Be wise and don’t wise of to a southern cop. Especially if he’s your jailor

The Brutal Truth
This was no Sunday stroll these two backwoods hooligans planned to take me on. As I was escorted down one corridor I noticed a cigarette machine with a paperback book on top. Thinking I may need some reading material over the next who knows how many days, I grabbed the book as we went passed without the goon squad seeing it. We made many turns and I was confused about where I was until we stopped at a door that said “Interrogation Room” If I was confused before, I was completely perplexed now. Not sure what interrogating planned but I h they had a nervous feeling about their interpretation of the word interrogate. As it turned out, having nothing to interrogate was the plan. Jimbo opened the door and led me inside. It was a relatively empty room. Four chairs, three on one side of a small wood table, and one lonely chair on the other. It was apparent which one was mine and Jimbo led me right over to it and signaled for me to sit down. Nervously, I sat. It was Billy who spoke as Jimbo moved the other chairs and the table to the corner. “Boy, we need to git an unnerstandin’ tween us here. Firstly, I done never wanna here ya call any of us law officers turn-key again. That get through all that hair into yer brain boy?” With serious alarm I shook my head yes. I was in a very precarious position and was quickly weighing my best options. He stared at me with razor eyes and said “I caint hear you boy, I asked if yew understood!” I sheepishly let out a soft ”yessir.” I was taken aback at how wimpy it sounded. Even the echoing on the near empty room was scoffing at me. Jimbo lifted his right foot up in the air and brought it down hard. He kicked me with his “County issue” stiff leather boot. He had reached up higher than I would have thought he could manage with his roly poly body and landed the heel of that boot directly in the muscle portion of my left bicep. Both me and the chair were caught off guard (pun intended) and went sailing across the floor in search of the wall. My head hit something hard, and I knew I had found the target. A flash of pain and a second of darkness warned me a major headache would accompany me later. Jimbo walked over to my shaking body and got about an inch away from my ear. “He asked you if you got that boy? You lose yer tongue or sumpin?” He didn’t need to scream so loud, what with me being a half inch away and all, but he did feel a need to cover my ear in spit as he yelled. Now I was at a horrible disadvantage and needed to react quick to win these guys over and get out of here. I looked him in the eye and said clearly “Yes sir, I got it. I will not call you turn-key ever again.” It took about all the strength I could muster to say it. Billy was picking me up and Jimbo assisted the chair. “Now that’s much better boy” Billy was now speaking with an air of superiority that he enjoyed immensely. “Sit back down now boy, we don’t want you falling off your chair agin y‘all might hurt yerseff” Big bad Jimbo leaned down to my dry ear and began to talk in a half whisper. “Let me tell ya how this is gonna go here yankee boy. We dun like no strangers comin roun here causin no trouble. We don like you, but y’all gonna be here a while so you need to git the rules straight. Theys pretty simple. Rule one, we are always in charge and you nevah nevah talk back to any one of us.” I was nodding my head in agreement, but before I could get a word out, Billy Boy had whacked my left calf with his baton so hard I felt fire surging up my leg and go numb in seconds. First pins and needles then my calf was throbbing. Jimbo looked over on the floor saw the book that took flight when me and the chair went airborne. With a mocking disgusted look he picked it up. “Boy, now what the Hell is this? Lookie here Billy, hippie boy done stole someone’s book.” He shook his head like the condescending asshole he was, “ Now see , hairbag, this is just the kind of thing we wants to avoid. Where’n the hell y’all get this?” I gently shook my head trying to think of an answer that would appease him, but to no avail. “Nevernin boy, it ain’t matter no how.” He placed the book up to my temple, pulled back his baton to hit the book so hard my head snapped back. A new pain shot through my head. Throbbing, burning, and pounding like I had never experienced before. The chair and I both tumbled to the ground again. Billy walked over to where I had fallen, and stepped hard on my calf. “Is this the spot where you hurt yaseff boy?” I felt throbbing all over, in my leg, my head, and now in my stomach. When I looked up Jimbo was standing over me with his baton by his side and a sadistic smile on his face. I felt nausea whirling up and feared if I puked it would just piss them off more. It snuck up into my mouth and I clenched it shut and swallowed. It was even worse than the