The Book of Michael Page 7

She was for. I was against. I know, it seems odd. Lisa, the great humanitarian,wanting the death penalty.We had both done research, although I could see that Lisa was much sharper at this sort of thing than me. And passionate. She probably believed in what she was arguing. I was just kind of wishy–washy, didn’t really feel that strongly one way or the other, but I took this topic because I thought it would be easy.

  I based part of my argument on the fact that the legal system was flawed and always would be.You might end up convicting the wrong person and ending his or her life. And besides, capital punishment is not a deterrent.

  Lisa had agreed. It was not a deterrent. People who murdered were not thinking about the consequences. But I can still remember her rebuttal. “Sadly,” she said, “I argue that capital punishment is still the best option, despite my opponent’s worthy points. Even if it is a wrongful conviction. It is the most humane option.”

  I was a little stunned by what she had said, didn’t know how I would finish my rebuttal now that she had thrown this in. But it seemed like absurd logic.

  “My point is this,” Lisa said with conviction. “Most imprisonment damages the life of the convicted in such a powerful and corrupting way that one can never return to normal. The loss of freedom, the deterioration of the spirit, and the disruption of a life through imprisonment is worse than death. The harm is irreparable. Thus, assuming that the right criminal is convicted most of the time, it is better to endorse capital punishment rather than any alternative.”

  She had cited several sources. She was not alone in her thinking. But it totally threw me off.

  Mr. Gelbert cleared his throat. “Michael, now for your closing words.”

  I remember looking at Lisa and she suddenly seemed concerned for me. She realized she had thrown me off with her final argument. “I don’t know,” I said, looking down at my notes.“I… um… still think it’s wrong to kill someone. Even if they murdered. I’m sure they can be rehabilitated. Somehow.” I leafed through my notes but couldn’t find anything else to say that I hadn’t already said. I think I shrugged then and said something like, “Aw, hell. Lisa’s probably right. How the hell are you gonna fit back into society if your life’s been ripped out from under you?”

  A brilliant way to end a debate on my part, I thought. The class laughed and Mr. Gelbert said, “That will be all. Please step down.”

  The next debate was over legal prostitution, pro and con.

  As Lisa and I walked out of class that day, she said, “Sorry,” in a soft voice as she walked past me, not giving me eye contact. I thought she was cute, sure. I thought a lot of girls were cute. And as she walked away, I noticed her hair. I should have told her I really liked her hair. But I didn’t. She wasn’t exactly on my radar then.A good student. I think she was on student council. I think she helped raise money for AIDS orphans in Africa. She was that kind of girl. I know she got an A on the debate. I received a lowly C, which was probably more than I deserved.

  ***

  And now, waking up, ten days into freedom, I was thinking about that debate, realizing she was right. I’d only been incarcerated for six months and I was certain my life was ruined forever. Lisa had been right. The damage was done. It was irreparable. I didn’t really want to live like this. Screw rehabilitation. It wasn’t going to happen.

  I was having a hard time getting out of bed in the mornings. I was depressed. Go figure. My brain locked onto weird shit. Like this capital punishment thing. And then this.

  A scene. Something like a movie. I’m in a room. My wrists are tied. A doctor with rimless, round lens glasses is about to administer a lethal injection.There is an audience behind the glass. Lisa’s parents. My parents. And in the scene, a bunch of kids from school.They are chewing gum and pointing at me. I nod in their direction.And then I feel the needle. And I go cold.

  It all seems so easy. Not at all like what I was going through.

  ***

  I went downstairs for breakfast.The clock said 11:45 but the time on clocks didn’t mean that much to me any more. It must have been a Saturday because both my parents were home.

  “Mr. Hawker phoned again,” my dad said. “What do you think?”

  “What do you think?” I asked.

  “I don’t know.Your mother and I think something needs to be done.”

  “Something?”

  “It’s not the money,” he said. “It can’t be about the money.”

