It began to dawn on me that I was under constant surveillance, even when taking a dump. Nope, I wouldn’t be having much more fun for a long time… not unless I turned gay and decided to enjoy picking up the Pert Plus...
Cell Numero Uno was mine, as well as the entire, otherwise-deserted cellblock. The peace and quiet, however, didn’t last long. About an hour after my arrival, I heard a fit of shouting and some sort of struggle. It sounded like the cops were wrestling some motherfucker to the ground. Great, I thought, With my luck, this guy's gonna end up my cellmate.
“Sit down, Mr. Bunk.”
“This is bullshit! It’s fucking bullshit!” he rasped.
The cop, apparently the one who hauled him in, was pushing Bunk around. “Have a seat.”
“But I didn’t do it. Listen to me-- this is fucked up! I was in the store, and I got this clock, I was getting it for a friend, and I didn’t have the money. So, I’m with the clerk there and I tell her, ‘I’m gonna be right back with the money. I’m just gonna put this here for one minute.’ And I put it in the bag-- right in front of her eyes!-- and left it and went out to the parking lot and got the money from my friend and as soon as I stepped back into the place, all these guys just jumped on me. I didn’t even take it out of the store!”
"Great, then plead ‘not guilty.’ Now, let’s get your fingerprints.”
Later, I heard him using the phone: “Honey? Yeah, it’s me. You’re not gonna believe this! Yeah, Manchester-- honey, no, don’t do this! Honey, we have to get married in three days, I’m not gonna skip town! Call that motherfucker, that bail-bondsman! Tell him! You tell him!”
He went on like that for ten minutes, telling her he loved her and all that hoo-ha and all the while, the cops are yelling for him to hang up before they yank the phone outta the wall. “Honey, please, baby! If I don’t make bail now, I have all these other charges and court dates and I’ll never get out of here.” He was whimpering and could barely get his words out. “Please, baby… Please! It’s a fucking larceny charge. Can you believe it? Neither can I, baby… I’m innocent this time." Pause. "Babyyy!”
Soon after, in walked Eric Bunk, a scruffy forty-year-old blond man resembling Jackie “the Jokeman” Martling of the Howard Stern Show. The cop escorting him was mid-insult: “I find it hard to believe you’re innocent with the rap-sheet you got.”
Eric muttered something to the extent of “eat my balls” and was thrown in the cell next to me. I couldn’t see him anymore, but I didn’t have to. Not like he could be doing very much unimaginable in that cell with a blanket, video camera, and toilet without a seat. He muttered for several minutes (“Can’t believe this… fucking clerk...") while I remained silent. He farted, grunting for emphasis. After another minute of muttering, he let out another fart. In fact, he must've farted a good half-dozen times in those first five minutes. Finally, mercifully, I heard him belch. “Hey, bro… How’s it going?”
I figured I’d show him how tough I was, how cool I could be. “Fucking pitiful. And yourself?” Hey, I sounded tough, at least.
“My sentiments exactly. Fucking pathetic. I’m a disgrace, my friend. I should be locked up, I deserve it.”
“So, you did it, then?”
“No, of course not.” Oh. Right. But he went on to tell me the whole story. Either he truly was innocent, or years of lying about his actions had molded him into a skillful, manipulative, and (almost) completely convincing liar. I laid down and listened to his woes, the prison pyschologist by default. When he started going on about his years on heroin, it reminded him that he needed to take his methadone. Whoops.
All of a sudden, Bunk started screaming like a tortured siamese cat, banging on the bars and begging at the top of his nicotine-stained lungs. But if the cops were around, they didn’t seem to think methadone withdrawal terribly tragic. Gradually, as he began to hyperventilate and dehydrate, Bunk sat back on his cot and resumed farting and and belching and wondering aloud what time it was. Another twenty minutes and he hit the hay, imploring me to wake him if I heard a cop moping around.
-
“I got larceny five: conspiracy. Conspiracy from hiding that clock in the bag. 'Hiding.' Humph!” He ripped open a nice burp. “Ah Christ, I got eighteen charges already. I just got out of jail the other day, served three months for robbery.”
We were eating our McDonald's Cheeseburgers and drinking our watered-down, warm-ass Diet Cokes. (It's now ten years later, and I've never eaten an American McDonald's burger since. That's what jail does to you. - Ed.)
“Bank robbery?!”
“No, chief. I stole some shit from Bradlee’s. My fiancee needed a new coat for her birthday, on a Thursday, but I didn’t get paid till Friday.”
“That’s bullshit, though. That’s only petty larceny. What the hell’s this robbery shit?” My foul mouth, which I had been improving on over the summer, came back strong. Ah, jail...
“Well, they say it's because I punched the security guard in the face when he tried to grab me. Now I got possession charges and this… this bullshit they throw at me now.”
I wondered what time it was, but at the same time didn't care. Finally, Bunk stopped and tapped on the bars. “Hey, buddy?”
“Yeah?” I said, sitting up.
“Are you innocent?”
After a moment, I said, “I may be an innocent, but I'm not innocent.”
I don’t think he understood what I was getting at. “Oh, I get ya. Pleadin’ not guilty, eh?” I didn’t say anything and there was more silence. “This your first offense?”
“First time they caught me.”
“Good boy,” he said. I could picture him grinning that Jackie Martling grin. “You're seventeen, huh?” I could tell he was getting misty-eyed. “Yeah, I been in and out of this place since I was your age. Twennyfive years, my passion’s always been the criminal life. Hey, so what? Fuck it. I never ruined anybody’s life. The heroin I got arrested for? I never sold heroin to anybody, so it’s all on me. Only thing I regret was the security guard. Poor guy, just doin’ his job, ya know? I didn’t even keep running when he hit the ground. I kept looking over him when the rest of 'em were hitting me in the chest." He chewed his burger and scrunched up the wrapper. "Poor guy, man, poor guy.”
When I finally made bail in the morning, Eric began screaming again. In between pleadings for another phone call, he called after me, “Take care of yourself, brother! Don’t let 'em get you!”
The cops hadn't found my drugs, although they were right under the shotgun seat. My father found them early the next morning, knowing better my hiding spots. I don't know what happened to Eric Bunk, whether he got married or did time instead. But I remember what he said and thought of him often for the few next years, which were just as out-of-control as my seventeeth.
“What are you doing here, kid?”
“Larceny six,” I repeated.
“No, what the hell are you doing here? Stealing isn’t a profession, get a job.”
“My parents put all my money in the bank.”
“All I’m saying is… Don’t end up here at my age. Don’t be a loser like me.”
I've been in trouble with the law several times since, but never again have I spent a night locked up and I've never done anything illegal that harmed anybody else. When the cops ordered me out into the no man's land between Mexico and America, their hands on their holsters and the German Shepherds barking and sniffing, I couldn't help it: I started laughing. Because after 12 hours of being locked up in Connecticut with only McDonald's for “food,” and only a fartknocking cellmate to keep me entertained, I was pretty sure I could handle whatever I had coming to me...
Top Photo by Rob Jenga. Prison cell photo by Metro UK.
Previously: Scanner Confessions: The First Time I Got Arrested (Part One)