'SUMMIT SHOCK'

2009-08-08T06:48:00.007-04:00

Brutally raped and beaten by her boot camp captain, a plucky New York State correction officer secretly taped recorded his demented confessions. But her State employers couldn't let the truth come out. For over a decade the courts kept the evidence secret. What awful truths did the captain expose? Thirteen years on and several dead witnesses later this appalling story can finally be told. ‘Summit Shock’ is the only authorized account of her heroic quest for justice in the capital of lawsuits. Whether you’re a fan of true-life conspiracy scandals or a lover of crime fiction, this is an astonishing story.

CHAPTER 1: TWENTY-THREE SKIDOO
Friday December 31st 1993. Surrounded by high snow-white peaks, in a world far away from the hustle and bustle of the city, the quilt-coated young woman tore herself from his pawing clutches. First she had rejected his invite to the ice carnival and Torchlight Parade and now this.
“No, Ed. I just can’t, I’m sorry!” She was getting wise to him and wasn’t buying into any of it any more. She wiped all trace of his unwanted kiss from her rosebud lips with evident finality.
“Ok, suit yourself. Whatever! Just forget it. I just had some crazy idea you might want to start the New Year together.”
Fidgeting Ed was losing his cool again. The craggy faced older man released his grip on those small, gloved younger hands and shrugged his denuded shoulders. Turning from his former lover he walked with funereal poise back to the garish red and yellow snowmobile.
“I’ll run you back to town then, Carla.”
The air dipped deeper into sub zero. Struggling to muster a composed exterior he forced the thinnest of insincere smiles back at her through a wispy ginger goatee. Tautly wrapping her scarf about her head and neck the disdainful blue-eyed beauty purposely avoided his moistening green eyes then baulked at putting her arms around Ed’s diminutive torso as she mounted the machine behind him.
All his wooing ways that Sunday afternoon, all his talk of roaring hearth fires in a cozy red Maple log cabin were vapid words swept away on a chill winter breeze.
“You can see your daughter whenever, Ed. You know that.”
Scant consolation for Ed who spat some expletive before yanking hard on the throttle. As he headed out into the cold wilderness along an invisible trail covered in that crystalline holiday bounty, Carla realized this wasn’t the path they had come.
“I was gonna show you a place with the best views across the Hudson. Would’ve been the perfect spot to raise a family!”
He cranked the throttle harder and they headed deeper into the rugged forest terrain. Her unprotected eyes started to smart uncomfortably in the cold upstate air.
“It’s getting late, Ed. Just take me home, ok?”
No answer. But Ed zipped his machine ever more haphazardly and a cringing Carla gave out a piercing shriek as he roughly dodged a precipitous rock. Ed, now laughing, started to mock his feeble-minded passenger.
“What’s the matter, honey? Thought you loved those pretty postcard views - those tall, proud trees?”
On he surged, faster and ever more dangerously. He would get a reaction from her even if it killed him. Erratic Ed consumed with unswerving bitterness had collided for the last time with her chill apathy. She flinched as he darted perilously, almost fatally, between dense packed, brutal monolithic forest trees. Even if it were the thinnest strand of emotion, he told himself, he would extract at least something, anything from the unyielding, harsh bitch.
“Ok! Slow down, Ed! You made your point. Ok!”
As myriad-dappled colours scorched across a bleached white canvas the slalom trekker spun deeper into boondock country, weaving uncontrollably across terrain she never knew nor wanted to, driving toward death through the cooling twilight.
“Jesus, stop you crazy jerk! Didn’t you see that branch? Stop-pleeeaaaase!”
She shrieked loudly and vainly into an uncaring wind only just ducking her head in time and begging him to think of their young child.
“You’re gonna kill us both!”
He didn’t hear – he couldn’t hear in that whistling, stabbing wind. He swerved violently towards a mesmerizing amber beacon, more obscenities flung to the frigid wind like gasoline fire belching from his lungs. Fast approaching was a black strip of meandering highway now painted red and orange with a fluorescing ribbon streak. In the race toward annihilation the snow charioteer homed in on his new target.
“Twenty-three skidoooooo!"
The angry engine roar from the snowy mountain draws attention from a passing car slowing for an icy bend. The dazzled driver watched dumbstruck as the eerie bobcat’s lights pitched a fiery mask into his eyes.
Suddenly, the two-manned missile catapulted itself up over the freeway and a deathly cry pierced the gloomy Catskill dusk. The rag doll figure could keep her grip no longer and prepared for death. In the final milliseconds before impact she foresaw their doom in a volcanic explosion of ripped metal, flesh and gristle. But Ed’s timing was off- momentum lost - somehow the boondock bullet bounces off the soft verge and the kamikaze four-stroke Yamaha wreaks but one fatality - an innocent scrawny brown woodrat.
Silence. Like everything else in life, Ed Richards had bungled it. A sharp stabbing pain shot from her wrist right up to her neck. With vision blurred into a fractal pattern of crystallized safety glass a battered survivor struggles to recognize the dimming blood red sky above. Just before a painful black fog steals away her vision she sees before her the upturned wrecked machine and a feckless weasel executioner lying motionless.
Flash! Click! Whir! Flash! Click! Whir! Noise? Then from an aching brown-gray haze comes muttering. A crowd of uniformed men stood imperiously over her with torches, urgent voices and photographers snapping. Carla strains to feebly beg for help.
“Oh, thank god. Help me, please!”
Laughter? But why are they laughing? How dare they? With her one good hand she loosens the scarf from her face for a better look and strains to see these are neither police officers nor rescue workers – they are corrections officers. Dizzy and feeling faint the gnawing cold bites at her uncovered bare flesh.
“Why am I naked?”
Bizarrely the officer with the camera beckons the others closer and smiles lasciviously.
“One more shot, Limoncello - one more for the money!”

CHAPTER 2: DÉJÀ VU DRILL
August 8th 1994. Rousing herself softly moments before the clacking bells of her alarm clock could kick in, Carla Limoncello stirred herself out of yet another restless night. A clawing at the door begged for her to come. It was three-thirty on a Monday morning and her first day back. For so long she had wallowed mournfully in her mother’s old grand four-poster recuperating in a familiar colonial style sanctuary.
But now she needed to escape the memory of that awful year. First there had been the pinch of that near-death wreck with Ed and now this; yet more months plaster wrapped and bed-bound. They were calling her ‘Calamitous Carla.’ How many more disasters could she befall? Ah, well, screw ‘em.
Here she felt safe and warm, cocooned in a room of heavy timber architraves and sturdy window frames with the photo of her daughter, Lita, on the bedside dresser. As she savored the last lingering moments nestled in a swathe of velvet green, too long secreted in her mountain ranch home she steeled herself before throwing off the blanketed bliss of a patch-quilted bedspread.
Carla sat up and wiped her eyes, tossed back her luxurious long, dark mane of hair and itched the limbs twice broken and twice healed.
“Wait, Blackie, I’m coming!”
She moved unsteadily to her feet and promised herself it must never get any worse. “Hey, Blackie! You know don’t you? You know what today is!”
The capering canine ran in and lapped and skirted around her ankles.
“We’re no quitters, are we, fella?”
Thank the Blessed Lord she was now free from her fastidious older sister’s squawking. Yet Constance Limoncello’s mark had permeated everywhere and would haunt Carla as surely as the ghost of their departed, but not forgotten mother. Building a shrine borne of remorse, Cantankerous Connie imposed that same twee servile domesticity onto Carla’s décor as assiduously as she did upon the mind of her niece, Lita.
Ever since mom passed away in ninety-one, Constance has been the self-crowned family matriarch and whether by a process of metempsychosis, astrological amplification or plain nagging, Connie was gonna make sure no one forgot what mom had sacrificed for them. The sparring siblings, although both the spit of mom to look at, were as far apart in taste as apples and oranges. Constance was fastidious and prim, while Carla was uncouth and frivolous. Connie had the perfect small town upstate New York ‘nose’ for what was right, tasteful and proper while Carla just wished big sis would keep her schnozzle out.
But Carla succumbed, albeit grudgingly and allowed a hotchpotch of home feminization in a façade of rich floral wallpapers in deep plum and aqua green, accessorized by a myriad frilly cushions and daft ornamental nick-nacks. It was all a legacy of the home country, of Italian memorabilia, of great-grandpapa’s flight from riotous Rome after the assassination of Umberto I and the fall of the house of Savoy.
But beyond the past, there was a new generation to think of. Pain or no pain, Lita still needed her. A daughter must have at least one parent willing to soldier on, be her example, a provider and protector. Lita must never endure what she did as a child. Not for her an over-bearing, sanctimonious bitch of a mother. All those years of taunts and dictates culminating in the cruelest blow of all, barring her attendance at Mohawk Valley Community College-where Carla sought her one true ambition: to become a probation officer – and what was so wrong with that?
But Constance carried on mom’s ‘good work’ and sought to make calamitous Carla serve perpetual penitence for that greatest of sins: getting herself pregnant and taking off with that ne’er do well slacker, Ed Richards. For her calamities there would be no college degrees or family largesse.
A job in corrections was yet another botched act of contrition for her to placate her overbearing, self-righteous, Roman-American clan. Ten years on and still nothing has changed. With a growing child to support and mortgage to pay and with no husband on the horizon, married Constance was holding all the moral cards.
“We just keep plugging away, don’t we old friend?”Purposefully making her way across the large bedroom Carla tossed her white cotton nightshirt to the floor. Her large breasts swayed as she opened the doors of a large dark oak wardrobe to plunder a perfect line of shirts and pants.
“I’m ready for them, Blackie.”
Puffing her chest out with a deep inhalation she grew tall and proud as she donned her uniform once more, steeling herself with single-minded purpose, to hone another batch of prison inmates in true military order, in far better fashion than the lockstep of yesteryear. She felt the buzz was really back as she laced up her thick new, drill boots.
“Jeez, they’re stiff, old fella!”
She tugged open the heavy curtains but the windows offered up no light as night still held sway over the mountains. Blackie still ran circles about her while she stood in the kitchen over a quick coffee and makeshift peanut and jelly sandwich. Outside the chill morning air was still and soft while the rustle of the trees made the ink sky less foreboding. Thankfully, there was no Lita to worry about this morning – childless Aunt Constance’s place had been crash pad last night. Crass, conniving Connie always jumped at the chance to steal away her prized niece whenever she could.
“Bitch!”
A startled short-eared owl flapped from its canopy perch as the sound of a snarling engine woke the quiet mountainside. The sad faced pooch watched as Carla took off down the winding dirt track onto Route 10 muttering expletives over Constance and how she could stick that dime-a-dozen job working at brother Jules’s auto repair shop.
With every mile she drove, Carla relished her day of return. She was itching to get back in there and grab another slice of New York’s Correctional Service’s pie. It was a Big Apple ‘New Idea’ baked up in the Eighties after the crack down on city crime by mayors Dinkins and Guiliani. Law enforcement had long been in the Limoncello blood and she often chewed it all over with her oldest brother, Frank, a cop of twenty years over beers at O’Malley’s Pub. Selected offenders were now getting hauled up from the metropolis to purpose built upstate jails with one explicit aim: to whip sense into them using the toughest military techniques.
‘Was the new system any better?’
‘Debatable.’
‘Was it any cheaper than regular jail?’
‘Absolutely!’
