New Life Pt. 3 Breakfast 1
Breakfast is one of the only times during the day that all of the cell blocks are in one place at the same time. Its also the time of day with most guards around. Its not like TV . Sure there are gangs and there are plenty of odd balls but for the most part it felt like I was back in a high school cafeteria. All of the gangs were just different clicks and the guards were teachers. There is always this sense of something can get out of hand at any moment, the food sucks , and there is always someone talking about you somewhere.
The individual cell blocks were there own gangs , but there were also intermediate gangs inside the cell blocks.
There were 5 main gangs. The old and untouchables were made up of the life sentence inmates who lived out so much of their life behind bars no one would mess with them. The predators were a gang made up of inmates who were exclusively the most out right predatory species. Then you had east coast and west coast , two gangs that seemed to only live to kill of one another. And then you had the inmate guards , inmates that seemed to be in league with the guards acting as humble servants for special privileges.
Outside of the gangs there were other lone wolf types and a few groups that could be seen in the cafeteria.
Now , much like high-school, I had to choose who to sit with. But it wasn't high school , and they weren't a bunch of high school teens. They were inmates, murders, thieves, rapist, con men. Of course I picked the only seat that I felt I knew any of the risk to. I sat next to Frank.
Frank- what are you doing
Michael- I thought we could eat together
Frank- I told you I'm not looking for a friend
Michael- I know but ...
He raised his hand to silence me.
Frank- you don't want to sit with me, you think just because we room together that I'm safer than everyone else in this room , I'm not , notice how no one else is sitting at this table, why do you think that is
Michael- I don't Know
Frank- why are you hear
Michael- I needed somewhere to sit
Frank- I mean why are you in prison
Michael- I ... I shouldn't be I didn't do anything
He knocked my tray off the table nonchalantly without blinking an eye.
Frank- why are you here? I can tell you why I'm here, I can tell you why no one else is sitting at this table, I can tell you why the guards wont even think twice to leave the room if I decide to start a fight stab you or go so far as to kill you right now , I'm not proud of what I've done but it earned me privacy in this place
No one so much as looked in our general direction. Even as Frank scolded me the guards seemed distant.
Frank- don't act like your safe around me , your just too stupid to ask the questions that everyone else starts with, and when you finally do you'll realize those shit stains parading around as gangs are safer for you than I am , none the less stay , the fuck if I care
He put his head down on the table as if to go to sleep but his eyes stayed open. He glared at me as like I was a fly on the wall bugging him but he was too lazy to swat it away . Then for just a second he looked to my food on the floor and back to me. I couldn't figure out what he wanted, but I noticed he wasn't eating. Why wasn't he eating? He was clearly starving.
I had no reason to care about him but I did. He was my cell mate.
But he was right I wouldn't ask the questions that I wanted to , that I needed to. I was going around judging without taking any information. I had no clue what anyone had done to earn there way into the place we all were , least of all Frank. And honestly I still didn't know why or how I landed in such a place. I wasn't a straight "A" student but I had good grades , friends, and was getting ready to go off to college. My life was just beginning and before I could take a step out of my small town it threw the book at me and I fell into a prison cell.
I picked my food off the floor but didn't eat it, at that time I didn't know not to waste food. We sat there for about 30 minutes before it was time to go. Every one was leaving but Frank. He was the last to get up from his table , the guards seemed to just let him be. As I walked out of the cafeteria I saw him take the bread from my salvaged plate with his tail , as if to hide the fact that he eats.