A Sign Of The Time

Introduction

“I just decided… I wanna paint’in too Ray. Course, not like the one you got on yer wall now. Not a picture a some broad.”

“You mean,” replied Raymond, startled by the brazen request of the prisoner in the cell next to him, not knowing exactly how to answer. Hoping to remain elusive and neutral as a deterrent to the violence that erupted every now and then, Raymond Mort cleared his throat and innocently tried to clarify his neighbors appeal… “You mean the picture I painted of Vicky, my girlfriend? Do you like it?”

“Yeah, sure, I like it. I like it just fine. It’s just not exactly what I had in mind though, you know? I was think’in more like… a picture a me. You know, like what rich people got in their houses an stuff. Like a picture a the old man maybe, hang’in in one a those rooms where they got maybe a fireplace like, an some books an junk. You get my drift? You know what I mean? Can you do that?”

“You mean,” returned Raymond meekly, as his outward appearance would imply. “You want me to paint your portrait? Is that what you want?”

“That’s it buddy, now your talk’in. That’s exactly what I want. I want a nice big picture a me, but like, not in these here clothes. Someth’in better. A suit maybe. Yeah,” continued the outspoken, slightly built man, whose vision of himself as the anti-Christ had motivated him to one especially insane day. A day in which he tried desperately to stab a Catholic Priest to death, but whose effort was thwarted by several quick thinking worshippers. “That’ll work. A nice look’in suit. Someth’in ta make me look extinguished an all. Whaddaya think?”

“I think I can do it,” answered Raymond, whose talent for rendering people had improved considerably with time and effort - a change that had taken place in Raymond, but was not necessarily for the better. “But it’ll have to wait till tomorrow. The lights go out pretty soon, an we better be in bed when Officer Johnson takes role call.”

“I guess,” replied Mr. Marco Pollo stubbornly, but obviously bothered by Raymond’s strict adherence to the rules at the psychiatric prison in southern Illinois. “But first chance we get, I want you should start. You get me?”

“Sure Marco, I get you,” said Raymond, but then began mumbling quietly and feebly to himself as he usually did when he was left alone, answering to the self-manufactured voices of relationships that had literally gone dead due to his own advanced mental problems and lack of any rational self control.

“Okay, but don’t forget, first thing. An quit mumbl’in would’ya, it’s driv’in me crazy. I gotta get some sleep.” But Raymond only turned his head to the opposite wall and kept his voice to a low whisper. Unable to comply with his neighbor’s request and helpless to stop the voices he heard which kept him company, especially through long dark nights, when the prison lights turned completely off and every prisoner was left alone to his own dark – sometimes unimaginable - thoughts.

Raymond’s neighbor on his opposite side was not usually as rambunctious as Marco. A young man in his early twenties, he was a victim of manic depression who had – every now and then – a temper tantrum that lived on in the likes of a sleeping volcano. The problem was, naturally, when it erupted it spewed years of childhood conflict for miles around and prosecutors thought that the best thing they could do for all the world was to put him in a cell next to Raymond and Marco where he at least could be watched; given medication and confined – unable to hurt himself or others around him. For any army reservist, they thought, crazy enough to steal a sixty ton military tank and aim to crush everything in it’s path must have more then just a bad case of nerves and when it came time for him to plead his case, he easily won his spot in psychiatric prison, a more subdued jail in which one might rehabilitate with the help of staff and the right doses of Thorozine. And as rosy fingered dawn arrived to show herself, slowly casting the first rays of morning light on the bars of Raymond’s cell, Franklin Steinberg rubbed his eyes; adjusted himself in his prison uniform and politely said, “good morning,” to his friend next door.

“Good morning Franklin,” replied a well meaning Raymond, always willing to start the day with an easy going manner and benevolent display of friendship, especially in observance of Franklin’s recent compulsion to mash things. “How did you sleep last night,” he added, never knowing what awful perception Franklin might have to offer that day.

“Alright, I guess. If it weren’t for all the people screaming. That’s how I usually wake up, anyway… ta people screaming.”

“Now, I wonder what would bring that on?” questioned Raymond, as Officer Johnson prepared to go home for the day, opened all the cell doors in Raymond’s block and greeted his replacement with a mundane, ‘good morning’.

“The war, I suppose. Or maybe the war before the war.”

“I’m not sure I know what you mean?” probed Raymond, even though he knew it was best to leave Corporal Steinberg to himself.

“Be’in a foster kid,” he began with a rub of his eyes. “Go’in from house ta house like a lost pet nobody wanted. Leastways,” he continued, as he aimed a playful right jab at Raymond’s upper arm. “That’s what the prison shrink tells me. Ta be truthful, I ain’t got a clue. I just get mad sometimes, know what I mean? It’s like, I lose my temper an I don’t even know where I am anymore, or who’s in front a me. I just get really steamed.” But oddly enough, Raymond had to admit to himself that he and Franklin had much in common, only one of the more obvious differences was that the Corporal did not have a taste for human flesh as Raymond did. A habit he acquired out of the need to establish a more lasting, permanent relationship with other males – to consume them and become a part of them and to forever, in this manner, always remain in touch, so to speak. Even going as far as to mount and varnish their heads on dinner plates, so they would always remain available for any imaginary conversation he might conjure. Only this habit of Raymond’s had become the main ingredient residing in a human stew of conflict, responsible for his incarceration and present whereabouts.

“Hey Ray,” came a voice from behind, where Raymond stood talking on the catwalk in front of the open cells. “Member what we talked about? First chance we get, right?”

“Sure Marco,” replied Raymond, turning his body around in Marco’s direction. “Right after class, I promise.” And the reference Raymond made to ‘class’ was the one in which he taught arts and crafts to any willing patient who felt that focusing on some sort of project might just help to resolve some of the inner conflict within them. That is, any patient consciously aware of their own particular agony - or what could be causing it - might benefit from such a practice, but some, like Franklin, didn’t have ‘a clue’. As a result, these were some of the patient/prisoners who were somewhat worse off than their associates and consisted of roughly half of the population which took the opportunity this class time presented and used it to aimlessly mill about like broken robots; play board games; argue over nothing, or stare out the window as some unfortunate people are want to do… much to the benefit of none.