But there was one thing Corrections Officer Limoncello never discussed with brother, Frank. Since she had transferred to Summit Shock from Elmira maximum security, she had been one of only four female turnkeys working in a facility of over fifty male CO’s and there are always those ‘incidents,’ incidents too sensitive for a sister to share with a straight-laced older brother. Anyway, those events were in the past and changes had been made. Norbert was gone, even if he had left her with one last parting shot: a Notice of Discipline and one last final warning on threat of termination.
Carla drove steadily up on NY-10, off NY-33S trying hard not to think of Captain Norbert. But as she pulled up to the facility off Wharton Hollow Road the butterflies in her belly eased when she spotted one or two familiar vehicles bathed in sickly-yellow artificial light. Among a small cluster of uniformed men stood out smoking, she was reassured to see Lieutenant Jerry Polanski, a passable look-alike of a young Billy Crystal and a half in the closet gay.
Jerry was a decent officer with a quality that Carla relished greatly: he was so easy to talk to and like her, he preferred honest to BS. Licking her dry lips she pondered how the men would react to seeing her back. Butterflies flickered in the pit of her stomach as she slammed shut the car door and strode up the hill towards the large double doors. Summit was nothing like any regular jail. There were no fences, no checkpoints, no towers, no ID badges and no stiff security. These doors were always unlocked and in you walked.
She told herself the inmates would be just the same, eager as always to toe the line and prove they could turn around and ‘graduate’ from boot camp. They had the carrot of a much-reduced sentence. The bosses at the hub were happy, too. They were keeping the politicians sweet because Summit Shock, like all the other correctional boot camps, was saving ten thousand tax dollars a year per inmate- that’s a vote winning bottom line. No, it wouldn’t be the inmates she’d have to worry about, it was the regular CO’s.
As a trickle of uniformed bodies shuffled into the building and punched in their cards Carla gave the obligatory nod and tip of her faultless Stetson to every face that she knew. Across the compound a tinted red dawn slowly rose across the valley in the east, and the female guard could feel eyeballs fall on her as two lines of inmates shuffled out and formed into platoons across the yard. It was 5:09am and she was in good time for roll call at half past.
This first day was not going to be a breeze. At the short briefing the main topic was the new batch of young offenders starting the program. It was the beginning of another ‘Zero Week’ and Officer Limoncello was assigned to break them in until their regular officer got back from leave. Every hack knew the drill. Zero Weeks were when most problems occur. Dropouts were high and Limoncello knew the math. Last year 1,188 convicted felons were on New York’s program. Their average age was just over 25 and most had done no more than 10.4 years in school while the typical number of prior felony arrests for each was 1.4. Most will have eligibility for parole in 18.5 months. Something like 66 percent of these jacks will have been convicted for drug offences and more than half will have come from New York City. But the toughest statistic was that the majority would be right back in general population before graduation in 180 days time.
All the men grew jittery – both screws and inmates - as everyone took their places on the parade ground. Fastidious officers were already heckling the new intake.
“Get in line, shape up, eyes front!”
Aside the assembled masses, Limoncello stood at ease blissfully unaware of one fatal flaw in this scene, something she never figured till years later: a dark secret involving her.
“Attention! Eyes front – dammit!”
Suddenly, Lieutenant Hunter stomped onto the square with a swaggering air of authority. He looked a menacing figure as he blasted the new jacks with his well-rehearsed speech.
“Welcome to Summit Shock - gladiator school. The days of the country club life are over. You now have the privilege of our expert instruction. Be assured, that what you will go through here will stay with you for the rest of your lives.”
Lt. Hunter was mean, inhuman and ominous with cold black dashes for eyes. He paced slowly up and down the massed ranks with his heavy nailed boots grinding purposefully into the parade ground black top. He nodded his approval at the crew cuts and neat green fatigues – looking far better than last evening when 45 orange-suited grunts in tatty white Converse sneakers were bussed in.
Hunter told them to get used to the green uniforms. They were going to be wearing them for every activity except for their schooling and counseling when they would wear a white shirts and ties.
“These officers are your drill instructors and will control your movements to the finest detail. They will get in your face about making your bed right; keeping your locker spotless and making sure you’re always well groomed. No inmate, not ever, will speak to staff without asking permission with a ‘sir’ or ‘ma'am.’ Sloppiness is dealt with on the spot. My officers will holler in your faces, make you move rocks, do push ups or lug a log around all day. So get used to it or you’ll be shipped out damn quick!”
As he finished, Hunter about turned and marched away in clip military step. She had heard that guff many times before. As the lieutenant strode by Officer Limoncello dutifully saluted her superior. With a faint but perceptible shake of his head the leering Hunter shot her a brisk salute.
“So you’re back, Limoncello? You better shape up this time!”
That Notice of Discipline, she thought, its her once Achilles’ heel and Hunter was right: she better be on her toes at all times. But in this regime, in this testosterone charged air, the funk, the brutality and the lack of compromise meant this was a narrow tightrope to walk. All thanks to that creep Captain Norbert. What had Norris L. Norbert taught her? Only that the lure of a shapely woman was the most powerful intoxicant not legally proscribed in this drug addict’s prison.
What Limoncello ought to have learned was that she never looked at herself as others did. In this man’s jail her smoldering hourglass curves, even in khaki and drills, had the men’s minds wandering to thinking dirty, rather than clean cut, whichever side of the fence they belonged.
Of course, in her own interests, she wore almost no makeup and kept those womanly features well girded up. Femininity was never her forte anyway – her sister was born with her share. And whether on or off duty she never looked cheap, never flaunted herself and she wasn’t out to lure anyone’s eyes to fall on her curvaceous womanliness. But fall they all did and some beneath a turgid, obsessive depravity that whirled around beneath the waves of discontent like predatory shark feeders looking for a feast of the flesh from the juiciest morsel they could catch. And the bait was to tempt the jail’s greatest prowler.
“Parade! Attention!”
At once a cacophony of boots clattered heavily as the new captain advanced toward the assembled troop. He was a very tall older man, willowy in stature, immaculately dressed in dark blue uniform and matching Stetson with a polished badge on his chest that shone out as brightly as the bars on each of his shirt collars. With a withering glare across the entire assembly he slowly assayed the new intake. Mentally, he noted two thirds were black and young as no shock camp admitted any men over the age of thirty.
“Forty- five all present and correct, sir!” bawled Hunter.
As the captain and lieutenant whispered something to each other the taller man turned three-quarter profile to Limoncello and she saw him leak a half smile. As the new captain walked away Hunter gave a nod and a fidgety drill sergeant tore into them like a rabid rotweiler.
“What a pack of street rats we have here. Well, you boys are going to be whipped into shape and fast!”
Drill sergeants were usually called just ‘D.I.’ and they are the scariest of all yard dogs.
“Ok, Limoncello. You’re covering for O’Toole while he’s on leave. Take over this detail – hit ‘em hard with all the basics till he’s back. Organise some physical training, do some drill and teach some military ceremony.”
“Yes, sir.”
This was the authentic army regime that the Department of Corrections wanted in zero weeks. Zero because every dog here starts as a zero – a worthless nothing.
“Right. We’ll take them to the medical block and have them checked out.”
As the new D.I. already had the parade eating out of his hand, Limoncello let him lead the men in good order, double file towards the medical block. This first morning was now all assessments, paper work and interviews as the inmates, or ‘candidates,’' as they were now being referred to, had their legal eligibility verified. Any candidate must be serving only their first state prison term and eligible for parole within three years. None must have ever been convicted of any violent felony offenses, sex offenses, or ever escaped or absconded from custody.
“Right, you men, line up down the corridor and stand easy for medical examination!”
While her inmates trooped in for their medicals, Limoncello and the new officer sat in front of a plain wooden desk loaded with manila files and papers. Assiduously, they went through the men’s files and double-checked the records.
“You new here, too?”
“Me? No, I broke a few bones some time back - trip and fall on the job – klutz, that’s me. How about you? Not seen your face around.”
“That’s right - my first posting. I’m Jim Newby - ex army.”
With a tight army grip he shakes her limp, spastic hand. He’s lean, medium height and build, well tanned with the expressionless face of the coolest Los Vegas poker player. Carla winced as a shooting pain taunted her from the ill fused bones of her wrist. The doctor was right, a permanent deformity she must accommodate; carpal damage, less flexion and extension with a grotesquely deformed jutting bone she hid valiantly with a thick, manly leather watchstrap
“Hi, Jim – I’m Limoncello - most just call me Limo. I’ve been working jails for years. Got into Summit soon after the boot camp system was set up.”
As the men came out of their examinations they took seats in front of the desk and Limoncello ran the platoon through the daily schedule for the next two weeks.Morning5:30 Wake up and standing count5:45–6:30 Calisthenics and drill6:30–7:00 Run7:00–8:00 Mandatory breakfast/cleanup8:15 Standing count and company formation8:30–11:55 Work/school schedulesAfternoon12:00–12:30 Mandatory lunch and standing count12:30–3:30 Afternoon work/school schedule3:30–4:00 Shower4:00–4:45 Network community meeting4:45–5:45 Mandatory dinner, prepare for evening6:00–9:00 School, group counseling, drug counseling, pre-releasecounseling, decision making classes8:00 Count while in programs9:15–9:30 Squad bay, prepare for bed9:30 Standing count, lights out
“As you can see, your time will be highly structured with lots of activities. So get used to being busy the whole time. Every day you will have physical training and real work. You will receive drug and alcohol treatment, proper education, some recreation, and you be taught how to drill properly. While you remain here there will be few if any free time periods, no packages from home, no commissary, no radios, no magazines, no newspapers, and above all no television. You’re gonna be too exhausted to care at nights anyway!”
The neat, lined ranks remained deathly hushed as she warned of the need to quickly orientate into military courtesy and ceremony, or face summary punishment. They all had to participate in community meetings and confrontation groups and learn about AA, NA, ASAT and whatever other bits of the alphabet they get told. They will be given a ‘word of the day’ each and every day and they will have no time to themselves until after platoon line up and formal dismissal every evening. After which, most will be too exhausted and will want to sleep.

CHAPTER 3: NANCY’S BOOTS
As she wound down her speech an uncomfortable feeling took over her as walking round the corner towards her was the one man she didn’t want to see, Officer Ted Nicklaus.
“Hunter wants you to assign a Latrine Queen right away. Just pick some nigger who won’t screw up checking for pubes with a flashlight in the dark.”
Nicklaus pauses, lowers his Ray-bans from the bridge of his nose and sneers at her.
“So you covering for O’Toole then? Jesus, he’s one lucky son of a bitch. He’s out in Nevada – probably right now at one of them brothels on the Moonlight Bunny Ranch lapping it up. All he’s gotta do is ring that bell, the women all line-up and he chooses who to buy. Now that’s what I need - piece of one of them pussy penitentiaries – know what I mean?”
Carla scowls back at the fool for undermining her in front of the new jacks.
"Sounds like contract rape - now I got work to do, ok?"
"Hey, Limo –don’t knock it! I take my opportunities as they come. You know the old saying - he who hesitates masturbates."
Nicklaus winks at her before poking a belittling finger into the shoulder of a passing black inmate taunting him disdainfully, as if to impress.
“Maybe this nigger might do. Hey, boy, you look like a sex offender. Did your slick defense lawyer slip you in here under plea-bargaining?”
The inmate stood motionless wisely averting the hack’s gaze.
“So tell me, boy - you any good with a flashlight? Can you get down real low and pick up boogers and pubic hair?”
The inmate remained motionless before the two officers.
“You see, Officer Limoncello. You gotta teach them those latrines must be spotless. Oh Lord, I feel like I’m doing time, too. You know, when I retire, I’ll have served an 18-year sentence in this cesspit.”
