Andy couldn’t believe that he would have to spend a week of his school break at Grandpas. Flying back to earth from Mars was like going back in time. No robot basketball games, no climbing Mount Everest with AI technology, and no waterslides to Saturn. Only lots of clean up to look forward to. Grandpa was going to pay him $140.00, which I would immediately convert to 1 million Nanobucks in his cryptocurrency.
But the question was - how was a twelve year old boy going to survive this week of boredom? All Grandpa said each time he saw him was “hello young fella, you must have grown four inches since I saw you last”, and then he lit up his pipe and sat in the recliner.
On top of that, Andy had a school project to be submitted online in a week. He had to interview a real person about their job. How was he going to find someone to interview on Grandpa’s property out in the middle of nowhere?
Grandpa Macks was the prison warden at Stagrix Prison five miles from his house since before Andy was born. He was retiring this year, and would be moving to Mars. First he had to downsize his stuff. The first morning he woke up at Grandpa Macks he ate his Cheerios and headed into the living room to start sorting through the wall of apple boxes that Grandpa had been storing for ten years.
Andy was going to be his company and his “legs” this week, to throw things in the garbage that Grandpa no longer needed, or to place things in the donation bin in town at the end of the week. Then grandpa would go to the bank and get him his cash for helping.
As Andy lifted the lids off the boxes, what he saw inside was badges, and police type hats with emblems, and security passes. As he went through the boxes the contents would re-kindle Grandpa’s memories about the inmates. The inmates were some of the most difficult prisoners in the entire galaxy. When Mars couldn’t deal with them, they were shipped back to earth on a maximum security Elon Rocket.
His grandpa’s specialty was trying to find out what made the prisoners tick, and how they could be useful to society and themselves again. Throughout the week as they broke down the boxes for recycling, Grandpa told him about the prisoners that stood out in his mind.
Naked Nigel
Kept showing up at random people’s doors buck naked. Nice guy, but he couldn’t keep his pants on! Literally! He worked at the Rocket Portairport. Stripped down to be scanned with the passengers. Inter-gallactic Police (IGP) kept bringing him in for indecent exposure. Was freezing his ars off in the paddy rocket to jail. His birthday suit was his fave. And that was a crime. Grandpa and him would discuss the need for a nudist planet, and Nigel started lobbying the delegations of the galaxy for one, and got so busy he forgot to remove his clothes.Bored Brad
Brad was born addicted to drugs. He was always looking to get stoned anywhere he could. He would steal rocket fuel on mars to get stoned, and when he was banished to earth he would steal cheap bottles of sherry, and tubes of glue from the stores to get high. He would steal cars and bikes and motorcycles to sell them and became a nuisance to the planet. He needed a drug treatment program but got a jail cell. He got wasted on mouthwash and rubbing alcohol in his cell, and those items had to be taken away from him. Grandpa introduced him to meditation, and he got high naturally by finding his higher power, and his source energy. He taught meditation to the other prisoners and they were giving up violence and seeking virtue now.JackKnife Jimmy - Assault and uttering threats. Violence was his mo. He would rather hit you than talk to you. He was like a guy who hadn’t had his coffee in the morning and hadn’t had his beer in the evening. Nasty. But he loved cooking, but the chef’s knives were a problem. He would talk about making reduction sauces in his cell, and searing shallots. He always complained about the prison food. Grandpa started him in the prison kitchen with plastic utensils and he cooked special gourmet meals for the staff. Eventually he opened a cafeteria beside the prison and everyone in the town started eating there. Jimmy’s Diner became so famous that Jimmy started smiling and greeting all the customers by name. He had gained new significance in being happy and making others happy with his gourmet creations.
- Philosopher King Bob. - Was arrested for protesting multiple things multiple times. Believed in technocracy and that people should be elected based on their specialized technical knowledge, or rule by experts in science and technology. Bob chained himself to government buildings to support his cause. He believed that anything that can be done or produced should be done or produced regardless of the ethical or moral implications. Grandpa suggested that Bob contact the leaders in the field of medical research and track down a cure for cancer. Last Grandpa heard, he was doing a clinical trial on 100 patients and all of them were feeling better. When Bob found his purpose with saving lives, he only protested for advanced medical treatments and because he became so famous, he never got arrested again.