As some of the more interested prisoners took up their seating positions in class, a man who’d been diagnosed with Capgras Delusion sat down next to Franklin. Recently, it seems his wife could not get him to recognize her as hard as she tried and, in believing that his own deceased mother had taken her place as an imposter, he did his best to lock her out of the bedroom they’d shared for the past twenty-five years. He then purchased a handgun from a local pawnshop and one day began blasting holes through their bedroom door as he heard her knock and plead to come in. Fortunately for both of them, none of the forty-five slugs had penetrated any vital organs and Mr. Iben Vild had no problem at all getting admitted to the very same Southern Illinois Correctional Institute that so many others like him had become proud, but unwilling residents of.

“Mr. Vild,” inquired Raymond, as most of the prisoners in class had taken their seats. “Do you recognize me today?”

“No,” he responded sharply, resting his folded arms on the table before him while looking around at the many faces in the room, some of which were recognizable to him, but some, completely and utterly forgotten. “I don’t know you,” he added. “Why? Should I?”

“He ain’t gonna remember you Raymond,” blurted Marco, anxious to get things moving. “Lets get on with the class.”

“Yes indeed,” remarked another man, who was fond of dressing himself in all white clothes as the attendants of the hospital wore, but every resident; attendant; guard and so forth knew that he was not an employee, but a patient and prisoner, that is… all but Mr. Vild, who could not seem to retain much at all in the way of facial recognition. “Let us begin,” he went on. “I wish to begin where we left off yesterday.”

“Alright then,” agreed Raymond, himself anxious to start the class, knowing only so much time during the day could be allotted to it. “Everyone get their clay.” And with no further hesitation from most of the students who attended that day, Raymond’s group of captive yet interested budding artists got up from their seats, went to shelves were they had last stored the large, clay busts they’d been shaping, and returned to their respective work areas.

As the ninety minutes of class time came to an end, Marco Pollo’s mood began to brighten. He so wanted Raymond to paint his portrait that he did whatever he could to make it easy for his teacher to begin. He pulled a canvas down from it’s shelf; got paint ready and assembled where Raymond would have easy access; found a palette that nobody seemed to be using and finally, a smock for Raymond to wear so the artist would not smatter himself with paint in the excitement and flurry of genius, which Marco and others came to realize was not a joke, but truly resident in Raymond and was not all that difficult to summon. But just as Raymond was about to begin and as luck would have it, Officer Peters - who was a veteran of all but three months on the job – decided to find out exactly what the two inmates thought they were doing, as to him, things just didn’t look right and also because he was more inclined then others to treat the patients as prisoners and not the former.

“Class is over you two,” he said sharply. “It’s time ta exercise now. Everyone’s in the yard,” he added, with a threatening wave of his nightstick for emphasis.

“Hey, wait a minute…” began Marco, noticeably upset by the intervention. “He was just about ta start paint’in me. What’s your problem? I’m a patient here just like everyone else. I got my rights.”

“Is that so? Lemme tell you someth’in Pollo, I know what you went down for. You’re no anti-Christ. You don’t scare me… you’re just another chickenshit nutcase. Why do I gotta keep remind’in you? Is he tell’in me the truth Mort?” he asked of Raymond, but with more meaningful intent. “You really painting him or what? You got something up your sleeve, you better spill it now. I know he ain’t smart enough ta plan someth’in,” continued the guard, making sure he made eye contact with Marco to add special significance to his point. “But you Mort… I don’t know about you. It’s the quiet ones you gotta watch out for. You get me?”

“Yes, I get you,” returned Raymond without hesitation, as earnest as he could be. “It’s the truth, I swear on a stack of bibles. I was just about to begin his self-portrait.”

“Oh really?” replied the guard, with as much cynicism as he could deliver. “An I suppose he’s gonna hang it in his liv’in room, next to the fireplace?”

“What’s it to ya?” complained Marco in a low murmur. Feeling compelled to retaliate, but knowing that it might work to his severe disfavor.

“Crawl back in yer hole, Pollo. I’m three months in this stink’in can an I already got a bellyful a nuts like you.” But before Marco had a chance to push the situation to any much more unfortunate end, Raymond intervened and somehow, got Officer Peters to relent…

“He didn’t do anything wrong… please Officer Peters… I just need him to sit for a few minutes a day after art class. He sincerely wants me to paint him. Honestly, that’s all this is about.” And when the guard’s temper finally did appear to soften and he withdrew from the aggravating clash he himself had caused, Marco seized the opportunity to begin to express how determined he was to do something… anything, about his situation. Among other things, he vocalized, “a’hm gonna eighty-six that bastard. No good cop,” letting Raymond know exactly how he felt.

“Don’t do nuth’in crazy now,” replied Raymond to his neighbor’s appeal, knowing full well about the sharpened toothbrush Marco kept hidden on his person at all times, snugly fitted inside a remote cavity of his body. Having been threatened by Marco before, at such a time when they were not as well acquainted and Raymond, in all his outward innocence and disconnection from any God, was somehow perceived as representative. As if such a thing were possible and such a man without conscience could be misconstrued as to having one. That in itself being one of the greatest lies Marco Pollo ever told himself, besides the fact that he believed he was the Devil incarnate. The very issue responsible for the captivity he detested.

By the time Raymond had gotten a good start on Marco’s portrait, the cafeteria had opened for lunch. An attendant nurse had already passed out medicine for the day and prisoners would not have to take anything in addition until evening hours gradually advanced. As they did - forcing the light of day to slow retreat, encapsulating an otherwise, well lit prison hospital – the night brought with it a mood of despair which only succeeded in negatively and repetitively charging a worsening state of mind, much like a sine wave in its downward collapse and Marco was no exception to the rule. After a meal like lunch though, spirits were temporarily uplifted, and the voices of the men talking amongst one another echoed through the concrete block hallway, resonating through the building – even into the heating and ventilation chambers – and it was for small reasons like this that much of the prison population was not found hanging from their bed sheets, or in a pool of their own blood, caught in the culminating act of suicide.

“Hey Marco,” asked Franklin in just such a mood, as the hall slowly filled with patients on their way back from the cafeteria. “You got change in your pocket? What’s that jingle’in?”

“None a yer business.”

“Gimme some… I need a pack a cigarettes an I’m broke.”

“Get yer own damn change, bitch,” expelled Marco, like a gust of bad air, but even that, a fair mood for a patient like him.

“Wha’did you call me?”