Unimpressed Carla glowers back at the babbling idiot and thanks him for the wisecrack as the prize goof slides off back from whence he came. The whole time Newby just sat in his chair watching. Taking his cue he raises the question.
“Chow time?”
“Yup - sure, Jim, some breakfast would be good!”
The D.I. brings the platoon into line and orders them to the canteen. As they all head across the yard Carla wondered what else Nicklaus was going to do to taunt her. A buzz enlivened the canteen as hungry inmates grabbed trays and piled up with plenty of food. In shock camp portions are never meager. She asked herself the question that had haunted her the past year - what did she ever see in that jerk in the first place? Dating a fellow officer had broken her first golden rule: no fraternization. She had always been a sucker for confident men but he really took the biscuit. She also shouldn’t have broken her second rule: never date short guys. But when they first met Ted was full of charm and smooth patter – how men change.
Way over in the corner was the welcome sight of Jerry Polanski. Slipping away from the dull drill sergeant she grabbed a coffee and donut and took a seat at the lieutenant’s table. Polanski was a smallish, thin unassuming man in his mid thirties. He was one of the good guys with a genuine and sympathetic tone with subordinates. One thing that Carla needed to know was why Nicklaus was still at Summit. She grabbed a chair and decided to pump Polanski for the scoop.
“Hey Jerry, I thought Nicklaus was headed off to the military after what happened with Captain Norbert.”
Polanski winked at her and half nodded in the direction of three inmates sloping by their table. He brushed pretend crumbs from his immaculate shirt until they had passed.
“Nicklaus? Just more dead wood piling up round here. Dunno if he withdrew his transfer request or got rejected. Besides, you met the new Captain yet. Limo? Can’t figure that one out.”
No, she’d only seen him that morning in passing. Polanski drained the dregs of his coffee and chuckled as he recalled a Ted Nicklaus boast about seeking excitement in Special Forces.
“To me that jerk looked less a Navy Seal and more a tin of sardines. What makes him think he’s a cut above all this.”
Seeing Sergeant Newby approaching their table, Polanski takes his cue to leave. He salutes his subordinates and breezes anonymously away from the bustle.
That late August day grew steadily hot. In an afternoon that dragged interminably Carla took a breather at the edge of the parade square as the indefatigable Newby relentlessly put the inmates through a routine of Cracker Jack jumps and rope skipping. That guy was hardcore bullshine. Wilting visibly she slouched against the shaded cinder block wall wondering how she would muster the energy to finish the shift.
While she paused to dry her sweating brow with a handkerchief she began to berate herself for allowing Nicklaus to dupe her. She recalled their first meeting. It was after she had broken it off with her daughter’s father for the umpteenth time. She was done with that drunkard’s relapses. Unfortunately for her, she merely succeeded in jumping from Ed’s frying pan into Ted’s fire.
She gasped for air as Newby heckled and harangued the new jacks to battle through the shimmering heat. Who would break first? Show no weakness and never look a quitter. Gracious Lord, this torture is so pointless: would she ever be lucky in love? You gotta raise your game, girl. You gotta stop going on first impressions. You can’t be duped like that again. You can’t let a man like Nicklaus get under your skin. And back then he had looked so neatly turned out, seemingly hard working, not too bad a catch. Even despite being vertically challenged and not particularly handsome, Officer Nicklaus stood out from the other boondocks wastrels that infested these parts. In these depressed years she lamented the dearth of the superior males. Anyone with any gumption soon scooted off to a letter life down in the city.
So, there was never any sense in being over picky with what was left. And a single mother would be crazy to blow out every Beta male she meet, at least not until she’d given the guy at least one opportunity. So that’s how Nicklaus earned his chance that day last year, when he sidled up to her as they both punched out of a graveyard shift and he made his play in a most measured baritone.
“So how’s it going, Officer Limoncello?”
His broad, infectious grin and super-white teeth elicited a smile back from her and before she could escape to her car, he begun to pitch.
“Going so-so, Officer Nicklaus – how’s you?”
He was mighty fine. Back then Nicklaus’ loud extrovertness could be excused as healthy confidence. But today, she saw him as he truly was - plain arrogant and obnoxious.
At the beginning no alarm bells rang and it seemed perfectly harmless to join him for breakfast at the local diner where many officers went. She followed in her car as he led the way up to the Cobleskill Diner off of 88 in his beaten up pick up – steering her towards her downfall.
“About face! Ten - shun!”
The rhythmic crunch of men’s boots beat back at the heat in metronomic mindlessness. She cringed as she remembered how gallant Nicklaus seemed when opening the diner door for her and how awkwardly she stumbled like some oafish buffoon before he deftly broke her fall. She should have known that his rescuing hands clasping at her breasts was no accident. She got that whiff of it then - cheap aftershave.
“Goddam boots!”
At a table nearest the window together they watched the rise of a new sun above the mountains to the east. Nicklaus chirped happily like a Blue-winged Warbler. He was so droll as he drooled over her, or was it the ham and eggs. He loved cracking jokes about the other officers.
“They all know they ain’t meant to chow down on the inmates food - but they all do it anyways!”
They laughed. Ted confessed he was a great people watcher. He observed the pattern in which officers would wave and smile at the inmates then pass comments like, ‘I don’t trust him,’ or ‘Put that inmate up front so we can watch him.’
She should have figured he was only running everyone down to make himself look big. What Polanski said was true. Nicklaus regarded correctional work as menial – less noble and beneath that of a police officer or a fire-fighter.
“Cops - now they’re the heroes. CO’s are nothing – we’re just locked away from public view - no respect from the outside, you see!”
She felt in slight awe of him them - too humble to correct him - too fawning to make contradiction, create any tension or paradox. What was it she said to him?
“Well Ted, some of us have no choice. I’m just an ordinary single mom living my simple life with no one around to bother me.”
She wished she had never spoken those words so forlornly. It was such a give away. He seized on her vulnerability immediately. Ordinarily, it never concerned her that she spoke little to the other officers. She was never one to ‘chew the fat’ and mix it with the men. It seemed better to let people think she was content being the solitary soul.
“Must be hard for you, Carla.”
She shrugged. A hack’s life ain’t so bad when it keeps you well out of the way of your dysfunctional family lording it up at the Finger Lakes. Jeez, how they so whine on about her low class job. ‘Carla, why go down to that gutter work?’
But she did and saw the good in it. She met real people who made a difference, saw misfits lifting themselves up to become men. That fateful morning really didn’t seem so bad befriending one friendly face from work. That was how she pictured Ted: sat there in that diner and asking her all those questions – taking a real interest – making eye contact, flirting softly.
“So Limoncello, are you gonna put me out of my misery and tell me what brought a gorgeous girl like you into boot camp?”
It was after the waitress cleared the table of breakfast that she relaxed some more and blabbed on about her family and how they acted like they were so superior to her, both financially and in their relationships.

She smiled coyly and began to let Nicklaus into the Limoncello world. She explained about brother Simon, the Manhattan surgeon, youngest brothers Sean and Martin, church-going family men now living near Rochester. Then there were older brothers Frank and Jules, well they’re just those six short miles away.
“Jules’s auto body repair business made him a millionaire what with a steady stream of deer hits. You know how it gets on the roads here - money for old rope.”
Oldest brother Frank was chief of campus cops up at a local college of SUNY, or State University of New York College. Frank she could tolerate. He had tact and a kinder way about him. Nicklaus nodded reassuringly; he had her opening up real good and all the while sidling up ever closer to her.
“So just brothers then, Carla - no sisters with eyes as pretty as yours?”
She had an older sister, but she didn’t get on so good with her.
“You got the face of an angel, Limoncello – anyone ever tell you that?”
The sweet talk was coming faster than the strengthening beams of light through the diner window. He had rehearsed his game plan. He, almost innocently and very casually touched her arm and her leg several times since they arrived. From the very start, when she had taken off her hat he commented of the beauty of her lustrous hair. He had such confidence in his charms and casually stroked her fingers when she raised her coffee hand for a refill. Taking a seat beside her, he brushed up his leg against hers.
“So do you prefer to wear your hair up or down?”
Up mostly. It was very heavy in the warm weather.
“Do you always keep it so long?”
Yes, of course. He had all the moves off pat. She kicked herself now for falling for it. Getting ever bolder he drew in closer, took a frond of her loosened hair, smelt its scent and gazed brazenly into her naive bright eyes.
With his prey cornered he placed his hand over hers and talked sentimentally about his dearly departed mother and spoke forlornly of his own loneliness and longing to find a soul mate. He gave a light squeeze of her fingers that triggered a reaction in her to squeeze his back. And that was the sign, he thought. When the girl squeezes you back, she’s really interested and the prize player secures his mark.
But it was only when they got outside that Ted took his first kiss. The setting was perfect as the hopeful morning sun was now full risen and warm, shining majestically across the rugged mountains in splashes of dappled yellow and orange daubs. As she paused breathless and panting he drew himself to meet her - mouth to rosebud lips, boot to shiny boot, web belt grinding against web belt.His impassioned liplock caused her Stetson to fall from her head to the ground. His fumbling found her buttocks and breasts yielding momentarily to him until she pushed him away gently.
“No – not like this.”
Ed wasn’t getting more eggs over easy. Her decorum won out and her forefinger pressed reproachfully to his mouth. She had to get home, do her chores, grab some sleep then collect Lita from Connie’s.
“Can we meet - go out somewhere this weekend?”
Ted was sounding ever more eager.
“Maybe, if the weather stays fine.”
She smiled and gave him her phone number. When he called the following morning, they soon agreed an afternoon trip out to Howe Caverns. It all happened so quickly that weekend. In her haste she would end up with more than she bargained for.
He got there a little after noon. She welcomed him to a home where few visitors came. She was being far bolder than usual – letting some man visit her remote wilderness cocoon. Ted was all scrubbed and polished; even his old pick up truck looked new.
She rewarded him as a stunning vision posed within the frame of her front doorway wearing figure-hugging slacks and crop-top that accentuated the lithe and seductive curves of her thighs, butt and legs. Never the most feminine dresser, she had no cutting-edge couture, but that day her clothes and hair were just perfect. She strode purposefully in her leather sandals from wooden steps to an awaiting carriage. Ted was pleased to see she even wore lipstick and eye shadow for him and gave her winning smile and a friendly squeeze of her yielding arm in reward. He opened the passenger door for her like a gentleman. Such a Slick Dick, she thought. He schmoozed his new conquest all the way as they drove to Howe Caverns.
“After Niagara Falls ain’t this the second-most visited natural tourist attraction in the state?”
Yes, he was right. It wasn’t even any great haul to get to but it was just one of those places she had never visited before. So to mark the occasion, she had packed the JVC video camcorder to get some good shots. She and her daughter were in the habit of recording special moments after a remorseful Ed bought his daughter the gift after forgetting Lita’s birthday last year.
Nicklaus wore a blue sports jacket, gray corduroy pants and a white shirt that accentuated his tan. She noted how well groomed he looked in his civilian clothes and drew a cheeky Ted wink when she joked that she wouldn’t go near him if he planned on wearing those Ray-bans in the cave.
Howe Caverns proved quite an experience. Out from a tightly- packed elevator they had shuffled in a small group into damp darkness to find themselves boarding the ‘World River flows boat ride’ at the bottom of a 160 feet deep subterranean realm. Ted took her hand and helped her into the boat and kept a tight hold of her small hand as befitted the dark and romantic atmosphere.