mornings year old oatmeal. I was having trouble breathing which is when I realized I had just been whacked in the stomach with his baton. Now my solar plexus and ribs ha joined in the misery. My head was spinning and my eyes had teared up and I everything looked blurry. Jimbo picked me up and locked my arms behind me. Billy took the book I had found, and placed on my temple again, and whacked the book again. He moved the book to various places on my face and continued the beatings. “See boy, you did us a favor with this here book y’all stole. Ain’t gonna be no marks on yer face, but I bet its gonna hurt for a long time comin’ You ain‘t gonna steal no more books, are ya?.” Jimbo sat me down in the chair, or should I say threw me into the chair where I collapsed in pain and exhaustion. I could hardly breathe, and barely speak. I looked up through the tears in my eyes and watched them parading around with ugly satisfied looks on both of their faces. The beatings continued for what seemed like an hour, but was more likely only five or ten minutes. They applied the book and baton combination to various body parts, mostly concentrating on my face and arms. It was accompanied with their hideous sadistic laughter. They were seriously enjoying it but I was beginning to fade in and out of consciousness and began numbing up. I swallowed another mouthful of vomit for fear of worse beatings. My entire body was throbbing and aching, and Billy got right in my face again. “So I think we have us an unnerstandin’ here, right boy?” He pointed the baton to my face and smacked it with his other hand. The hard wood made a direct hit to my nose and I could immediately feel blood trickling down my face. It took every ounce of strength to just nod yes. Satisfied, Billy stood up and smiled at Jimbo. “I think he unnerstans Jimbo. Maybe we should get this nice young law breaker something to drink, he looks like he has a mighty thirst. Maybe you better fill out a report bout how he got into a fight with another inmate. Use Chester this time” They both laughed. Billy left the room and Jimbo picked up the paperback and handed it to me. “Keep it son, you earned it. Now don’t y’all go nowhere ya hear me?” I looked up at him but everything was still blurry. I knew he was very close because I could smell his stale smoke breath. He grabbed my pony tail and lifted me off the chair, put his forearm to my chest and flung me as hard as he could into the wall. I collapsed and just laid on the floor, not sure if I couldn’t move or just didn’t want to. He threw what I hoped was a clean handkerchief at me and told me to clean myself up. I heard the door close and sensed I was alone. I think I cried as the blood from my nose was thinned out with tears.
After abut a half an hour I scrambled to stand up but fell again. I couldn’t put any pressure on left leg without feeling intense pain. I managed to climb onto the chair and rubbed my leg. My head and face took turns pounding out a tribal beat. I could actually feel the blood coursing through my veins as though my defense system was an ER on full alert. Blood to the injured areas, STAT! Blood rushing to my injure face, my swollen forehead, and my still throbbing leg. I was breathing hard and the dried blood on my nose made it more difficult. My ribs and my stomach hurt. I had been worked over real good, like Cool Hand Luke. Now a puddle of crying beat up excuse of a man was sure his street creds were all but over.
The door opened up and it was Jimbo again. “C’mon boy, it’s time to take you home.” He walked up close and stepped hard on my foot with his fat ass digging in his leather heel. A twist for good measure then a sarcastic smile and wink. Billy walked in with a bottle of water and threw it at me. “See boy, we takes good care of our crimy-nals in these parts. I sure hopes we got us a good unerstanding now.“ They each got on one side of me and basically carried me out of the interrogation room and back down some more corridors until we reached the general population of the jail. I was hobbling along limping and bent over like a captured animal. It was as if they were parading me around all proud of how tough they were to beat up a prisoner and making a statement to the others about who is in charge. They walked me to my cell and tossed me towards my bed. I plopped down on my mattress. They left and I just laid down and started to re-live the beating. Everything hurt. My face felt swollen and my spirit had been broken. I was barely conscience of my surroundings, but I heard noises all around me. After about a half hour, I fell asleep and dreamed. I had one of the most vivid dreams of my life. I dreamed I was going to a big mansion somewhere in the sky, and wondered if I was dying. The song “Spirit in the Sky” played over and over in the dream. I was in and out of lucidity for the rest of the day and night. Tomorrow would be another day