“Quit it already,” exclaimed Raymond, doing his best to bring peace between the two problematic inmates. But that alone was not enough to keep the two from the physical conflict that’d been brewing between them for some months and before guards could rush to the scene to break it up, Franklin had badly beaten Marco, smashing the back of his skull into the two inch concrete floor slab beneath them, causing it to fracture in several places and causing in turn, his own severe punishment… a deserved two week stay in an isolation chamber – an emotional trauma which struck fear even in the worst of prisoners, who were to begin with, a psychiatric shambles, ill equipped for such a stressful ordeal.
As a result, at the end of his two week term, kept from his medicine and all else which helped him to survive even the easiest of days, Franklin was found in the hospital exercise room, hanging from a weight machine cable, far beyond the reach of any additional mortal aid, abuse, or extant intervention.

When Marco heard the news, he was still in the infirmary recovering, but it did little to assuage years of pent up emotion and hate unrelated to Franklin, but still, focused on him for lack of a better source or immediate explanation. “At least someth’in went right around here,” he remarked to Raymond, after returning to his cell and walking slowly from the gurney which delivered him back to his cot. But Raymond only stared on at the clay busts of the friends he was busy sculpting. Friends which constantly occupied his thoughts… even at times, controlling his thoughts – a primary reason for his own wretched state of mind and incarceration - a cacophony of voices in his head that kept him company practically around the clock. Unfortunate symptoms of schizophrenia that could be alleviated with medication, but never fully resolved.

As days turned to weeks and weeks to months, Raymond completed four clay representations of the real heads he’d kept on dinner plates in his Chicago apartment. The human heads which he had laboriously varnished and spoke to quite often were key pieces of evidence weighing heavily against him and were mostly responsible for his committal to Southern Illinois Correctional Institute - a place he was more and more growing accustom to, largely because he had no other choice in the matter. His own attorney had told him many times over how lucky he was to end up where he did – even though the chances of him getting out of prison were very, very remote or did not exist at all, Raymond realized that he was fortunate to walk away with his own life… a mistake to some, especially to those surviving family members who were hoping to see him pay more dearly.
“Remember your bible,” reported one of the parents of a man whose life Raymond took. “And remember it well,” he said, slowly standing to deliver his words more clearly and carefully to a courtroom already reeling with grief and looks of dreadful concern. “… ‘If any harm follows, then you shall give life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.’ We cannot allow this man to walk away from this court and one of the wisest and most ancient of Gods Laws.” But walk Raymond did, at least far enough to get himself to prison/hospital; a warm cot to sleep in and as many art supplies as he could utilize. Not a bad deal, thought many who’d been following the trial.

In addition to the four clay busts he created – which no law existed to prevent him from producing – he painted a beautiful portrait of his girlfriend, a voluptuous blond transsexual named Vicky and lastly, a very descriptive and telling portrait of Marco Pollo, the prisoner in the cell next to him who venerated the portrayal of himself by hanging it promptly on his wall for all who passed by to see, marvel at and at times even show envy of.

“Hey Ray,” asked one of the prisoners who happened to walk by and see it one day. “I like what you done there for Marco. You think you can paint me like dat? I mean… It’s not like you don’t got the time an all. You’re here for a stretch, aint’cha? I mean… last I heard, anyways.”

“Yes,” replied Raymond, doing what he could to clear his mind of voices that existed only in his imagination, but to him, were all too real. “I think I could fit you into my busy schedule. But it’s gonna cost you.”
“Cost me? What are you, serious? How much are we talk’in about here? I ain’t got a pocket ta piss in, an you know it.”

“I know... three packs. Whaddaya say?”

“Sure… yeah, I think I can. it’s a deal. When do we start?”

“Tomorrow, after class.” But the more time that went by, the more other inmates had grown gradually envious of each others wall paintings and it wasn’t long before Raymond had accumulated at least one lifetime worth of smokes, which he neatly arranged in rows and columns, from wall to wall at the far end of his cell. If there existed any conundrum at all, it was what to smoke in the number of following lifetime sentences he was committed to serve, but logic would dictate that Raymond - like anyone else - had but one lifetime to render or offer and so had only an appropriate number of cigarette packs to be concerned with.

“What’cha gonna do with all them fags?” asked a new inmate, who’d only lately moved next-door to Raymond, in the very same cell once occupied by Franklin Steinberg.

“Who?” replied Raymond, caught off guard as he lay resting on his cot with his hands behind his head.

“The smokes you rummy, what’d you think I meant?”

“Oh, those,” said Raymond, unsure of exactly how to interpret what the new prisoner had asked, especially because he knew the man was suffering from an illness doctors call; Confabulation, in which nearly everything he said was an out and out lie, or mixture of truth and imagination, though he never realized he was guilty of telling any untruth at all. “I’m gonna smoke ‘em I guess.”

“All of ‘em?”

“No, I guess I could give you some.”

“That’d be great. I got an idea too,” he continued, who’d asked Raymond when they first met to call him ‘Newt’ and ironically said on one occasion, ‘don’t never lie ta me.’

“What’s your idea?” responded Raymond blandly. Already weary of Newt’s form of mental illness, and more concerned with a scraping noise he thought he heard from time to time, but couldn’t quite put his finger on what it was, or where it was coming from, or even if it was real, or another symptom of his own illness. “Do you hear that noise,” he asked suddenly of Newt.

“No, I don’t hear nuth’in,” he answered, as honestly as one could hope him to.

“That scraping noise, don’t you hear it? Is it my imagination, or what?”

“A course,” interrupted Marco, who’d been listening to the conversation - or most of it - as might be expected given such close proximity. “I know what it is… it’s rats, that’s what it is. Ain’t you nuts seen ‘em in the mess hall. I seen three of ‘em just yesterday.”
“Is that right?” replied Raymond, satisfied with Marco’s answer. “Anyway Newt,” he continued. “What was your idea?”

“Oh yeah, I forgot. Wait,” he replied, as a hundred newly manufactured themes ran amuck through his mind. “Now I remember. Why don’t we sell the cigarette’s back ta the mugs who gave ‘em to ya. That ways, we can even make money on ‘em.”

“You call dat an idea?” intervened Marco again, unable to restrain himself, having overheard such an outlandish suggestion. “A’hm gonna buy back my own butts now? Are you crazy or what?” But such an understatement of Newt’s disorder never seemed to have much effect at all except to add fuel to an already raging fire and Marco had only succeeded in replacing one enemy with another… an innate ability peculiar to his personality which had a tendency to make his stay in prison all the more difficult for it.