  “Well, you lost your job. Whose fault was that?” I asked.

  “I know.”

  “Maybe you should do something. I just don’t think I want any part of what Hawker is proposing.”

  My mother came in the room then. “Your aunt and uncle think you should do a TV interview. They know someone who would do a good job.We could do it here. We’d have a say on how it was edited. Clear the air once and for all.”

  I shook my head. “I’d screw it up,” I said. “I don’t think I could do it, anyway. Look at what the media already did.They don’t care if it’s truth or lies, as long as it’s a good story. What the media does well is generate hate and mistrust,” I said and then felt a shudder go through me. Those final words were Lisa’s, not mine. Those were her exact words. She never watched TV. She didn’t trust the news.

  “There’s got to be something,” my mother said.

  I sat there glumly. The boy beyond repair, that was my story. Well, Oprah, it really kind of sucked losing my girlfriend and ending up in the slammer. And having everyone think I raped and murdered her. But you get over these things.And the upside is: I lost ten pounds while in prison and improved my mind. And then the audience would applaud and they’d cut to a commercial for Pampers.

  ***

  My parents yammered about going for a car trip.A lake, a mountain, a beach. Nothing sounded appealing. “I think I’ll just go back to bed.”

  “Don’t you think you are sleeping too much?”

  “That’s what I learned to do in prison. I learned to sleep. It wasn’t like sleeping here. It was different. I went away when I slept. And I was always, always shocked when I woke up again and realized the bad stuff wasn’t just a dream. Do you know what that’s like?”

  They both sat silently now. My pain was their pain. Another good reason for capital punishment. Just make the bad boy go away so everyone else can start over.

  And so I slept some more.

  I didn’t know just then that I was waiting for something. I thought I was still waiting to be punished. For I still felt I deserved punishment. Lisa was dead. I was alive. I hated that trade–off.

  And I did not want forgiveness. That’s what I think my parents believed I needed. But I wasn’t ready for it and wasn’t sure I’d ever be ready for it.

  It was nearly five in the afternoon, nearly dinner time. I’d slept through another day. I heard the phone ring. Someone answered it. My mother knocked on my door.

  “Yeah?” I said.

  “It’s your grandmother. She wants to talk to you.”

  Phyllis. She was the only person I was willing to take a call from. I could never say no to her. I got out of bed and picked up my phone. I waited for my mother to hang up.

  “Michael?”

  “Yeah, Grandmom.”

  “I asked you not to call me that.”

  “Sorry, Phyllis. I’m just waking up.”

  “I know about the sleep thing, Michael. When your grandfather died I was working on the world’s record.”

  “Is there a world’s record for sleep?”

  “Yes, but it’s hard to beat the ones in comas.They can hang on for years before they wake up. Nothing like a good coma, I say, to keep the world off your back.”

  “You’re nuts,” I said with the first hint of a smile on my face in a long while. I heard something funny, a sucking of breath,“You’re not smoking are you?”

  “Jesus. Can’t get away with anything. Don’t worry. These are lettuce cigarettes. Bought them at the health food store.” There was another suckin
g of air and something that sounded like bubbles in water.

  “But your lungs. Anything with smoke could hurt you.”

  “I know. That’s why I bought this hookah thing–like a bong but something they use in the Middle East for tobacco.The water cools the smoke.You should try it.”

  “Save me some of your lettuce cigarettes. I’d love to try them.”

  “They come in menthol, too. Although I prefer the regulars. No nicotine, though. So I chew the gum and wear the patch. It’s still not the same.”

  “And?”

  “And what?”

  “Why did you call?”

  “Because I did the I Ching for you.Threw the sticks. And guess what?”

  “What?”

  “Hexagram 33.”

  “Let me guess. Something to do with inner strength. Wings like eagles. Eyes like hawks.”

