Rikers High Read Online Free Page A

poles, two basketball courts laid out side by side, a handball wall, and some bleachers.
    I felt like I was back home on the playground, and my mood just picked right up. It felt like I’d carried my mattress from my real house to camp out overnight in the park. And maybe those were even the same stars I used to wish on when I was a kid.
    The officer told me to sit in the bleachers while he showed my paperwork to the CO on duty in the yard. I sat there looking up at the sky, wishing I could do my time on those bleachers. I would sit through the longest night that anyone could imagine. Then the sun would come up and I could go home.
    And despite the pain I was in, it felt that sweet.
    The yard was surrounded by six white bubbles, the kind people play tennis in during the winter. I never saw anyone walking around the jail with a tennis racket, so I figured that’s where they keep the inmates in this part of the jail.
    The bubbles sat together in pairs and had a big “N” or “S” painted on them. I knew from living in the main building that it meant the north and south side of each house. The sides were connected by a little station, and that was probably for the COs.
    I knew I’d be starting all over again. I’d be walking into some strange house like a new jack, with a fresh cut on my face and a lot to prove. For another sixteen days, until I went back to court, I’d have to buckle down and keep it real.
    The officer came back to the bleachers and said, “You’ve been assigned to Sprung #3, my man .”
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    I put my hands up against the wall and Officer Johnson kicked both my ankles out hard. My feet were spread as far apart as they could go and still be standing. In front of us was a set of double doors that led to the officers’ station in Sprung #3.
    That’s where I’d spent all of thirty seconds before Johnson brought me outside for a private introduction and to hear his house rules. Behind us was another set of double doors that led back out to the yard. We were in his private jail now, a ten-foot space where he made all the rules and kept them with his fists.
    Johnson was big and black, and looked more like a grizzly bear than a CO.
    â€œI’m here from four till midnight, five nights a week,” he growled. “Do the wrong thing and I will personally shit on you. This is my house and you’re only renting. I don’t know what you did to deserve that cut. But try any of that nonsense out here and I’ll ship your ass back to the building where they can take another piece of you.”
    He ended his speech by slapping me in the ribs with a huge open hand. When I caught my breath, I stood up and followed him back inside.
    It was twenty after ten by then. It’s always lights-out at ten o’clock. But most inmates lie awake in the dark for a good part of the night. This house was no different. They’d been stirring like mice since I walked through the front door. They were sizing me up, trying to figure out where I fit in their food chain.
    I remembered how tough it was when I first got to Rikers, carving out a place for myself and trying not to become anybody’s herb. I’d learned plenty in the past five months about how it all goes down, and I was hoping to get some space without having to fight for it. I had been in Mod-3 for so long, new jacks watched me to see how it would go.
    Out here, I was going to have to do all the watching for a while.

CHAPTER
    8
    T he count was low on the north side, and when the COs looked at my ID card they saw the number forty staring at them.
    â€œBed forty is open on the north,” said one of Johnson’s partners. “All we got to do with this kid’s card is change Mod-3 to Sprung #3.”
    My world had been kicked upside down since yesterday, but on Rikers Island I was still going to be called “Forty.”
    My bed was in the back of the house, near the bathroom. I