“No, I ain’t crazy,” answered Newt, getting up from his cot to stand, grasping the bars of his cell with clenched hands, venting some of his anger on the inanimate steel which bared no opinion of him or his situation either good or bad, save for the stubborn resistance to his hold they forever maintained… as he was not just put where he was on a whim or caprice, but for murder - with no conscience or memory of it - having long since juxtaposed many lies over it and around it; an amalgam which made him an especially odd and dangerous criminal.

After agreeing to begin a new portrait, Raymond knew he must keep his promise, as anyone who did not, soon learned that it was far better to remain honest, fair and equitable, rather then risk retaliation – which could amount to practically anything, but surely, the beginning of a feud.

But painting had been an artistic outlet for Raymond for much of his adult life and so the task of applying himself to it was not so much a labor or job, as it was a self-gratifying experience which also allowed him some slight peace of mind while he struggled to focus on it and break away from imaginary voices which were a persistent strain on him.

At this time, as he was just about to begin another portrait, something else had gone terribly wrong, which Raymond, nor any of the others had any control over whatsoever and neither could any have foreseen its development. But unfortunately, as the issue unfolded, the blame for it was to rest mainly with Raymond, as the warden believed him to be the main responsible cause. In fact, he was not merely a scapegoat as some of the inmates wanted to believe, but was looked on as accessory to the crime and was even forced to endure hours of interrogation – good practice for some of the more sadistic guards, but nevertheless, a necessity.

“I’m not done with you yet,” replied Warden Stromboli, having assumed a pensive, thinking posture as he carefully chose his words.

“I don’t have anything else to tell you though,” said Raymond, plainly and truthfully.

“Tell ‘im ta jump off a freak’in bridge,” muttered Joe, one of the resident voices in Raymond’s mind and also one of the human heads Raymond had acquired and befriended long before the Chicago police had realized Raymond’s habitual practice of beheading and consuming those whom he couldn’t bear to live without.

“Wait a minute,” interrupted Lorin, another of Raymond’s friends who’d become both captive in Raymond’s apartment as an inanimate head and as a well preserved memory, in tact in Raymond’s thoughts… an ever present advisor and friend who Raymond had also sculpted – along with three others – in order to keep memories and thoughts of them fresh and alive, even though they’d long been dead. “Just hear him out,” he continued. “He’s got someth’in on his mind.”

“That’ll be the day,” remarked Dan, also a well spoken friend and memory of Raymond’s who was once very much alive, but who had unfortunately become another silent testimony to Raymond’s skill with a dagger; his appetite for crime of passion beyond comprehension and the habit he procured of displaying a victims head to better involve himself in an ongoing friendship and communication; an exchange in which only Raymond could ever be a participant, due to his own wretched mental illness. Another of Raymond’s clay advisors, Dan forever stood at the ready to assist his lamentable colleague.

“Quiet you,” answered Raymond aloud, to his imaginary entourage.

“What was that?” questioned the warden. “Are you talking to me like that?”

“Ahh, no.”

“Then who?” responded Warden Stromboli, getting up from his desk chair to approach Raymond, displaying a dominant body language as he sat at the front edge of his desk, peering down into the two bottomless pits of Raymond’s eyes. “An don’t gimme that schizo crap… I never did buy that shit from you Mort. You just like ta kill, don’t you.”

“Ahh…” repeated Raymond, for lack of anything better to say.

“Never mind that now Mort... I didn’t bring you down here just to go on about your past. No one can undo what you did and It’s not my job to judge you - you’ve already been tried,” he added, turning to walk back to his desk chair and sit down in it, brazenly lifting his feet to rest them on the edge of the massive, solid wood desk he occupied; another display of dominance and arrogance easily afforded by and to, the warden’s personality and office. “Only ‘The Man Upstairs’ can adjudicate your case now. No,” he maintained, as he folded his hands behind his head. “I want more from you then just an admission of guilt.”
“But what?” asked Raymond, “I told you… I had no idea at all what Marco was planning. Nobody knew. He had us believing rats were making the noise, and then it’s like I said… No one knew.”

“Yeah, sure,” began Warden Stromboli, mockingly. “Nobody home but us chickens… I know, play innocent all you want Mort. I can’t say for sure who’s lying and who’s telling the truth, but we’ll get Pollo. It’s just a matter of time. What ticked me off so much is that you made the whole thing possible, you and your damn painting.”

“I swear, I had no idea he was using it to hide a tunnel. If I’d known, I never would have painted it.”

“Yeah, and then everybody wanted one, like an epidemic… not a bad plan Mort, not bad at all,” he said, watching the men below him slowly exit out into the exercise yard as he spoke. “Like I say, we’ll catch ‘im. It’s just time and inconvenience. Anyway, I don’t suppose you know he sent you this,” continued the skeptical lawman, disclosing a picture postcard of Marco Pollo, whose arms hung draped around two beautiful girls, posing for the photo with him.

“Gosh,” replied Raymond, taking the photo from the administrator’s tightly held grip to hold in his own diffident hand. “He made it all the way to Las Vegas. He sure moves fast.”

“Yes, he does, doesn’t he,” agreed the warden. “Go on,” he continued to say. “Read the back of it.”

“Okay,” said Raymond, turning the card over to read what Marco – former hospital inmate 72764-6999 - had quickly scribbled out for him to mull over. “It says…
‘Ray, I figure you’re mad at me for bust’in out the way I did but you gotta look at it my way for a minute, okay? I couldn’t take no more… an I knew yer picture a me would cover up my tunnel real good. I didn’t have no choice – an that thing with Steinberg, that was the last straw. I just had ta get out, an digg’in my way with a fork an spoon from the café was all I could figure.

(Member that jingle in my pocket? An that wackjob Steinberg thought it was change. Big fight, all over nuth’in.) So… okay, it wasn’t rats mak’in that racket… it was me. Anyways, so now I’m on the lam, so? Anything’s better then sitt’in in stir.

Hey, one more thing Ray, I met someone here, an guess what? I might join the priesthood. Yeah, I know, you’re probably ask’in yourself, what’s that nutcase talk’in about? Cause I went up for frigg’in stabb’in a priest in the first place, but, people change, you know... I could be real charm’in sometimes… when I want. Later,
Marco. P.S. – Tell Warden Stromboli he can kiss my…’

“What!?” interrupted the warden. “Give me that damn card, Mort. I always hated that dumb son-of-a-bitch. Who else would stab a priest and then become one? Anyway,” he went on to say, with a growing serenity in his voice. “I figured I’d give you the benefit of the doubt and show you this. Also,” he added, taking the postcard back from Raymond to return it to its place in his drawer. “There’s something else on my mind. Something I’ve been tossing around in the back of my head for quite some time now.”