They took off on a voyage in the aptly named Lake of Venus upon a shimmering jet-black liquid. Intermittently, a fussy yet knowledgeable tour guide waved her powerful hand torch into their eyes on pointing out every fact, every geological detail about those magnificent underground limestone formations. As they drifted silently and purposefully through the beautiful flickering lights that bounced hypnotically off the limestone walls, their guide then instructed they gaze upwards.
“As you can see, the rains have dissolved the soft rock and carved out much of the cave and you can clearly hear the distinctive echo of every water droplet that falls.”
As they momentarily cast their sights away from each other they marveled at immense mineral statues that seemed to fill the entire the cave casting eerie, shadowy shapes up and down convoluted walls.
“Wow! This whole place is extra terrestrial!”
Nicklaus pecked his date sweetly on her soft cheek and Limoncello switched on her camcorder to take a few ranging pan shots of the underground vista. Ted, being Ted, teased her and goofed off on cam while the a handful of disapproving daytrippers turned a blind eye to the cavorting couple in the back of the boat as it meandered serenely past dramatic craggy outcrops.
“Do you feel that chill in the air?”
Ted took the hint she was giving and wrapped a protective arm around her – no cold-shoulders.
With schoolboy devilry Ted then grabbed at Carla’s waist and tickled her mischievously as she earnestly sought to raise the camera to pan another shot across the fairy lights of a vast grotto.
“You won’t be laughing if one of them stellar-mites comes thumping down on your fat head, “ She mused and he laughed back uproariously at her gaff.
“No, they’re stalac -tites, honey. ‘Tights’ because they come down when you look up them.”
He laughs and winks at her and she huffs and sniffs in mock rebuke.
“Didn’t some heavy metal band do a video down here?”
“They sure did, sweetie. I would say, about a year or so back.”
After the tour, they wandered pointlessly for a while around the gift shop as Carla poked and prodded the homemade fudge, then the souvenir gemstones until she picked a tub of the former as a gift to take home for her daughter.
Ted then suggested they take a drive out and then go grab a bite at a restaurant.
“Ok, let me find a pay phone- they’re should be one here.”
She needed to check back with sister, Constance to see if all was well.
“Lita’s having a sleep over - my sister’s dropping her back in the morning – all covered.”
The anticipation on Nicklaus face was palpable. All the while he gazed upon the bare skin above her breasts as they rose and fell sharply whenever she let out that staccato laugh of hers.
Nicklaus took her to the fanciest restaurant he knew near Richmondville on the old Loonenbergh Turnpike. She had never been there before. But the food was good and it was in a great atmosphere among old original posts and beams that made the evening feel so romantic.
“ It's the oldest structure in the village, dates back to the French & Indian Wars.”
Ted acted suave. He was so unlike her daughter’s rambunctious father. Ted primed his catch with impeccable wine while also keeping the compliments flowing. Her soft skin had glowed, he said like, ’magic’ in the soft candle light and all the while she succumbed more to the touch of the gentle beams of incandescence that softened ever further her yielding heart. As the wine poured the final hours of the evening descended into a blur. She remembered they held hands as they walked through the town's Center Park across the street to his truck but then the details grew hazy.
She couldn’t recall the drive home and she mourned how stupid she was to let him in. A repentant Carla vaguely recalled how the peremptory coffee was soon forgotten, as were their clothes. She then remembered how he slavered and suckled over her breasts like a drooling animal before devouring the rest of her voluptuous milky whiteness.
Now stood there in the sweltering stark light of day she cursed her judgment. Taking the khaki cap from her head, she wiped beads of sweat from her brow with her one good hand and hid her embarrassed face. It was no good, what was done was done; she assured herself life must go on. But her guilt kept taunting her by reliving how they must have thrashed about on her mother’s four-poster, cavorting madly in a debauched daze. She could not even recall whether the sex was good or bad. She hadn’t had much to compare it with, since Ed Richards had bedded her she had been with no other man.
Then, she vaguely recalled something horrifically bad. It was the craziest of notions. Wrenching at the bed sheets twisted around her limbs he freed her naked form for his ultimate and darkest pleasure. He inveigled her into naughty role-play acting out, horse playing erotically for her own video camera.
Too stupefied to decline his urgings she let events blur into her greatest undoing and far more damaging than she ever dreamt in her worst nightmare. Her cavalier and carefree cavorting, weak-limbed and drugged had fixed more than just a glint in Nicklaus’ eyes.
She savored his every command as he encouraged her on; her submissive tendencies excited her as much as they did him. It had been so long and her desires got the better of her. She cupped her voluptuous breasts together, kneaded them, and tongued her erect nipples in an exhibition so splendid for her new master’s pleasure. Oh, how she loved it, the wild abandon of surrendering to a voyeuristic, appreciative, urging lover. He had her right then, he had what he wanted and now he owned her.
She was so dumb and deluded to think there was no harm in it. Of course, she had been wild and free with Ed but Ed was the father of her child and Ed had promised marriage. Or so she thought. Oh, god, why do men do this to women? What is this obsession with seeing their women perform like the most degraded street harlot? Now she yearned to shrink away once more and escape to her backcountry self-imposed prison.
“Hey, Limo. You look a million miles away.”
Lt Polanski startled her. He had seen her there at the corner of the blacktop and needed to tell her something.
“Just to warn you – the Captain has seen you and commented whether you were the officer with the outstanding NOD. So watch your back, Carla.”
“Ok, thanks, lieutenant. I will.”
She carefully pulls her sleeve back and glances at the watch on her misshapen wrist, careful not to expose her deformity.
“It’s almost three-twenty, lieutenant.”
She wriggles the thick leather strap back strategically into place.
“Just about time to get the platoon off to their showers ready for their classes at four.”
“Ok, Limoncello, but remember what I said. ‘C.Y.A.’ - cover your ass. You don’t want any blowback from what Captain Norbert piled on you, right?”She acknowledged his caution with a nod and a confident smile, straightened her cap and returned his salute as he marched off towards the Quality of Work Life Building.
Carla felt the urge to get home and treat herself to the longest and laziest soak in the tub - wash away her sins and the grime of it all. It was such a relief to be home after that sultry afternoon. She kicked off her boots, threw off her shirt and bra, let her heavy belt and pants drop free and stood for a second in front of the air conditioner mounted in the window. A chill breeze teased around her breasts making her nipples erect while pleasure of the cool laminate wood floor was an unexpected relief to tortured feet. Naked and liberated she walked to the kitchen for a cold beer from the fridge and greedily quaffed the cool liquid in celebration of her successful return. Just have to keep Nicklaus off her case, she thought.
The voluptuous form lay back in her bath, letting the soothing balm wash over her tender skin as she soaked away the cares of her weary existence. It wasn’t long before she was touching herself intimately. Carla craved sensuality, to touch and be touched, one caress for another, giving and receiving. If only she had someone to justly appreciate her – a man she could trust to give her heart and soul to. Dreamily, she closed her eyes and dallied with the tantalizing pleasure of a soft, wet sponge offering her the merest sense of detachment, an inkling, the merest hint of a man, a real man running his hands over her. Carla laid back while fine fingers crept mischievously into her willing mound. Slowly at first, then with more urgency she worked it up into a steady rhythm. Unconsciously her other hand caressed her smooth breasts, and then teased herself by pinching her erect nipples as they bobbed up out of the water.
As hands roved back and forth, from breast to stomach, from thighs to open vagina, each motion grew more urgent and necessary until the hypnotic trance made her body spasm of its own accord. There came a gushing release, a welcome climax that gave her permission to let go completely.
Fully satisfied, she wallowed sleepily in timelessness while the water saturated and shrivelled her skin. Suddenly, the phone rang, making her jump from her drowsiness in a panic and making a dash for the receiver that she knocked clumsily from its cradle. Dripping and fumbling she stuttered to get the phone to her ear.
“Hello?”
Silence.
“Hello? Anybody there?”
Nothing.
Carefree and lazily she ignored the pools of water that followed her about the house. Now utterly refreshed and composed Carla wrapped her magnificent womanly form into the welcome succor of a thick towel then stood contentedly before her full-length mirror. Her face had caught the sun and her skin glowed pink almost youthfully. Then she let her towel fall to look objectively at her shapely naked body to ponder why Captain Norbert could not believe that it was Lieutenant Hunter who had put all the moves on her.
Were those men so weak, so stupid as to not see it for what it was? She had lost her temper at the their workplace taunts. She was hot-tempered and they found her weakness. They needled her endlessly and she had snapped. Her sharp tongue had been her undoing and to teach her a lesson Norbert had locked her in the key room for an entire shift. Thank god for one just soul. Thanks god for the understanding of Polanski. She had filed a grievance for their baiting antics and only he kept it in check. But the gay lieutenant could never be any part of it. No – he was a victim as much as she was. If things ever got made official, then they were on their own and would have to fight their own battles.
And thereafter, she steeled herself resolutely remembering her training at Elmira – never show fear and never give in. That first long week played out, the routine stayed calm and settled and it was much of a breeze – not unlike that fine, late summer weather that teased those tree covered mountains.
Limoncello was assigned work details outside the camp and the new jacks grew ever more accustomed to her inscrutable firm but fair, no nonsense manner. Everyone just seemed to know that Officer Limoncello knew her job and she never felt the need to bawl or shout at the men.
But it was that following Friday, during briefing, that the order came. It seemed very insignificant and matter of fact at the time. There was no apprehension on hearing such a command. She assumed it to be nothing more than routine. Lt. Polanski told her she was to report to the captain’s office later, before she clocked off for the day. So she got on with her tasks as usual. She assembled her work detail in good order, gave roll call, assigned them tools and packed lunches from the canteen then calmly drove them all out to work in the beat up old school bus.
It never fazed her that she was the lone female officer with twenty-eight young black convicts, off to the woodland work site three miles from camp. She had done so many times before and it never seemed out of the ordinary. It was just utterly satisfying that her superiors considered her worthy of such sole responsibility. At least, that’s what she told herself and that’s what she liked about it. She felt empowered.
Today was another Encon job, or Environmental Conservation to be more precise – the kind of work Limo liked most. In the Fall it would be clearing leaves from cemeteries, or tidying up after storm damage. In winter it was often clearing ski paths of snow. The inmates did work for any non-profit organization that needed stuff doing, like out buildings painted or sheds built.
It always felt great to be doing good for the community, putting something back, plus it was a real boost for the men to see they could make a difference and achieve something truly worthwhile each and every day. But there was just one major drawback; being female Carla couldn’t use the toilet. There was usually just no place to go. She daren’t leave the men unattended and the worst of it was when she had her period. There was that one time she came back to camp an hour early – she just had to get to the bathroom. But Captain Norbert had no sympathy and wrote her up. She complained to her union, they got it pulled. But ever since there was the joke going round about the day Limo got written up for being on the rag.
The busload of inmates was in good humor singing songs, cracking jokes and laughing aloud throughout the gentle drive. At the work site they found their days’ task - a rarely used service road almost impassably clogged with matted shrubs and overgrowth. Limoncello set her gang to work with machetes, shovels, rakes and forks while she settled down on a sweet spot in the shade of a large tree, away from the glare of the strengthening sun.
She sat with cap pulled low over her brow as she quietly watched the steady progress of the inmates chopping and hacking at tangled vegetation. Slowly, throughout the morning they progressed yard by yard, moving industriously forwards along that winding dry road without any incident at all until she got hit squarely in her eye. Limoncello let out a choice expletive in disapproving exclamation. Close by, a young black inmate momentary resting on a scythe and hearing her yelp enquired after her.
