“Doesn’t look like a jailhouse tat… ’least none I ever saw,” I said. “Doesn’t even look like ink, the colors are so clean.”
“The colors come from within,” Ristelli said with the pious aplomb of a preacher quoting a soothing text. “There are no jails.”
That conversation stayed with me. If Ristelli was not certifiably a wacko, I assumed he was well along the road; yet while he had given me no concrete information about Diamond Bar, the commingling of passion and firmness in his voice when he spoke of the place seemed evidence not of an unbalanced mind but of profound calm, as if it arose from a pivotal certainty bred in a quieter emotional climate than were most prison-bred fanaticisms. I believed everything he said was intended to produce an effect, but his motives did not concern me. The idea that he was trying to manipulate me for whatever purpose implied that he needed something from me, and this being the case, I thought it might be an opportune time to make my needs known to him.
I assumed that Pork understood how the relationship between Ristelli and me was developing. To discourage him from lashing out at me, I hired a large and scarily violent felon by the name of Rudy Wismer to watch my back in the yard, at meals, and on the block, paying for his services with a supply of the X-rated Japanese comics that were his sexual candy. I felt confident that Wismer’s reputation would give Pork pause—my bodyguard’s most recent victim, a bouncer in a Sacramento night club, had testified at trial wearing a mask that disguised the ongoing reconstruction of his facial features; but on the Wednesday following our discussion of tattoos, Ristelli took sick midway through class and was forced to seek medical attention, leaving Pork and me alone in the art room, the one place where Wismer could not accompany me. We went about our cleaning chores in different quarters of the room; we did not speak, but I was aware of his growing anger, and when finally, without overt warning, he assaulted me, I eluded his initial rush and made for the door, only to find it locked and two guards grinning at me through the safety glass.
Pork caught hold of my collar, but I twisted away, and for a minute or so I darted and ducked and feinted as he lumbered after me, splintering easels, scattering palettes and brushes, tromping tubes of paint, overturning file cabinets. Before long, every obstacle in the room had been flattened and, winded, I allowed myself to be cornered against the sink. Pork advanced on me, his arms outspread, swollen cheeks reddened by exertion, huffing like a hog in heat. I prepared for a last and likely ineffective resistance, certain that I was about to take a significant beating. Then, as Pork lunged, his front foot skidded in the paint oozing from a crushed tube of cadmium orange, sending him pitching forward, coming in too low; at the same time, I brought my knee up, intending to strike his groin but landing squarely on his face. I felt his teeth go and heard the cartilage in his nose snap. Moaning, he rolled onto his back. Blood bubbled from his nostrils and mouth, matted his beard. I ignored the guards, who now were shouting and fumbling for their keys, and, acting out of a cold, pragmatic fury, I stood over Pork and smashed his kneecaps with my heel, ensuring that for the remainder of his prison life he would occupy a substantially diminished rank in the food chain. When the guards burst into the room, feeling charmed, blessed by chance, immune to fate, I said, “You assholes betting on this? Did I cost you money? I fucking hope so!” Then I dropped to the floor and curled into a ball and waited for their sticks to come singing through the air.
Six days later, against all regulation, Frank Ristelli visited me in the isolation block. I asked how he had managed this, and dropping into his yardbird Zen mode, he said, “I knew the way.” He inquired after my health—the guards had rapped me around more than was usual—and after I assured him nothing was broken, he said, “I have good news. You’re being transferred to Diamond Bar.”
This hardly struck me as good news. I understood how to survive in Vacaville, and the prospect of having to learn the ropes of a new and probably harsher prison was not appealing. I said as much to Ristelli. He was standing beneath the ceiling fixture in my cell, isolated from the shadows—thanks to the metal cage in which the bulb was secured—in a cone of pale light, making it appear that he had just beamed in from a higher plane, a gray saint sent to illumine my solitary darkness.
“You’ve blown your chance at parole,” he said. “You’ll have to do the whole stretch. But this is not a setback; it’s an opportunity. We need men like you at Diamond Bar. The day I met you, I knew you’d be a candidate. I recommended your transfer myself.”
I could not have told you which of these statements most astonished me, which most aroused my anger. “‘We?’ ‘A candidate?’ What’re you talking about?”
“Don’t be upset. There’s…”
“You recommended me? Fuck does that mean? Who gives a shit what you recommend?”
“It’s true, my recommendation bears little weight. These judgments are made by the board. Nevertheless, I feel I’m due some credit for bringing you to their attention.”
Baffled by this and by his air of zoned sanctimony, I sat down on my bunk. “You made a recommendation to the Board of Prisons?”
“No, no! A higher authority. The board of Diamond Bar. Men who have achieved an extraordinary liberty.”
I leaned back against the wall, controlling my agitation. “That’s all you wanted to tell me? You could have written a letter.”
Ristelli sat on the opposite end of the bunk, becoming a shadow beside me. “When you reach Diamond Bar, you won’t know what to do. There are no rules. No regulations of any sort. None but the rule of brotherhood, which is implicit to the place. At times the board is compelled to impose punishment, but their decisions are based not on written law, but upon a comprehension of specific acts and their effect upon the population. Your instincts have brought you this far along the path, so put your trust in them. They’ll be your only guide.”
“Know what my instincts are right now? To bust your goddamn head.” Ristelli began to speak, but I cut him off. “No, man! You feed me this let-your-conscience-be-your-guide bullshit, and…”
“Not your conscience. Your instincts.”
“You feed me this total fucking bullshit, and all I can think is, based on your recommendation, I’m being sent to walls where you say hardly anybody ever gets out of ’em.” I prodded Ristelli’s chest with a forefinger. “You tell me something’ll do me some good up there!”
“I can’t give you anything of the sort. Diamond Bar’s not like Vacaville. There’s no correlation between them.”
“Are you psycho? That what this is? You fucking nuts? Or you’re blowing somebody lets your ass wander around in here and act like some kinda smacked-out Mother Teresa. Give me a name. Somebody can watch out for me when I get there.”
“I wish I could help you more, but each man must find his own freedom.” Ristelli came to his feet. “I envy you.”
“Yeah? So why not come with me? Guy with your pull should be able to wangle himself a ride-along.”
“That is not my fate, though I return there every day and every night in spirit.” His eyes glistened. “Listen to me, Tommy. You’re going to a place few will ever experience. A place removed from the world yet bound to it by a subtle connectivity. The decisions made by those in charge for the benefit of the population enter the consciousness of the general culture and come to govern the decisions made by kings and presidents and despots. By influencing the rule of law, they manipulate the shape of history and redefine cultural possibility.”
“They’re doing a hell of a job,” I said. “World’s in great goddamn shape these days.”