“I told you he’s got something up his sleeve,” said Lorin, in Raymond’s mind.
“Ease up,” interjected Guy, another of the imaginary friend’s who resided in Raymond’s bizarre intellect; who also happened to be one of Raymond’s very first unfortunate victims, now duly represented in clay in Raymond’s cell, alongside three other companions.

But before Raymond could ask the warden to elaborate, or make himself more clear, the previously tenacious guardian of the prison/hospital actually began to flatter Raymond with respect for his work…

“I couldn’t help but notice the portraits you’ve been painting Mort, they’re all over the place. But you know what?” he asked with growing emotion - a facet of the warden’s artistic interest that had never before risen to the surface beyond the hard shell of discipline, or just and fitting punishment he normally portrayed. “They’re good,” he added.

“No,” murmured Raymond coyly.

“No, really Mort… they are very good. You have real ability. Tell me,” he went on to say. “Are you self-taught, or did you go to school? Either way, anyone can see you have talent.”

“I… I just picked it up,” remarked Raymond, still shy and reserved about most anything, including his talent for art. “I guess I learned how to keep myself busy, my dad was a real tyrant.”

“That’s what I’ve heard,” answered the warden, surprisingly acquiescent. “Anyway, about what I wanted to ask… I’ve been thinking.”

“Yes… you’ve been thinking,” replied Raymond, sitting in his chair, arms folded over his chest, modestly peering at the proud figure of the man who’s responsibility it was to repress, control and govern.

“That’s right,” he returned, rising from his chair to stand at his window and look out over the exercise yard. Not so much in an attempt to make emotional contact with the greater subordinate populace, as it was to allow himself the pleasure of feeling superior. Then, with both hands pressed flatly to the cold, bulletproof glass, until the faint lines and depressions of his fingerprints could be determined from the opposite side – as if any common perpetrator had made available his identity at the scene of a crime - he began to resume speaking, but this time, in a much more serious, pensive tone. “We all realize ourselves in the end, don’t we Raymond?”

“Huh?”

“Mmm… I guess what I mean to say is, sooner or later we become that person we were meant to be all along, don’t we? I’ve become head administrator here and that wasn’t an easy road, I’ll tell you. I’ve achieved things along the way you know. Maybe not every one of them a very big deal, but nevertheless, things I would like to remember. Even, things I would like to tell others, who for some reason, may not know me or my reputation.”

“May not know you?”

“Yes, you know,” added Warden Stromboli - as much the egomaniac as many of the inmates he blindly regarded as, ‘the sick bastards I babysit’. “To put it simply, I’d like to tell the story of my life to all those who may not know of me. I think it would be interesting to everyone here, to those who visit and to all posterity, if you were to paint it. I think that would be quite interesting, don’t you? After all, you do have some time on your hands, don’t you?”

“Yes… I guess so.”

“And you do have the talent for it… so why not?”

“Okay,” began Raymond, finally feeling as though he’d understood what the warden was getting at. “What I usually do is, I ask whoever it is I’m painting to sit for me and then…”

“No Raymond, I don’t think you quite understand the magnitude of this undertaking.”

“But, I thought you wanted me to paint you, the way I’ve been painting everyone else… you said you liked what I did.”

“I do,” he restated emphatically. “But you’re not going to paint me the way you’ve been painting those animals out there. No sir, you’re going to paint my story, as a mural!” he exclaimed. “A mural that will cover the entire far wall at the entrance hall of the prison - now do you understand?”

“Oh, I get it. Okay… but, that wall you’re talking about… it’s huge. That’ll take me months, maybe years to complete it.”

“Whatever,” replied the warden mockingly, “however many lifetimes it requires, I’m sure you can afford. You’re here for quite a few I understand.”

“But sir… I only have one real lifetime.”

“That should do nicely Raymond and don’t worry… you’re going to make Pablo Picasso jealous. There is one more thing I’d like to add though and that is… if you do a good job for me,” maintained Warden Farfel Stromboli, striking a pose as he’d done some minutes before with his legs extended up and over the edge of his desk .“I’ll see what I can do about abbreviating your stay here with us. How would that be?” he asked of his captive, yet newly motivated audience.

“That would be n… n… nice,” stammered Raymond nervously, at the thought of being free once more and free to do whatever he chose, or whatever chose him – as in whatever unrestrained mood compelled him to act in the way he’d learned to respond in public; not surprisingly, when the weather changed from good to bad, or at the drop of a hat.

“But if you screw this up Mort,” continued the head administrator, in a manner one might have expected. “I’ll see that you rot in solitary. Remember Steinberg… he’s no longer in attendance at this institution, is he? Is that the way you want to leave here Raymond – in a pine box? The penal system does have its failure rate you know. One more won’t be very difficult for me to explain.”
“I’ll do a good job,” said Raymond, less nervous under the pressure of performance then he was when he considered the possibility of his freedom. And then, as Raymond extended his arm as he stood, the warden handed him a portfolio of his own historic past much as a favored runner might pass the baton of a relay race to another, for Raymond to consider in the collaborative design of the mural – a work which had quickly become of unequivocal importance not only to the warden, but to Raymond’s very existence.

As Raymond sat alone at the tiny desk in his cell - reviewing newspaper clippings and assorted documents the warden had narcissistically collected over the years - he couldn’t help but wonder how the administrator had gained his lofty position, as it appeared from his past that many others might have risen to the task before him. After all, even Raymond could see that the events which Warden Stromboli so fondly recalled as admirable were just not all that impressive... ‘Hmm,’ Raymond thought to himself. ‘How did he impress people so much? He’s not very nice, that’s for sure.”

“Good point,” remarked Lorin’s clay sculpture, still and inanimate on the perch of his shelf, but very much alive in Raymond’s mind.

“Yeah,” agreed the clay bust of Dan, as plainly to Raymond as any flesh and blood, living breathing person. “What the heck did he do, anyway? He’s a bitch, that’s for sure. I mean… just look at his record,” he added. “Here’s a clipping from when he was a cop on a beat,” referring to a newspaper clipping Raymond had come across, enclosed in the manilla folder. “We’re supposed to be impressed because he brought a fourteen year old to justice… and what did the kid do? He pushed over a glass gumball machine. I mean really, what’s the deal here?”