  “No way. Hexagram 33 can be interpreted this way: Once you decide to retreat from the world, do it with determination. If you act with full regret you will not be successful. That’s why I thought I should call you right away. Do you understand what the sticks are saying?”

  Coming from anyone else but her, I would have thought it the flakiest thing in the world. But it triggered some miniscule connection in my brain. She was saying what no one else had said to me yet. She was giving me permission.

  Permission to be alone with my suffering. Permission to hide from the world for as long as I wanted.

  And that was the first time I felt some relief from all the weight on my shoulders. I think that was the first full breath of air I took in my lungs since I got the phone call that night.

  Chapter 14

  Unless you’ve had significant first–hand experience with tragedy in your life at sixteen, you truly know nothing of death. In North America, it is a thing on the news daily but it is a form of entertainment–the stories about accidents and murders and natural disasters. My grandfather had died when I was young and that had startled me and upset me, of course. But it was amazing how quickly I moved on to whatever was of interest to me then–baseball or bicycles or studying paperbacks about performing magic tricks.

  Prison allowed me to read widely about death. Reading was this gift that Lisa had given me. Sure, I knew how to read but she had a passion for it. She was already well beyond anything our teachers were teaching us. When it came to reading, she consumed everything. Her words, not mine. But they fit. She’d sample broadly from any book in the library she could get her hands on. She believed in books. I can almost say it was her religion. My word, not hers.

  The prison library was not great but not bad. We could request books through the public library system, though, so if one was patient, all the world’s literature was available.When I read, I felt close to Lisa again. And I read quite a bit about what happens after you die.

  I know every kid thinks about this. But I rarely considered it. It was almost like I didn’t want to waste my time on something I could do nothing about. When you die, I guess you figure out what death is all about. I was all about living. Not that I loved everything about life. Much of it sucked. But I was the here–and–now sort. Eat, drink, and be cynical. For tomorrow…

  I begged for a ghostly apparition of Lisa in my book- –strewn cell.Yes, I read books, serious books, on ghosts. On communication with the dead. But I fell short of trying to call her back somehow. I almost thought it actually was possible, but what if she appeared and saw me in Severton? What would she think? Would this hurt her in some way? I read about angels. Lots of books about angels. So many first- –hand experiences.Were they all making it up? Could it be possible that it was all bullshit? Or was there truth here?

  If there be angels, then one, Lisa perhaps, watched over me in Severton. Eduardo, however, was my on–the– ground “angel.” I was, after all, a test case. He had the responsibility of preventing the headline: Young murderer murdered in Severton. I had my private cell, my “unit,” as it was called. I had my books to protect me and I think I had–or liked to think I had–an angel watching over me. Lisa.

  How I longed to feel her touch me. And how often I was haunted by the very last physical contact we had. Just before she fell asleep in the tent, just before I left, I kissed her. Our lips held together, then parted. I touched her face. And left.

  Those few seconds exist somewhere out of time, I believe.They exist in the present and in the past and in the future. The universe began with an explosion, expanded, collapsed, and returned to a dot of pure compact everything and nothing. But all the while that kiss remains.

  Like I say, I read a lot. It wasn’t like I was killing time or trying to do something “useful.” Every word I read was Lisa. Every page turned was Lisa. That’s how good it was–the reading. And that’s how bad it was–the pain of missing her.

  Inside, I became many things. I was already a cynic. Now I was a more sophisticated one. I was a misanthrope. I shed years of youth–there would be nothing left of the boy by the time my verdict was overturned.The boy had fled. He’d been bullied away. I also became an intellectual. Lisa and books and my library card. There was beauty still in ideas. In concepts. In stories. In the way language shaped itself on the page. Eduardo said, “Michael, you read so many books. You yourself should become a writer.Tell your story in print.”

  “Do you believe I’m innocent?” I asked him more than once.

  “I believe that you believe you are innocent. What I believe does not matter. I believe that if you write a book and it sells, you may get out sooner.You may remember that I was fair to you. Maybe you’d make a lot of money and buy me an in–ground swimming pool.” It was an odd thing to say.