- Quiet Cole. He would yell out in his sleep “I didn’t do it!” There was a parade of legal aid lawyers in and out of his cell during the day. Nobody in jail cared about what he didn’t do, he had to serve his time like them whether he did it or not. The appeal process was slow, and he would have to go before multiple parole boards. Meanwhile he did primal scream therapy, and was threatened with solitary confinement if he didn’t shut up. Nobody could get any sleep unless he took 2 Nyquil each night and went to sleep.. Everyone hoped his conviction would be overturned so he could go home and they could get some sleep. Grandpa suggested he help inmates who had been wrongly accused to overturn their convictions. Once Cole began receiving hundreds of letters from inmates across the United States, he made a career out of helping them once he was released, but he came back and visited others often.
- Neat freak Nelson. You could bounce a dime on Nelson’s bed, and see your reflection in his shoes. He was always dusting and cleaning, and had a mop right in his cell in case any staff walked in with their shoes on. Nelson was fine when he was taking all his medication for schitzophrenia, but when he went off his meds, and the psychiatric ward was full, he would land in jail. When he was released he would go off his medication and crash into all the parked cars along the road and see how many cars he could hit. He would clean his own car to showroom perfection, but it was no use, as he would smash it up whenever he flushed his medicine. Nelson would come for short stays and point out all the scuffs on the floors and walls and put the custodians to shame. Grandpa kept winning awards for the cleanest prison due to Nelson, and he convinced the State to put him on a monitored medication program and had him tour the prisons to ensure they were clean, which provided him with a good income and didn’t make him want to go off his meds.
- Boston Bart. Boston was a white collar criminal. He diverted his company funds to his personal bank account and tried to shred the evidence. His partners were suing him for millions of dollars and trying to trace the funds in his numerous accounts in the Cayman Islands. Bart followed the stock exchange information that scrolled across the screen while the football game was on in the lounge, and worked out a lot in his cell doing pilates. He loved waterskiing and diving. Grandpa asked Bart if he would like to start a newspaper to teach the inmates how to handle money but in an honest way. Bart loved the idea, and started a prison finance program that has been adopted across the country. To atone for his sins, Bart emptied out the Cayman account and put all the money into start up funds for the prison financial training program, and helped the prisoners with their finances when they were on the outside as well.
- Trader Joe - He liked to impersonate police, bouncers and security guards on Halloween and other occasions like Cinco de Mayo. He would fraudulently have his car painted with security company signs and buy military clothes at thrift stores and surplus stores to impersonate security and gain access to public events. He never hurt anyone, but he was undermining the system and had to be stopped. He observed the prison guards intensely, and fantasized about one day impersonating one of them on the inside. Grandpa got Joe working out at the prison so he would be strong enough to join the military and request that he be in uniform at all times. Joe graduated first in his class in the army academy and Grandpa went to his graduation.
- Roger The Lodger. Roger seemed to be gaining significance from jail stays. He would do something wrong so he could get locked up again and get a roof over his head and 3 meals a day. He was lazy and didn’t want to work and couldn’t handle the stress of life’s responsibilities. Once he left his parent’s home, his prison habit started. He started committing crimes right in front of the police, so they had to arrest him. He was always sad to leave when he was released and would start getting parking tickets and running stop signs to get noticed by police again. When he was released we would say to the guards: “see you next time”. Roger was difficult to punish because he wasn’t a bad guy and Grandpa realized that Roger was simply looking for a permanent home, and noticed that Roger was a genius at playing chess. Grandpa arranged to get him a plane ticket to New York City and told him to go to Union Square to challenge the chess players to a game. Roger was never without a place to stay or a chess mate after that day. He was the ruler of the park, and everyone came from all around the galaxy to challenge him to a game.
Before Andy knew it, the week was over, and everything was sorted. The large pile of boxes was reduced to four boxes of memories that Grandpa wanted to keep. The whole school project was done from interviewing Grandpa and the notes about all the prisoners at Grandpa’s work. Andy also had a new found respect for his mom’s dad, who was a pretty cool dude.
He told Grandpa he didn’t want the $140.00 because it was so much fun getting to know him, but he said he earned the money by working hard, and he was proud of the fine young fella he had become, and he thought he had grown 4 inches that week alone with all the Cheerios he ate, and they would have to go to the grocery store after they went to the bank and the donation center.
Here’s a link to the contest:
@mctiller/writers-win-5-steem-24-hour-short-story-contest-march-27-topic-10-the-warden-from-the-most-difficult-prison-in-the-galaxy
photo ~ Pixabay