“I know,” said Joe, another clay buddy. “Here’s another one, look,” he continued, as Raymond turned over another news article. “We had ta get this kid off the street, he was a bad one… he stole baseball cards from a dime-store. Leave it ta the warden, the streets were a lot safer ‘cause a him, for sure.”

“Wait a minute guys,” coming to an article that caught his attention. “I think I found something here,” said Raymond, thinking clearly enough, considering all that was going on in his unrestrained imagination. “This is something… look. It says here that Officer Farfel Stomboli’s rich grandfather gave millions to fund the prison before he died.”

“So, don’t tell me,” concluded Guy, also present and accounted for on Raymond’s shelf. “Officer Stromboli becomes none other then Warden Stromboli. End of story… there’s your answer.”

“Well great,” remarked Raymond. “We know how he got where he is now, but what am I supposed to paint… kids knocking over gumball machines, or stealing baseball cards? Take your pick, what do I do?”

“That’s a good point,” agreed Lorin. “Kinda stuck, aren’tcha? Why don’cha just make things up.”

“Like?”

“How should I know? It’s your painting.”

Having spent the night thinking over what to portray in the grandiose mural he was supposed to paint, Raymond never took notice, or realized that there was already a new occupant in Marco’s old cell. It just so happened that the new man was really more a boy – considering the fact that he was a senior in high school when he decided to put on his long black trench coat; hide underneath it his grandfather’s twelve gauge shotgun - which he’d sawed off after seeing it take place in a movie - and begin to kill the kids who’d made fun of him because, lets face it, he didn’t fit in. So when nobody accepts you and all you get is backlash, you get irritated, you get mad and you get back… sometimes anyway.

Regretfully – in regards to the parents of his victims – he never turned the gun on himself, but they still have the satisfaction of knowing that only an act of God will ever get him out of psychiatric prison and he was fortunate also to have ended up there – likely because of his young age and delicate mental health – the latter, a characteristic he shared with many other inmates and so at last, through a set of strange circumstances, he’d finally found himself and his place in society, or for lack of better terms, his niche. “What’cha up to mister?” he asked of Raymond, who was by now deep in thought, considering rendering the warden as the male counterpart of the female Greek goddess, Themis - who to ancient western civilization had been goddess of justice and virtue. One of the problems with it though, was how to make the warden – who was not an overly handsome man – appear in the likeness of Zeus, who was pretty much delegated to the role of the universally perfect male.

“Got any ideas yet, Mort?” asked Warden Stromboli, surprising Raymond from his thoughtful reverie, especially because the catwalk past Raymond’s cell was a very seldom used path by the warden. “The new man isn’t bothering you, is he? Say, you there…” asked the warden, who almost by nature, created a drastic contrast between himself - dressed neatly in a black suit with white shirt - and the inmates around him, dressed in typical prison issued clothing. “What’s your name, young man?”

“What’s it to ya?” replied the new man, who’s name was really of no concern to the warden, and his poorly timed sarcasm only served to spark Warden Stromboli’s nervous tension, sending him into a fit of rage. “Johnson!” exclaimed the head administrator, in no mood to mince words with anyone. “Take this man to isolation.”

“But he didn’t do anything,” answered Raymond impulsively, in defense of someone he barely knew. And as the guard acted on the warden’s order – opening the cell door and removing the prisoner – the warden moved to the next cell adjacent to Raymond’s, to question its occupant as well… “Newt,” he began. “You’re not bothering Mort here, are you?”

“Why warden,” began the inmate, at rest with his hands behind his head, laying stretched out on his cot. “I didn’t think you cared?”

“Johnson, him too,” ordered Warden Stromboli, without hesitation. “He’s going too.” And as that inmate was removed also, the warden returned once more to Raymond’s cell, but this time with an anxious energy that transmitted itself through Raymond’s entire psyche – or in a man like Raymond, at least what passed for one. “You can concentrate better now, can’t you Mort?”

“Huh?” answered Raymond, not sure how to reply to a question which made reference to his ability to concentrate, or lack thereof.

“You have no neighbors now… no one to bother you anymore. Now all you have to do is think of my mural.”

“But I promised I’d do another portrait… somebody else asked me to…”

“Never mind that, you just get to work on my mural,” maintained Warden Stromboli, pointing his forefinger at Raymond for emphasis. “Remember Mort; remember what happened to Steinberg. I always get what I want Mort, and I get what I want anyway I can. Do you hear me? Am I coming through?”

“Yes,” he replied, finally aware of the profound seriousness of the task he was assigned.

Sketches for the mural progressed sluggishly, as Raymond struggled to bear the weight of what had become a burden. But were it not for the pressure Warden Stromboli had applied, it would have been just another art project to him – even though the scale of it was beyond anything he’d ever attempted. So when he sat to draw out any ideas that came to him - even though it was very much as if he was working along with the aid of his four clay friends, the final drafts of concept were slow to materialize.

“I don’t think he’s gonna like it if you paint him naked,” remarked Guy, quite frankly and to the point. “He’s way too up-tight to appreciate the artistic significance of it.”

“Yeah,” said Joe, about to agree. “I don’t think you wanna go there anyway… or do ya? I’m still gett’in used ta your girlfriend Vicky.”

“You leave her out of this,” returned Raymond aloud, and with no close neighbors to hear him, his imaginary conversation went largely unnoticed. “She’s the best thing that ever happened to me.”

“Yeah, but she’s a chick with a…”

“Pipe down Joe,” interjected Dan. “The warden’s coming around again. Don’t piss him off, he’ll toss Raymond into solitary.”

“How’s it coming along Mort?” asked the chief administrator. “Making progress?” But as anyone could see, this was not just a visit from an interested or concerned patron, as the warden had come to see Raymond with a police nightstick in hand, and he used it without discretion as he spoke, flagrantly replacing a much less lethal forefinger which he previously employed to make his point. And literally aiming it at Raymond, as it projected through the prison bars of his cell, the warden continued to speak… “Let’s see what you’ve got so far Mort. Hold it up so I can take a look.”

“Well, it’s just some preliminary stuff really… nothing set in stone,” answered Raymond. Not too badly shaken by the warden’s strange, determined presence, but nevertheless, worried. And holding up the first sketch – which Raymond thought one of the best in the group – the warden looked on in what was at first, a sudden, contemplative mood. Then at last, he remarked “…I’m naked Mort. I’m naked in that sketch. What am I doing with no clothes on? That’s depraved and immoral Mort. I won’t have it, do hear me?” he said, raising his voice all the more as he crashed the baton he held very purposely into the steel prison bars, causing a terrible reverberating noise throughout the hospital/prison for any and every inmate who had the ability to hear. But as a consequence of his action, the reactionary force which returned into the nightstick had traveled back into the warden’s firm grasp and up into his arm, causing a shockwave of pain which he’d clearly not anticipated, but carefully tried to mask over. However, he again let his intentions be known, and the pain which was considerable, affected his madness all the more. “You put some damn clothes on that drawing Mort, or I’ll pay you a visit you’ll never forget. Is that clear?”