“You ok, Ma’am?”
“Er, yeah, don’t mind me - damn fly in my eye, that’s all.”
“Country flies get me illing, too – sure have the edge on city flies.”
Seeing the drenched green fatigues and sweat poring off the face of the inmate and taking pity on him, Limoncello reached for a six-pack of bottles and threw him some water.
“Thanks, ma’am.”
“So what’s your story, dog, why you in boot camp?”
“Drug rap, ma’am. My Fifth Avenue lawyer did a real good snow job on me and burnt through my money. So I gets sent to Summit.”
“You’re taking to it pretty well, er, Thompson.” (She reads his name off his ID tag).
“Just doing my best. Never done anything like this ever – hard labor, I mean. All day cutting grass, trimming trees and moving rocks in this heat makes you flaky. Just wish I could hear from my folks more than just for ten minutes on the phone every other week - just missing home, I guess, ma’am.”
“I bet. So how’s the counseling classes going?”
“Sweet, all sweet. I wanna finish my GED and drug classes and be gating out with the rest of my ace cools.”
He tells her he is much luckier than his younger brother. He couldn’t post bail - awaiting trial on a drug ticket.
“Had a dirty bottle, refused a drug test and got given 90 days for free. Then right before his hearing he gets another ticket coz they found a shank in his cell, dumb ass!”
“Where’s your brother at?”
“Lakeview. He thought it would be easy – but it’s a hole there. He don’t get no use of the phone, no yard, no store and no packages. But he still gets his visits and mail. My bro, he can be in the box anywhere from a week to a month - real hothead - more time in the box than his cell.
“We don’t keep SHU here.”
“’Shoe’, ma’am?”
“Special Housing Unit - the box – as you call it.”
“No - I don’t plan on being in one, ma’am.”
“Trust me, it ain’t good. At Elmira, when I was there, one clueless inker got caught with a jail purse up his ass and got himself a year in the shoe with just a bed, a toilet and a sink to talk to for 23 hours a day.”
”That’s the pits, ma’am. I’m taking care of business and keeping away from penny ante BS. This is pure gravy compared to that trip. But like they say, ‘give me life, give me pain, give me myself again.’”
“Exactly right, Thompson. Keep smart, watch your step or fall on the worst of all slippery slopes.”
“Yes, ma’am. I wanna do my one-eighty days and be gone from here. In general population, I hear, lights go on at six then off at ten and nothing happens – not one thing all day –that’s torture – I couldn’t cut that. I don’t want to be with the dogs brewing and wearing those geeky Converse sneakers and orange suits. Jeez, anyways, from the get-go I knew I looked cooler in army greens.”
They both laugh and agree jail time is nothing like you see in the movies.
“It really ain’t Hollywood.”
Limoncello reached her hand down and flicked a switch on the tape player at her feet. She was often in the habit of taking a boom box with her to work sites. Music and entertainment was strictly banned for the inmates, but out here she was a world away from the eavesdropping zealots. She had a tape of mishmash collection of sixties music and seeing that her work detail was in good spirits, she ramped up the volume so they all could listen in. On hearing the kind of music their turnkey was into, one of the inmates began to chide the officer about her questionable taste.
“Hey, ma’am, do you really get all lit up on that stuff?”
“Nothing wrong with the Beach Boys. You just need some educating in good music!”
Another black inmate prods the outspoken gangbanger with the handle of his shovel in rebuke knowing anything she plays is good - anything when you have no privileges at all.
“Use your gourd, homeboy, watch out she don’t cut you a chrono for speaking out of turn - the sergeant is entitled to a little me time.”
A gentle breeze wafted its way down the valley with soothing caresses to lift the spirits of the work gang pausing for drinks break. The clearing and felling tasks on that dusty dry single-track highway was going well.
“Hey, Jackson, I’m not a sergeant, ain’t you figured that yet? I’m just a regular CO.”
“Sorry, ma’am. I ain’t got the full deal yet on the ranks of all you officers - I just knew I was gonna call a captain a sergeant of something.”
“Nah, you ‘re ok, guy. You will get it soon enough – you just need to look at the officer’s collars. Regular CO’s wear the ‘NY’ on the right and ‘DC’ on the left. Sergeants got the three chevrons; the lieutenants got a single bar and the captain, a double bar. Also, lieutenants and the captain wear the peanuts on their Stetsons - while us regular hacks don’t.”
Limoncello fast-forwarded the tape to let some Motown infuse the air. This brought a hooting and hollering of laughter as the work gang sound their approval. A skinny, bespectacled youth blurted out an apt commentary.
“Barry White! Now there’s a brother who gets more connection and less infatuation in a relationship.”
Her eyes scanned around and made a head count.
“Right, you guys back to work - let’s get this road cleared so we can all have a real mellow time today.”
The inmates wielded their shovels, picks and scythes in a rhythmic staccato as they cleared another drainage ditch. She looked further on, far into the distance and felt the freedom of the breeze blowing in from across the vast woods to the north of the road. She turned her head and looked south and squinted momentarily at the bright sun that lit up the whole stretch of unbroken wetland that seemed to go on for miles. In such an awesome spot she relished the feeling of satisfaction at being at one with the great outdoors on this perfect day. The impromptu music was infectious and soon pervaded the mood of the entire work detail.
Turning her head back to the busying gang of hackers and scrapers she felt utter contentment in her task. Scanning across a landscape of trees so dense and still, pine-fresh and fragrant she saw the abundance of trees, trim and straight and marveled at the innumerable acres of untouched virgin forest out there, so much ground hidden for miles under that thick canopy of vivid green. It was all so good; no decay, no blemishes anywhere to spoil that lush landscape canvas.
After lunch, the gang moved further down a stretch and set to the task of clearing another overgrown section of the road. Limoncello did her mandatory roll call, walked around a couple of times then perched contentedly on a cut tree trunk. With one hand on a raised knee and the other feeding herself steady sips of cool mountain water, she let her military boot toy with the yielding stems of milkweed beneath her feet, brushing gently the wild bergamot and spattered lavender and white specks among that endless swathe of blue greens.
Contemplating the busy faces of her workers she wondered what they really made of all this upstate beauty. City life felt a million miles from here. Only a few short months ago most of these boys were all lit up on apple jacks booking it like their life depended on it when the narks came chasing their tails. Now look at them, acting like they have the base crazies in a ditch doing conservation work and sweating out their cravings for Candy Cane and hot ho’s down a shady Brooklyn back alley and now no more. Softly thorough the heated air the music played on and Carla sighed at how good it could all be and how much purpose there was out here.
Suddenly, the tempo of the music changed and the air was plucked by the strain of a very different beat. A strident, young female voice grabbed the attention of the workers.
-You keep saying you got something for me.
Something you call love but confess –
Two inmates straighten up their crooked backs and rest their hands momentarily in bemusement on their tools.
- You've been a'messin' where you shouldn't 've been a'messin' –
And now someone else is getting all your best –
Limoncello sways her upper body to the Sinatra sound, her well-shod foot resonantly tapping on the hard tree stump beneath her and in drawing the attention of the rest of the men around her.
- Well, these boots are made for walking, and that's just what they'll do-
-One of these days these boots are gonna walk all over you-A couple of the men laugh.“Ain’t that just the perfect song for boot camp?”
Shortly after three-twenty the work detail finally gets the quarter mile section cleared enough for Limoncello to call a halt to the day’s labor. After listening to the officer play the same tape over and over again that long day, there was one song that had sunken into the subconscious more than anyone had expected.
As the men ambled back to the bus, three inmates, Jackson, Thompson and a bespectacled scrawny youth whose name she never remembered, adopted the Nancy Sinatra song as their theme tune and marched singing toe to heel, to the bemusement of the rest of the new jacks.-You keep lyin' when you oughta be truthin'-
-You keep losing when you oughta not bet-
-You keep samin' when you oughta be a'changin'-
-What's right is right but you ain't been right yet-
-These boots are made for walking,-
-and that's just what they'll do-
-One of these days these boots are gonna walk all over you-

CHAPTER 4: ‘E’ MEANS EVERYWHERE
He towered above her like he was a man who really knew himself. He fixed her with his gaze and seemed to wait for an answer. She hesitated to meet his eyes.
“Finally, I get to meet you, Limoncello. I heard all about your past problems. I’ve been keeping tabs on your work this week and I’ve been through your file. It says you were off post on the evening of April 19th. Apparently you were wrapped up in some long conversation with another officer. Your NOD here, also says you submitted a false report about the incident and Captain Norbert took a very dim view. He wanted your dismissal from the Service.”
She saw he was smooth-shaved with a chiseled angular jaw and polished skin that almost shone. With a stiff back, straight legs and a self-assured radiance he maintained his fixed stare at her.
Captain William E. Peek seemed the picture of commanding good health, a man of power and forthrightness. His slick, short and tidy black hair was tinted with a little salt and pepper at the temples. The bars on his collar shone bright like gold bullion as he puffed out his manly broad chest deep and wide beneath a three-iron starchy gray shirt. There was no doubt; he struck her with all the bearing of a man no one trifled with.
“Well, sir, I contested all that - it’s still with the union and I will fight it if I have to.”
Captain Peek stared at her hard as she stood, eyes front and to attention, before him. He then slowly and purposefully walked around her and paused at her back, out of view. Suddenly, unexpectedly, in her ear he spoke softly.
“Well, let’s me and you not go there, Officer Limoncello. Here now, you start with a clean slate. I see that up until Norbert became your captain your record was satisfactory, perhaps more than satisfactory. So let’s just put all that down to a clash of personalities. I like to let time be the judge of things. Shape up now and all will be fine and dandy. So if you have any more problems – either with inmates, or other officers, you call me. Is that understood?”
“Yes, sir. Totally understood.”
Then without warning, his face cracked into an easy smile showing that he had thirty good teeth, none busted or broken. Like a chameleon he switched to wearing the face of simple, happy, boy-like vanity and nodded approvingly close to her face. He was so close she could smell mint on his breath. Then without further ado he dismissed her from his presence and obligatory salutes were exchanged.
She left his office in hope rather than expectation. When Polanski asked how she found their new leader she merely uttered, “creepy.” But if Peek could keep the likes of Hunter, Nicklaus and O’Toole in check then life under his authority would be a distinct improvement from that of the last. Experience teaches everyone that it’s whom you know, not what you know, in Corrections. Keeping her nose clean was never a problem. Her problem had been male officers who didn’t want to keep their pants zipped, like she told that investigator, Lucy Jones, from Affirmative Action. But Jones was Norbert’s buddy and she retorted back bluntly, “What’s that got to do with all the fucking tea in China?” And nothing came of that.
That kind of deal was typical of Corrections. But it was Hunter who, perhaps, worried her the most. He had been well in with the last captain and was most likely going to be working his influence on this new one, too.
Lieutenant Hunter was pure scum and could easily be the root of all her problems. Hunter was very much the old school spit and polish and he appeared to have the look to match the new captain’s. Even off the parade ground, rather than wear the army fatigue caps most officers wear on informal duty, Hunter always kept his good Stetson on.
It was no secret around camp that her and Hunter were at loggerheads. She would never forget how he ordered her to stay entire shifts in the Key Room – eight feet square. She was never allowed to leave at any time. Made to sit alone at some stupid desk only to look out of the window all day. What kind of assignment was that to give her? Why would he do that?