  “That’s all you want? An in–ground swimming pool?”

  “Yes,” he said.“I think I’d be happy and so would my wife and kids.”

  ***

  As you can imagine, I read law books. And books on psychology. I was never denied a single request. I was allowed to read a book on devil worship by a scholar of the occult. I was permitted books on human sexuality. I read several sacred texts from Hinduism and Buddhism. I read Malcolm X’s Autobiography and that inspired me for a while. Every inmate of every prison should be required to read this.

  I understand how far–fetched this sounds. I would never have done this if I had not been locked up.This is not to say that I completely loved books. I loathed life at that point and therefore everything included in that category. But books were a matter of survival. John Fowles, Ken Kesey,R.D. Laing, Bertrand Russell, books on social justice. Outdated or contemporary. I even read the Kinsey Report. And after that, Kubler–Ross and her books about death and dying. Near death experiences. So similar and universal in all cultures though some scientists conclude that it is not real. You are not traveling to the next dimension through that tunnel with light at the end. It is simply a hallucination brought on by hypoxia, an inadequate supply of oxygen in the brain.

  When I read that last bit, I fell into a kind of despair. Everything can be explained through science. You believe you are going some place beautiful and it is just the lack of oxygen in your brain.

  And then you die.

  This option presented itself to me over and over. No purpose, no plan, no real before or after existence of the mythical soul. When you die, you die. I had friends in high school who told me they believed this. A couple of my fellow inmates in prison expressed this view. Basic. Matter–of–fact. The lungs stop functioning. The heart stops. Make room on the planet for another bag of skin to pretend it all has meaning.

  They let me read books about suicide and suicide prevention. I thought that was brave of the librarian–a rather old, thin man, bald with the boniest of skulls.The others called him Mr. Bones but I never did. He took his job seriously. Ordered me books from the public library and had them sent here by courier. When I asked him why he worked here, he answered, “For the pension. I’ll be out of here in five years and I’ll have a good pension.” But I think it was more than that. I could tell by th
e way he reacted to my requests.

  I meant to test him one day. Ask for a book on some aspect of terrorism or one on home manufacture of drugs. But I decided not to push it. A good thing is a good thing when you are incarcerated.You didn’t want to mess with that. So the suicide books were about the limit. Oh,my “counselor” in Severton heard pretty quick about that. I suppose Mr. Bones was worried about more than his pension. I think he had a good heart.

  Mr. Bones, when he had seen me reading Dostoevsky early on, thought I was faking.“I’ve seen this game before,” he said, but there was no real accusation in his voice.

  “What game?” I said.

  “The model prisoner.”

  “They all read the Russians?”

  “Some.Why Dostoevsky?”

  His question made me think of Lisa. It was her suggestion. My eyes began to tear.“It was recommended,” I said. “Different time, different place.”

  “You ever read Tolstoy?”

  “He’s on my list,” I said. The truth was I wanted to move on from the dark Russian novelists. Not exactly the thing to sustain you inside.

  Mr. Bones handed me a big fat book that I expected to be War and Peace but turned out to be Anna Karenina.

  “Yikes,” I said.

  “Yikes is right,” was all Bones said.“May not be your cup of tea.” He began to take the book back.

  “No. I’ll give it a try. Model prisoner game, remember?”

  It was rough sledding, I admit, but the passages about death and dying drew me in. In one scene, a girl is contemplating suicide by throwing herself under a freight train. She has been hurt. She wants to punish the man who hurt her and she wants to punish herself. She throws herself in the path of the oncoming train and then has second thoughts.

  The author wrote: And just at that moment she was horrorstruck by what she was doing. Where am I? What am I doing? She tried to get up, to remove herself but some monstrous thing struck her on the head and dragged her down.“Lord forgive me for everything,” she murmured, and knew there was no point in struggling.