“Yes,” returned Raymond, driven to humility - which although was not an unfamiliar emotion to him, was an especially embarrassing situation played out in front of not only his four clay friends, but to all of the other inmates who could hear the warden yelling, and on an even more personal level, reminded him of his own father, who on dark rainy days often returned home drunk, releasing his anger on Raymond.

“I think he means it Ray,” muttered Lorin, in Raymond’s fragmented imagination.

“I think you’re right,” said Dan. “Whatta we do now?”

“Put clothes on ‘im… what else?” determined Joe correctly.

“I’ll do better Warden. You’ll see,” replied Raymond, trying hard to block out the voices of his friends in his mind.

“You better,” he said, grabbing the right arm he’d used to hold the nightstick and make his startling point, which was continuing to produce a throbbing, dull ache he could conceal no longer, “You just better. Because God help you if you don’t.”

“Geez, he sure fires up, don’t he?” noted Guy.

“You can say that again,” returned Joe. “Better do a good job,” he added, considering all that had gone on.

“Back to the drawing board,” remarked Raymond, as the warden walked away. And in the same manner as Warden Stromboli, Raymond did his best to hide the real and worsening pain he felt.

In the following days - and despite the warden’s harassment - Raymond tenaciously applied himself to the task and drastically improved his concept and approach to the mural’s design. In fact, Raymond’s work improved to such a degree, in the warden’s opinion, that he began to suspect Raymond had enlisted the aid of some outside source, or knowledgeable fellow inmate, but in reality, neither was the case. The only assistance Raymond had received was through the influence of his mute, clay buddies who were to Raymond, all the help he ever needed.
Depicting the warden as a warrior of justice and virtue - characteristics Warden Stromboli greatly admired but in actuality, could never conceive of – Raymond transposed facial characteristics of some of the teenage delinquents Officer Farfel Stromboli had vanquished from the mean streets of crime and chaos to portray the enemy, drawing representations of peace and prosperity to reign ever after in their place. These faces of truth, justice, virtue and the like were to be represented by none other then Raymond’s collection of four close friends that he’d accumulated, intending to solve two problems at once. One of which and of primary importance, was to make the warden happy by designing something he could appreciate, but in doing so, Raymond seized the opportunity to help his friends achieve immortality and intended to include them in the mural as conquering warriors. Of course, the warden could not care less whose faces were among those he led to victory, when what impressed him so at the sight of Raymond’s detailed composition, was the glory of his own image, purposely establishing a focal point and in the center of Raymond’s creation - adorned in beautiful shinning armor, which brightened through the light of God from Heaven above - the sword raised high in his right hand, and shield in his left.

“Wow Ray,” expressed Joe in admiration. “That’s some design. The warden’s gonna love it when he sees it on the wall.”

“It’s terrific,” agreed Guy. “You might even win some kinda award for this… never can tell.”

“So when are you gonna start to really paint it?” questioned Dan. “It’s no small project.”

“No time like the present,” replied Raymond, as he very purposefully did his best to get Officer Johnson’s attention.

As Newt Weiner and Raymond’s newest neighbor, Philbert Knutz sat listlessly in isolation, Raymond sat – feeling resolute to his task – stirring paint and mixing colors on one lonesome looking, plain wooden chair… an antique from the days in which the prison had first opened it’s steel doors to any qualifying criminal, but nothing anyone could ever really rest on. The only thing that might’ve been called an extravagance and the only thing allowed Raymond while he painted was the company of his four clay companions which rested to his side on the floor - lined up in a row to give advice upon request, or at other times, to just plain butt in.

“Okay Ray, lets get crack’in,” commented Joe - always one to vehemently assert his opinions whenever he deemed it appropriate, and even at times when it wasn’t. “Let’s get this show on the road. What’s tak’in so long anyways?”

“He’s busy, can’t you see,” replied Guy, who by now had become used to coming to Raymond’s defense whenever he deemed it appropriate, and even at times when it wasn’t.

“I don’t wanna start unless I’ve got all the right colors ready to go,” answered Raymond to his friends. “So please, let me concentrate.”

“The drawing looks good,” remarked Dan, in reference to the charcoal sketch Raymond had made on the wall, outlining the entire theme. “Just slap some paint down on it.”
“I can’t just ‘slap paint’ on it Dan. It’s not abstract art, it’s much more photo-realistic then that. I need to focus… you guys don’t understand.” But eventually, and contrary to the friendly argument his imaginary colleagues presented, Raymond did make slow progress… although it was progress roughly akin to the type a sane person may have made in an office filled with bosses; co-workers and the like, all tending to slow a worker down with pressure and attitude particular to that specific person. In other words… a typical office environment. Of course, the warden didn’t help much either…

“It’s a good start Mort. So far, so good, but…”

“Yes, Warden Stromboli?” asked Raymond, during one such conversation, as the mural began to take shape beyond mere dark outline.

“But, when will you be done?”

“When I am finished,” remarked Raymond, who had over a period of some weeks, become much more dynamic in character, and at times spoken to the warden without regard for station or status – a new development in their relationship and naturally, something the warden could never appreciate, but for some reason… tolerated. And usually, after just such an altercation, the warden would turn and leave the great, cold vestibule in which Raymond labored, only to repeat the event time and time again.

“Hey Ray,” mentioned Joe one day, after witnessing one of these brief squabbles. “You sure you’re not tak’in chances?”

“What do you mean?” asked Raymond, who really did not understand his own transformation in attitude and was thought by his friends to be precariously disposed to a conflict that he could never win.

“He means…” interjected Dan, who’d been napping, but woke up just as the warden walked away – easily guessing what the conversation was about. “You’re gonna be knee deep in shit if you don’t quit pissing the warden off like that.”

“Like what?” returned Raymond, as he simultaneously applied streaks of white and yellow paint to portions of the sky, while standing on his chair. “What are you guys talk’in about? I’m busy here, just say it.”

