shut behind me, I sighed and sat in front of the monitors. I took a few minutes to look at each monitor. I took out the logbook in case I needed to update anything. While the man in cell thirteen wasn’t hunched over anymore, he was still in the same spot, now leaning awkwardly against the bedpost closest to him. He wasn’t moving. I wondered if he finally fell asleep. I leaned closer to the screen, trying to decipher what I was looking at. And then I saw it. The smallest pool of liquid formed around his thigh and butt. 

I immediately grabbed the walkie. “We have a code Blue in cell thirteen, East Wing. I repeat we have a code Blue in cell thirteen, East Wing; I need medical personnel immediately,” I shouted into it as I searched for the emergency response kit and a pair of gloves. I grabbed what I needed and ran out of the security room and towards the cell. As I reached the door, I heard the buzzing and clicking mechanism that indicated the door was unlocked. I pulled on my gloves. 

“Inmate!” I shouted at him. “Inmate, are you ok?” I asked again as I cautiously approached him while putting on my gloves. I walked around him and saw that he was using his left hand to cover his right wrist. There was blood pooling under his hand and dripping from his arm. 

“Oh no, you not finna die here,” I said as I grabbed the loose sheet on his bed. I moved his hand carefully and used the sheet to apply pressure to the area to try and stop the bleeding. Where the hell was the medical personnel? What was taking them so long? I could hear my heart beating in my ears, and the blood pooling around him made me feel queasy. How long was he like this?

“What happened?” Someone asked. I looked up and saw two people in uniforms and scrubs. 

“I think, uh, I think he cut himself with something—his wrist. I have pressure on it now. Not sure how long he’s been like this.” I motioned to where I was holding the sheet in place.  

“Ok, we got it from here,” one of them responded as he motioned for me to move so he could take my place. I got up, and a few more people walked in. There were now paramedics in the central area, and other inmates were peering through the little window in their cell doors. A couple of other guards were walking around, taking headcounts in each cell and ensuring the area remained secure while the paramedics took over and placed the inmate on the stretcher. 

“Yo, you think he’ll make it?” James asked, nudging me. I didn’t realize he came back. 

“He has to, man,” I responded, never taking my eyes off the paramedics and the inmate. “The punishment in this place is not death. The punishment is life.”