No one ever came to speak to her. From the small window of that little room she was able to look out across the parade ground and watch the men drill but she saw nothing else. She watched a lot officers traipse in and out of the QWL building like some big meeting was going on but apart from that she saw nothing odd.
While she was holed up Hunter would come check up on her every hour or so. Sometimes he’d tell her she ought to work harder at being a better officer and asked why you didn’t quit. Sometimes he would give her books and some training manuals and ordered her to read all day. She read up on some guff by Corrections’ Commissioner Goord on how officers must focus alternately on rehabilitation and discipline; respect, yet suspect inmates; be flexible in an institution marked by strict rules and regulations; maintain solidarity with your co-workers while appearing emotionally independent and unneedy.
The spin was all there, she read page after tedious page of that garbage. She read how CO’s were to be judged on a ‘qualitative picture’ of what the commissioner called ‘emotional performances.’ God, how those higher-ups got off on their fancy words.
She wondered if it was really just Hunter punishing her. Perhaps they all had joked over her in their meetings? Maybe it was all a bullying tactic to toughen her up for being so humane to the inmates?
She wondered if Peek would turn into another Hunter or Norbert. Only time would tell. Like the manual says, ‘Be Suspicious! Because a good officer knows that a primary part of the correctional officer’s job requires maintaining constant suspicion. Just like the book says, ‘Suspicion is unlike ‘pure’ emotions like happiness or anger that have a clear object and a corresponding facial expression.’
Suspicion was going to eat away at her if she wasn’t careful. But she was resigned to keeping the stoical deportment expected of a first-rate officer. She knew she would be judged, in great part, on her outward emotional performance. Just like they teach you, you got to run the full gamut in this line of work, from inflated cheeriness, to suppression of fear, to the creation of an angry, tough demeanor.
Above all else, an officer has to demonstrate skill in handling the complex web of emotions to managing in this tension-filled job. Hunter kept criticizing her for failing to abide by the rule that forbade officers from standing nearer than six feet or turning their backs on any inmate. When Hunter had shadowed her once before, he mocked her.
“God, you’re so dumb, Limoncello, because they’ll try to distract you so that someone can go warn someone else that you’re coming.”
Hunter liked to belittle her by making her think she was never wise to the tricks inmates pull. But Polanski was better at guiding her. He never mocked her or verbally abused anyone. He was far more encouraging and would tell her things like:‘Limo, you gotta walk the line between not doing what inmates tell you, but also joking and throwing them off without being rude. It’s only a matter of time - one day you’ll be an experts at it.’
She had become an expert, she thought. Good officers maintain suspicion by hiding personal information. She knew his way was the safest way when he said, ‘I never talk about my personal life.’ It was like the time an inmate asked his what his middle initial in his name stood for. He told inmates that the ‘E’ on his nametag stood for ‘Everywhere.’ That meant, ‘I’m everywhere you are and I see everything.’ Polanski was right. Maybe she should be more like the men and not open up, not empathize and hide more of herself in every way.
But what she feared most of all was being labeled a ‘fish’ or a ‘mule’ that was what the other hacks called co-workers who got played by inmates and in the worst cases, became ‘carriers’ for their contraband. She had principles; she had a vocation some of them would never understand. No one would ever play her – or so she thought.

CHAPTER 5: A BROOKLYN BLACK DAY
Friday 19th August 1994. As a soft sun rose over gracefully to meet the pitched roof of the hushed parole building, dew-white crystals were trampled evenly by the slow and steady march of three pairs of spit-polished shoes toward a dark blue Chevrolet. Sandwiched between two immaculately starched officers was a young black man dressed in black. His neat but plain attire was accessorized with shiny bracelets of steel about his wrists.
On Polanski’s orders it was Limoncello who wore the .38 pistol. Without fuss they cuffed the detainee to the metal grid that bisected the front from the back of the car. The female officer then signaled her first gesture of compassion. Into the free hand of the prisoner she slipped a small tape player and headphones. Jackson raised his eyes to meet hers and nodded gratefully back at her.
But there was method to her kindness. While Jackson listened to his music she and Polanski could chat. Polanski threw her the keys and told her to drive and she turned down the hill he asked Carla if she heard about Nicklaus’ mother.
“Oh, Jesus, Lieutenant - not you too? Don’t buy into that crock. Ted has told everyone that story – once he stung me with it. He’s got himself a slew of sympathy cards and bereavement leave that way.”
Polanski looked bemused.
“Haven’t you figured that creep yet - a smart guy like you? I’m surprised more people aren’t wise to him.”
“ I didn’t buy it off the bat – it was Hunter playing along that got me wondering. Them and O’Toole in the QWL over some card game played along.”
“Yanking your chain, too? I thought it was just me they rode.”
“Well, while you been out they’ve been finding other ways to amuse their tiny minds. Gotten to a real tight knit crew.”
“Sure – I can imagine.”
“Ted’s old lady slung him out and they all hang out at the motel where he stays.”
“As long as they’re out of my hair I’m happy.”
“All us Hebes, gays, bitches and coons - we just ain’t got a neck red enough.”
“You said it. So how long’s this ride, Limoncello?”
“Couple hundred miles - long haul just for a church service. Weddings, christenings and funerals - boy, do I hate ‘em. Had religion rammed down my throat my whole life. Almost bailed when they put my mom in the ground. Too freaky, I guess. You catholic, Polanski?”
“No. Polish Jew. I’m the same - this reminds me of my father's back in Ottawa. That was a hot day like this. He wanted a simple ceremony My pop wasn’t much into the Hebrew ways.”
“‘Happy is the bride that the sun shines on; blessed is the corpse that the rain rains on.’ Did you say Ottawa - in Ontario? I never figured you for a Canadian, lieutenant.”
“Just ‘coz I don’t say ‘eh’ all the time? Anyways, I can tell you’re not originally of the mountain clans – what with that city accent, Limoncello.”
“Yeah, you ain’t kidding, lieutenant. I was born a Queens’ girl - in my blood. My folks came upstate when dad retired from NYPD. In fact, mom insisted she be buried at Cypress Hills. Why they would ever want to leave the city for this godforsaken wilderness is beyond me.“
“So why hang around if you hate it?”
“It grew on me. You know what they say - you let the grass grow under your feet then before you know it, you feel you belong.”
“I was the same - came south for the work. Ma was from New Jersey and pop came over from Europe as a kid during the war. Narrow escape from Auschwitz.”
“Death camps? Gruesome! My grandfather’s dad was from Europe - Italy. They say he was a court musician to the king, or something. Some revolution or something made them leave.”
“This kid they’re burying today - a murder victim I heard.”
“Yeah, that’s what I got told. Can you imagine what its’ gonna be like? Never gonna be a happy occasion either way, though, I guess.”
“Makes you look at life different. Pop once told me a story of when he worked as a heating engineer he visited the home of an old German soldier who had served in Poland. The German offered to shake his hand but dad’s hand froze at his side. He just couldn’t forgive. I guess forgiveness happens after you admit your hurt and scream your hate.”
Polanski looks askance at the bobbing black head of their prisoner engrossed in his music.
“What’s his name again?”
“Jackson – Kendall Jackson.”
“Makes you wonder how Jackson will turn out, don’t it? Shame how good kids go bad. Feels like we’re all displaced persons drifting from tragedy to tragedy.”
But at least for the ones like Jackson there was a flicker of hope. They debated Jackson’s odds of making it. Polanski was a mine of little known facts about Boot Camp. He told her how Shock inmates passed the GED at a rate of 86 percent, compared with 58 percent of New York’s general public. The typical grade level improvement in other GED programs is three years, but in Shock, inmates improve by as much as nine years.
“It’s not the tragedy that makes you; it’s how you turn that from a negative to a positive. When pop died, even though I was the youngest, I did all the funeral arrangements. Him and me were close – always favored me - it hit me hard.”
Limoncello nodded her head in agreement.
"Yup, stuff like that really scars. But, for me, I wasn’t too upset when mom died. We never got on – chalk and cheese.”
Polanski could read from her tone that there was something else that bothered her. Something she wasn’t going to reveal.”
“At least we got one good omen today – nice weather for a funeral.”
The bright sunlight flickered up off the road like a sheen causing the officers to squint. Polanski pulled out his ‘John Lennons’ from his shirt and hooked them onto the end of his nose while Carla tipped her Stetson to the side to give her eyes a little shade.
“Worse losing a younger brother though. Losing grandparents, parents - you prepare for that. But someone younger- not more than a kid? Well, that’s gotta cut you up real bad.”
Jackson, head still bobbing, eyes closed and oblivious the chatter from the two officers.
“Seems like he’s deep in himself. He’s ok for now.”
“I reckon these kinds of occasions can bring out the best in people. Pop insisted on a plain wooden casket with a Star of David carved on top - something uncomplicated with a bit of ancient writing from the Talmud. Stuff about simplicity, uniformity and equality - that was important to him. And I had enough to worry about stressing over pallbearers, strangers I’d never see coming up offering condolences and are willing to help.”
They mulled over the misfortune of the inmate’s life. Only days earlier he had gotten news of his brother’s death from a fatal shank wound during a prison fight at Sing Sing. Polanski and Officer Limoncello had both volunteered to take Jackson on the long haul down to the funeral in Brooklyn. The streets of Brooklyn had been her cop dad’s beat.
“He used to take us around those streets. I was a shy child – I’d skip and hop scotch all and loved the life on the streets.”
“Ain’t it all changed now? It’s all new housing projects and ‘clean ups.’”
“I guess so – at least round the Myrtle Avenue side of Fort Greene Park. That’s where they had the great criminal crackdown – busted open those on ghetto streets. Supposed to be all rejuvenated now. Made something out of those brownstone buildings.”
“Ain’t that the way - clear out the slums, build a few luxury condos for the wealthy and so long poverty!”
But she wanted to see for herself if the politicians had done more than just scratch the surface of change. Was the great metropolis really going to have such a different feel from the prison her savvy cop dad once so determinedly ‘freed’ his family from all those years ago?
Finally, they made the New Jersey Turnpike. It was the dullest of drives and Polanski agreed there is no sense keeping Jackson permanently uncomfortable wearing those handcuffs. As the journey went on Jackson started talking. They had gotten out of him that he was just 22. He was a father of a two-year old daughter he missed badly and had confessed he fully deserved his one and half to three years term for drug dealing. His dead brother, Randall, a year older, had been doing a life stretch in Sing Sing for his part in a gangland murder. Clearly, someone had decided to apply the death sentence instead of the long stretch.
The Jacksons never knew their father – didn’t particularly want to, either.
“Another addict – hard core style.”
That drug culture was still endemic in New York and very hard to escape. A path amongst city gangs was never going to take you far. Since the tragedy of his brother’s murder, Jackson’s been praying hard that the six-month stint at Summit will be an end to it all. He felt remorse that his family suffered so badly for two wayward sons. Mom was now partially disabled and walked with a cane, her ‘atonement from the Lord’ due to a hit and run car smash a year ago.
From nowhere, an erratically driven yellow cab cuts across their path as they turned sharply off exit 5 toward RT-27 E and Fort Hamilton Parkway. Polanski let out an almighty shriek and dumped half his hot coffee over his immaculately pressed pants.
“Jesus! Fucking rag heads!” ******
Gloria S. Jackson waited patiently with her sister, Elvira, for the funeral home cars to come and take the family to the service for her son. Pulling in to Ocean Avenue it was strange to see million-dollar homes alongside smaller, much more drab homes on the side streets, mostly black owned.
“There’s my mom’s home, ma’am. See the flowers?”
Beside the door of Gloria’s home, in the black-American tradition, hung a large mixed floral wreath. Here in downtown Brooklyn the Jackson family had always lived in that run-down four-storey tenement building in a street that appeared permanently sentried by several watchful indigents smoking blunts outside a thrift store.
“Ain’t changing much – them’s look outs for their applejack dealer homies.”Polanski: “You know, Sylvester Stallone and June Jordan lived in one of these dumps.”Limoncello: “Who the hell is June Jordan?”
Within moments two black limousines pulled up in the street just behind them. Fighting back her weariness, Limoncello put on her Stetson, got out of the car and spoke briefly with the chauffeur of the first vehicle before taking her seat once more behind the wheel.
Pulling out slowly into the light traffic, the line of five vehicles made stately progress through the most violent streets of New York. As the two limousines pulled out in front of them they all got sight it of the coffin car. Emblazoned in white roses across the length of the side of the coffin was ‘Randall.’ The legend instantly brought clouds to Jackson’s eyes. Limoncello quickly averted her gaze from driver’s rear view mirror. Boys don’t cry.
“I’m tailing them to the church, they know the route better than me.”
Perhaps it was the smell of incense or sitting among so many Bed-Stuy blacks but sat in church in that rarefied atmosphere made Limoncello feel uncomfortable and claustrophobic. From a high, wooden pulpit came a steady litany of pious words wafting out nauseatingly in the dank oppressive air. Must be the heat, she thought not to mention the early start, the four-hour drive and this sultry weather. Whatever it was, the occasion was starting to take its toll.
She had seen death before but having to walk side by side with Jackson past the open casket of his brother’s corpse had felt strangely humiliating and grim. Now all three sat squashed wilting together, her and Polanski either side of the prisoner. Frazzled and cooped Carla just wanted to escape. When the reverend reached out to the congregation in Jackson’s name, most raised their hands in shared affirmation. Despite the surge of emotion washing over her she was steadfastly weary of god, woefully tired of bible-bashing bluster. Between minister and congregation, she was getting a full dose of African-American call-and-response fundamentalist Christianity. How she yearned for sleep to wash over her, take her high and away in a welcome slumberous drug.
Finally, there came a shuffling clamor and they all rose together to trickle out into overcast skies. Leading off, the Jackson family began the long silent ride in the hearse for the twenty-minute drive to the cemetery, detouring past the family home in a gesture of farewell. No one spoke a word.
At a snip after twelve-thirty most of the mourners, all deferentially clad in black, had assembled in an impressively large horseshoe about the neatly dug grave. One by one handfuls of earth were cast over the coffin, then came the eulogies for a beloved son, nephew, brother and cousin. Hollow voices spoke softly and slowly in faltering fashion and teardrops fell from sullen cheeks as the earth swallowed up the casket, like an unwanted bitter brown pill.
The Rev. John Fowlsey Jr. paused to gaze around solemnly and slowly into the faces of the darkly clad mourners packed around the grave. Fowlsey raised his hand above his head in benediction style and offered his solemn prayer for the dead.
“In every life, no matter how rich or poor, there will come tragedy. It is the one promise life always fulfills. Happiness is a gift from god and we should not expect it, but when it comes we should cherish it for the time we have. The premature and tragic death of Randall Jackson will raise, in all of us here gathered today, reflection on our faith and our goals. Those of us with strong religious faith may find the peace and emotional resources to cope better than those without religious faith. But we are not here today to judge, only to mourn…Oh, Lord, we ask you forgive us our debts as we have forgiven our debtors…”
Fowlsey’s heartfelt oratory rode on like sonorous waves washing over a supplicant congregation. The ebb of tears in sorrow and loss was soothed with his utter reassurance that the tide would one day turn.
“…. Flow out that pain – for the healer is here!”
But not everyone was convinced. Hatred is not always wrong, and forgiveness is not always deserved.
“Amen!”
The grisly, premeditated killing of Jackson’s younger brother was shocking even more when you see the grief of his family, normal people, with normal aspirations, not criminals, not cardboard cut-out television characters on the news or a slick Hollywood film. Jackson’s aunt leaned over to whisper something to Limoncello.
“Did you see his face in the casket? That boy looked beyond fault! Now you know - sons see living as a tough deal - only set free when dead!“Limoncello: “God, I hate when mourners cry for themselves, not for the deceased. Poor kid, I’ll take hope - they can have their grace.”Polanski: “Well, you gotta say one thing: I know what they mean now when they talk about the cathartic effect of black funerals.”
Limoncello: “That’s the weight of living black in America.”
Normally, a sense of cathartic release, often starting with the sense of loss and ending with rejoicing in the life of the deceased, fills most African-American funerals. A white-haired old man released a dove that flew away into the sky as a symbol of the soul of the deceased ascending into the heavens. And so it was, after the ceremony the junior choir of the Zion Chapel Baptist Church sang a melodious hymn in honor the death of the son of one of their congregants. Then Elvira Jackson took a hold of Polanski’s arm and asked a favor.
“Would you officers like to come back for some sweet potato pie? It’s so good and it would be real kind of you to let Kendall have a little time with his mother.”
With the added incentive of chicken, macaroni and cheese, greens and iced tea, the lieutenant gave the nod graciously.
“You must be really hating all this religiousness, Limo.”
“I’m going with the flow, just like you, lieutenant. “
Elvira gave the officers some prophetic words as she thanked them for their patience.
“You folks enjoy your food. Don’t mind us here. We are all used to injustice, always have been, and always will be. You see most New Yorkers going to their churches or synagogues, reading their Bibles and all that. But the truly righteous are few while those whose hearts are obsessed over power or hate are many.”

CHAPTER 6: ZITS AND PARTING SHOTS
Saturday August 20th 1994. She clasped the gun tightly with deadly intent and proceeded to fire off the full magazine without emotion. Officer stress - it’s a bitch when it drives you to the point of agitation. She heard the pleading voice of the range master in her ear to uncock her pistol.
“Nice grouping, Carla. That was excellent. You held the gun firmly, at eye level, and fired like your life depended on it.”
Words of wisdom wafted around her carefree brain: you just can’t manage inmates as well if you’re not clear minded. We don’t want a riot situation or get injured all because of a cluttered mind.
This was Saturday shooting and Limo was working for her concealed handgun license (CHL) from the local shooting range. Her license was in the bag, he told her. Upstate rural officials liberally issue permits but urban officials seldom do.
“There’s not much more I can teach you. Use your remaining time at the range to work on faster, slicker movement from holster to shoulder, that’s the only area you could improve. But apart from that you’re a damn fine shot!”
“Thanks, Joe. Why’s it so busy today?”
“Ain’t you heard? Last Monday some guy comes in, he rents a semi-automatic, takes some instruction, watches a safety video, signs the waiver form, then goes on the gun range, shoots targets for a couple minutes and then without hesitation, blows his brains out. They found the suicide note. Every day since the club has been bustling with business.”
“Wow - makes you wonder - how can anyone’s life get that bad?”
Later, tucked away anonymously on the corner of the Great American an old station wagon, a ‘woody’ was parked strategically opposite Carla’s green sedan. It was a glorious sunny afternoon. Dappled light fronds played mischievously through silk clouds casting a warm and gratifying radiance across the mottled and pitted car park. She would never have suspected that a shadowy figure was stalking its unsuspecting prey waiting for her to exit the store.
Pushing a cart full of groceries Carla strode serenely into the sun. She moved in fluid strides with a carefree certainty about her gait. Here she was on home turf and life was untroubled once more. Dressed casually in a light blue v-neck sweater and black leggings and sandals she looked an alluring housewife. The sight of her sent an electric pulse through her stalker’s loins. As the target opened the trunk and bent forward those heavy white breasts swelled up to form a long, satisfying cleavage. Slinking deeper into the driver’s seat transfixed as she bobbed up and down, side-to-side shifting her packages, the shadow surreptitiously stroked a yearning crotch.
Little did she know that this was the second time that day those eyes had invaded her privacy. An hour and three quarters earlier, the opportunist prowler stole away in a thicket waiting patiently for her to leave her home. her lonely watcher had crouched behind a clump of secular willows, which stood to the edge of her small clearing in the very heart of her dense portion of the forest. Only when she drove off did the creature break the silence of the forest.
Getting in through an open window, rifling through her cupboards and drawers had all been a breeze. Then finding that black box of treasures in her bedside cabinet, tucked in a brown paper bag was almost an orgasmic moment. The thrill of owning a piece of her had been achieved with a minimum effort but with maximum guile.
Clunk! A clumsy fat oaf and his jawing wife broke that moment of relish as their rusty pick up truck inattentively knocked askew a jutting wing mirror. In sudden fear of being recognized the stalking phantom quickly tosses a mangled old copy of Militia Minds Weekly into the passenger foot well, spits out an unheard expletive at the burger-burdened bodies. Then throwing the transmission into drive heads out onto the highway with a new plan to bring her pain.
Monday August 22nd 1994. Just like any life-altering event there was nothing exceptional about how it all began. In fact if anyone pondered on what was the root cause, then the situation was rather unremarkable. It was as she was mulling over a coffee in the Quality of Work Life canteen that Lieutenant O’Toole made his presence known after his return from leave.
“Don't let your mind wander, Officer Limoncello - it's too small to be left out on its own.”
She paused from spinning the dregs at the bottom of her coffee cup to shoot O’Toole a withering look. She had done her very best to make a good impression covering his platoon for those last two weeks. Now he was back and being as swaggeringly obnoxious as ever. As he walked around the melamine table she saw he looked well-tanned and a little cleaner cut. Up close O’Toole looked scarcely old enough to drive, let alone make rank. He had been a college dropout who drifted into the service on a path his parents frowned on. Most of his time he idled away either jawing with Nicklaus about Nascar, custom trucks or the Jets winning the Superbowl or skulking in the QWL counting his zits and daydreaming.
“Funny, funny, Lieutenant – maybe someone should tell you - the size of a mind is measured by how much it can think for itself.”
“Watch your shit, Limo! All you had to do was make it through zero weeks but you fucked up my platoon already. You’re such a flunk - you go soft on the new jacks and now I gotta fix what you done wrong!”
O’Toole altered his step and rather than take a seat at the table beside her, turned up his nose and walked on by to a seat further away leaving her one final parting shot.
"Yeah, they say if the noise in prison don't bother you, then the smell will."

CHAPTER 7: SPIT AND POLISH
Thursday 26th August 1994. She was patrolling the perimeter on a fine sunny afternoon. It was after 4pm, she was working the late shift. As she strolled lazily from block to block she mulled it over. Maybe O’Toole had a point and maybe she was too easy on the inmates. It could be to do with her compassion and we all know a lot of officers aren’t so strong on compassion in this boot camp. But a prison is still a prison, nonetheless.
She turned her head left then right and gazed all about her and considered the context of what it meant to be in this ‘prison.’ Most of the buildings you see here no one would readily identify as part of any jail. There was no penal complex feel to it all from the outside. While on the inside the walls were painted either a neutral light gray or light blue. The structure was built mostly of timber with some cinder block covered with aluminum siding. You could see no bars on windows, no high fences, no gates and it as all open plan as any institution could be.
Within each section there was painted on the walls large murals, some expertly created with skill and artistry. One particular mural was a pastiche of the famous World War Two photo of the 5th Marines taking Mount Suribachi and raising the Stars and Stripes. The painting bore the legend,’ Make it to the Peek’ prominently inscribed.
She chuckled and thought the misspelling of ‘peek’ seemed rather ironic. In another dorm there was a mural depicting a man laboring hard in a field burdened with a heavy load on his back, that had the inscription,’ That Which Does Not Kill You Makes You Stronger.’ While on another wall a large monochrome image of a black man’s face looked up to a bright sun and a more shadowy figure with a drooping posture stood behind him apparently holding the words, ‘Only You Can Make Yourself Feel Inferior.’
On the floors of every block were laid buff colored heavy-duty tiles that inmates mopped and machine buffed daily. All the outer doors were very heavy duty fitted with industrial mesh glass for strength and painted battleship gray and could only be opened by those old-fashioned oversized skeleton type keys. All the windows were the crank handle style you see in most houses in the region.
On a night shift the officers would walk around the dorms guarding inmates that slept in bunk bed rows that lined the walls end to end. If an inmate ever wanted to use the lavatory at night they had to ask for permission, as the toilet was located at the far end of each dormitory.
Inmates always stood to attention and saluted the officers while on grounds and if they needed to speak had to say, ‘permission to speak, sir’ or if they wanted to ask a female officer, like Carla, a question they would have to say, ‘permission to ask a question, ma’am.’ But over time, once the new intake got broken in, by about the third or fourth month, it was more than likely this eased up somewhat and life got a little less formal.
Best of all at Summit, Limoncello loved the work details in the finer, warmer months and the chance to get away from what she saw as the suffocating low element of her peers. She grew to appreciate nature and the outdoors more than she ever did. Each April and May time she relished the appearance of the forsythias, lilac and crocuses while in the Fall she delighted in the crunching of myriad colored leaves underfoot and the variegated red, ochre, yellows and oranges that splashed their earthy shades from root to treetop. Of course, like Frank would tell her, there were pine trees everywhere, but look also at the bountiful birch, white birch, and maple. She grew to know their names and appreciate their individual beauty. To escape the ugliness that would infect a lesser character, she found her antidote not in people but in plants, animals and the vast abundance of these idyllic mountains.
And times she would not be alone. She relished seeing the joy in her daughter’s eyes when, together they would go among the forest trees and tap the Maple syrup from March through April. Then you truly felt nature had sprung and new life electrified the soul when they ventured out to go up the hill to the sugarwood and tap the syrup for uncle Frank. Frank was kindly to her kid and did his best to fill the void that every daughter feels when your father doesn’t care. It was then you’d really see that sparkle in those innocent young eyes when he would tell them to wait for the cold, sharp nights followed by the warm, sunny days. They were the best times when the sap got to flow.
“Nail those buckets to the trees and cover the tops with pieces of cardboard.”
This was how you keep the bugs out, warned Frank. And once they had drawn enough sap Carla would let Lita hammer home the wooden pegs to stop up the drill holes until next time. Together they would carry the sap-filled steel pales home trying ever so hard not to spill the watery clear juice, all the while goading each other of how many pancakes they would scoff covered in that beautiful amber liquid.
But first they would have to drive to uncle Frank’s where he would have them help him fill the boiler then cook down the vat of sap into syrup.
“Bet you five bucks the sugar water will freeze.”
“I’ll bet you ten you can’t guess how many gallons there are!”
But everyone agreed with Frank, who said every time, ‘That hot syrup smell - you just can’t beat it!’
On and on from block to block Officer Limoncello walked the jail perimeter lapping up the late afternoon sun that warmed deep into her bones. There she stopped for a moment between the Parole Room and the Visitors Block to look inside and see Kendall Jackson all alone, head stooped and mopping the floor rhythmically side to side.
“Hey, guy, how you doing?”
“Oh, fine, ma’am, just fine – plowing on.”
She enquired politely about the health of his mother and the rest of the family. He answered they were doing fine.
“I owe them all – they don’t give up on me - not my kid, my woman - but most of all, not my mother. It’s for them I do it - I ain’t gonna end up dead and gone like my brother. This chance - here at Summit- I’m taking it with both hands, ma’am.“
Limoncello asked him what the worst problem for him on the outside had been and he answered in one word, ’gangs.’
“The saddest part is when you kill for the gang you feel you’re a man. They say it’s that fish in a small pond thing, but really - you’re still nothing.”
Limoncello nods her head wistfully empathizing.
“I don’t want to spend the rest of my life in and out of jail fooling myself like I’m working my 401(k) for free food. Just coz I got a bed every night while my kid is growing up telling her friends she has no daddy.”
The inmate stood still and rested the mop in the bucket to ask a question that he had been mulling over.
“Excuse me for asking, ma’am. No offense intended. But why’s a white woman like you in a jail full of black men?”
She paused to answer but in that instant saw the humor in it and laughed allowed to the bemusement of Jackson.
“Well, for me, being in here on my side of this jail is doing something right – kinda opposite to you, maybe. But sure as hell opposite to what my folks wanted me to do. They say this job is no good. But the more they hollered at me the more I wanted to be my own person!”
The black inmate nods philosophically and respectfully.
“Families do play their part, that’s for sure!”
“Very much. I got it in the neck from a whole slew of brothers and one crazy sister. But I just about keep my mouth buttoned for my kid’s sake. Everyone thinks they know your business better than you – that’s what riles me.”
The female officer pulls up a chair and the inmate takes his cue to ask her something that had been puzzling him. He wants to know why the bulls like to talk to the inmates more than each other – is it because they don’t get along?
“Well, hacks are discouraged from interacting with each other on duty, especially when the senior officers are on the snoop. But with the inmates, that’s ok – it’s kinda encouraged and seems to help a long shift pass more easy.”
But she was putting a gloss in it. For her, things seemed to have changed since she got back from sick leave. Or maybe she was just being paranoid. The regular guys who once would have shared a few words or a joke with her were now blanking her. People were walking in detours to keep out of her path.
“Don’t you get the fun taking out of you by the male hacks?”
“Sure do! Them guys – they try to be so macho but I give it all back - they say it’s just the boot camp mentality.”
Unexpectedly, through the door come Officer Nicklaus and Lieutenant O’Toole talking the kind of body language of something no good. The pair stood facing her and Jackson and Nicklaus took off his Ray-bans and began to smirk nodding his head. With much affectation he stashed his shades into his shirt pocket and slipped on his black leather gloves as O’Toole tut-tutted the two figures stood silently before them.
“So, tell me, what do we have here – a fucking nigger new jack? And sucking up to a white woman officer?”
Limoncello cringed and turned her eyes askance – there was no escape. Her voice crackled with trepidation as she sensed something ugly was brewing.
“We’re fine here, officers, we don’t need any help, thanks.”
It happened all too quickly and she was helpless to stop it. A sickening punch from Nicklaus thudded into Jackson’s rib cage. He collapsed instantly gasping for breath. Immediately a deft boot swung hard into the groin of the prostrate heap while a second kick from the other man launched a bucket of dirty water into the contorted face.
“Ain’t you been taught how to clean anything properly, boy?”
Nicklaus and O’Toole guffawed with laughter. The barrel-chested Nicklaus pulled open his fly and began to urinate on the crumpled figure calling him a ‘wiseass bitch.’ Lieutenant O’Toole stands back to applaud the spectacle.
“Next time we’ll teach you how to drain a bucket of snot and suck puss out of a dead nigger’s ear.”
O’Toole now gave a withering slow handclap as the ‘bitch’ squirmed groaning beneath another kick from the heavy size nines. Not to be undone, O’Toole followed up, for good measure, with a thick wooden baton whipped down hard across the legs of the malefactor in a further taste of backwoods discipline. Suddenly, unable to take any more, Limoncello snaps and begins throwing her fists in Nicklaus’ direction. Easily evading her repost, the taunting bulls mock her ‘candy ass’ and tell her she’s too weak to be a shock camp hack.
“Fuck you assholes – you’re moronic – you know that!”
The shrill rebuke of Limoncello cut no ice. As she clutched at Nicklaus’ arm O’Toole caught her by shoulder and tossed her like a rag doll to the side. More staccato blows fell upon the inmate until sweat beads and the bull’s disheveled hair signaled the end to the impromptu exertions.
Checking no one else was eyeballing them, Nicklaus left his black poodle to wallow in a cocktail puddle of blood, piss and mop water. O’Toole, for good measure, sunk a final sickening boot toe into Jackson’s face. It was enough to loosen teeth. A departing Nicklaus confessed to one thing: he would rather be in a desert storm wasting Camel Jockeys than stamping on worthless inkfaces.
Limoncello took a handkerchief from her pocket and administered it to the blood oozing from Jackson’s face. It was futile. Nothing could be said or done here: it wasn’t how it worked. You learn to keep it zipped.
”They just need a good beating to get them out of the drinking and drugging, street hustling gang mentality.”
As Nicklaus opened the outside door he looked back at her mightily self-satisfied.
“I hear guys are retiring on stress—what’s so stressful about this job? I just love it!”
He wiped the gunk off the toe of his boot onto the back of his trouser leg then took to another of his bad habits - chewing the end of his pencils.
The whole time O’Toole kept a few paces back from Nicklaus doing nothing to stop the hothead subordinate. The lieutenant merely deferred to Ray-Ban man like it was he who held the rank.
“Limoncello- I think your inmate needs a mop and bucket. He appears to have messed himself.”
“You won’t get away with this – you’ll pay – you see!”
Nicklaus blurted out, ‘Captain coming’ and hastily he and his henchman shot off across the path towards Admin. Block. Limoncello helped lift Jackson to his feet, picked up the mop and overturned bucket and handed them to him.
“Don’t worry, ma’am. This ain’t your fight.”
Her one consolation is that you learn really bad officers become marked men and the 3 R's of Respect, Reputation, and Revenge invariably catch up to them in the form of a shank in the back. Likely as not, Jackson would get his own divine inspiration and, like her, wisely follow the words of Malcolm X who said, ‘when people are sad, they don't do anything. They just cry over their condition. But when they get angry, they bring about a change.’
The captain walked the corridors with squeaky shoes; he filled his foot ware soulfully and walked in funereal slow fashion generally with his hands clasped behind him. His symmetrically aligned shoelaces were a testament to his orderly mind. When Peek was on his rounds you never spoke to him unless spoken to, he was also a captain with a penchant for snooping.
Through the glass door Limoncello could see squeaky shoes signaling to Nicklaus and O’Toole. He had collared them just as they were entering the Admin building. He’d seen it. The captain had actually seen it and was about to do something, she thought.
Then a beckoning hand was aimed her way. O’Toole was motioning for her to come to where the three of them now stood. She left a dazed Jackson tending his wounds and marched in quick time towards the little group. Then the captain gave to her his first direct order in a deep gravely tone.
“My office Limoncello - now!”
For a moment Peek continued to stare at the spot from where Limoncello had disappeared. He then turned his troubled face to the task before him, for he had witnesses something that had shaken him. He hesitated then half turned as though to follow her. But then thinking better of it turned his attention to the waiting parlous pair. He gave them no opportunity for speech, for at the sound of the door closing Peek’s impassivity left him. He stomped his feet as if his whole body had suddenly become electric. His eyes flared up; his heavy eyebrows screwed up tightly toward each other; his jaws worked, twisting his chin into strange contortions; his tall frame straightened compellingly; and his voice boomed from his deep chest in a torrent of ardent abuse.
Lieutenant Polanski never heard what was said but he saw it all from his desk through the glass door inside the Admin building. He sunk lower into his chair and watched it all from the shadows.

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SUMMIT SHOCK

'SUMMIT SHOCK'

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