“Are you dense, or what?” remarked Lorin impatiently, who could not understand how Raymond could so misinterpret the situation and put himself in such a dangerous position. After all, Warden Farfel Stromboli was not above punishing a prisoner to the absolute extreme. “If you don’t quit answering him like that, you’ll never see the light of day again. Why don’t you get it?”

“I just say what I feel,” explained Raymond. “It’s like, sometimes, I can’t answer for myself. Someone else takes over an answers for me.”

“Oh yeah? Well how about waking up ta the fact that when yer done with this painting, the warden might just lock you up an throw away the key,” said Guy, which was not in keeping with his character and who rarely even admonished Raymond, but on this topic, realized that far too much was at stake not to. “He might have Johnson an Peters hang you upside down an walk away. Ever think a that?”

“Et tu, Brute?” asked Raymond, as he continued to paint brilliant colors over the wall, depicting the universal judgment of God and its effectual law to the order of mankind.

“I don’t know who you’re becoming Ray,” replied Guy very seriously. “You’re getting scarier all the time.”

“Don’t worry about it. You guys worry too much. Everything’s gonna be just fine… I just know it”

The next day, and before Raymond had begun his daily routine of getting out of bed for the sole purpose of working on the warden’s mural, he received a letter. It wasn’t the only letter he received while locked away in psychiatric prison, but it was – up till now – the most emotionally rewarding. And considering the fact that very few living people ever had such emotional impact on him at all, that one unique event was significant in itself. The letter read as follows…

‘My Dearest Raymond,
It’s been too long since we last saw each other. Every time I’m on stage I think of you, sitting there in the audience watching me. Everything here is the same, but for one thing… I’m without you.
I’m lonely, and nothing I do seems to make it better. I must come to see you. I have a train ticket on my desk as I’m writing this… It feels like a ticket to happiness in my possession, as I pick it up and hold it dearly in my hand.
Please be there for me when I get there. I couldn’t stand the thought of you with someone else. There is no one for me but you, and no one for you but me. I’m never giving up on us.
Love Forever,
Vicky’

And as Raymond began to paint that day, his mind drifted to his loved one who was more then partly responsible for his present state of well being, and for the fact that the idea of hanging himself by his bed sheet rarely crossed his mind.

“Nice letter,” noted Guy, who was by nature, more emotional then the others and so, more deeply touched by Vicky’s correspondence.

“She’s great,” replied Raymond, applying shades of brown and gold to the warden’s shield as he spoke what was on his mind. “If it wasn’t for her… I don’t know what I’d do. I might not be here now talking to you guys if it wasn’t for her.”

“What about us?” asked Lorin. “What would we do? We’re a team Ray, remember?”

“I remember, but you Guys don’t have two or three lifetime sentences to serve in this nuthouse. I can’t even remember how many. I don’t even know why you guys stay here. What could you possibly be getting out of this?”
“We’re buddies till the end Ray… whatever the ‘end’ is, anyway. Besides,” added Dan, always the practical one. “When was the last time you seen a clay head walk out a door? That’d be a trick, wouldn’t it?”

“I suppose,” admitted Raymond. “But nothing would surprise me anymore. I mean,” he said, as he stood back a few steps from the wall to examine the last few brush strokes he’d made. “Who would’a thought I’d be standing here painting this stupid…” But even as the last word had left Raymond’s mouth, Joe struggled effusively - but not in vain - to get Raymond’s attention and to make him realize that the warden was there, paying them another surprise visit.

“Don’t let me interrupt you Mort. I don’t mind it when people talk to themselves. I catch myself doing it sometimes too. What were you mumbling?”

“You wanted to tell him how brave he looks in the paint’in, didn’t you Ray?” said Joe, feigning his true feelings, of course.

“Yeah, that’s right,” observed Raymond, who after all, had truly depicted the warden as the most courageous warrior of justice in the mural, so it made good sense to him to use that fact in the matter of his own self-defense. “When this is all done,” continued Raymond, more excitedly. “Everyone’s gonna wish they had a dad like you when they were kids. I mean look… you look like a super-hero in this, don’tcha?”

“Why yes, I must admit, I do radiate a kind of super-hero appeal don’t I?”

“Yes, you do,” answered Raymond in compliance, partly because he’d felt beaten into submission by Warden Stromboli as his father had done, and partly because of his own great talent as an artist. As a result of the latter, he’d succeeded in fooling even himself into believing that the administrative leader had character.

“That’s how I became head administrator around here Mort. An uncanny ability to rise above the others, given situations that would make most men pale with fear.”

“I can see that,” responded Dan derisively. But before Raymond had the chance to answer his imaginary friend - calling attention to his schizophrenia – the warden continued to speak. Having had another reason for visiting Raymond on his mind then the usual progress report would imply.

“Ur… by the way Mort,” said the warden, in no hurry to make the following announcement, as no one’s time was ever as important as the warden’s own. “There’s someone here to see you, and she’s really quite pretty. You must introduce me to her.”

“Ohh! Vicky’s here!” shouted Raymond, who for just a few seconds, forgot himself; his neurosis; all associated problems, and even… the overbearing warden. In fact, in the tiny space of time in which Raymond responded, he’d shed all those things that had confounded him and fouled his personality since childhood, and for a few fleeting seconds, became a normal man. Aside from the fact that he was not heterosexual - a gauge of normalcy to some, but not to all.

“She’s waiting for you, but I want to remind you to be sure and observe the visitation rules here Mort.”

“Of course Warden Stromboli,” replied Raymond, beyond the reach of all admonition, as all of his mind was consumed with thoughts of one and only one thing… Vicky.

Entwined in a ball created of their own arms and legs, Raymond and Vicky could not contain the passion they felt for each other and what began as an eager reunion soon turned into a fireball of emotion. Inmates seated around them who were also receiving visitors did what they could to ignore the event, but through the tempered glass of the visiting room’s fireproof door, Officer Peters stared on in anticipation and watched, as the floor of the visiting room became more and more, a sexual playground for the couple. It was at one point - some minutes into the encounter - that Vicky’s dress rolled up beyond her lower abdomen, revealing her contradictory anatomy and shocking even the most seasoned of prison veterans.

The next day - after Vicky had left and gone to a nearby hotel to spend the night - Raymond was cautiously notified by a guard that the warden wanted to see him. He did not say what the topic of conversation would be; leaving Raymond to surmise only that he was either about to receive fair warning for not adhering to prison/hospital rules, or that Warden Stromboli wanted to add something else to the mural’s design. Either way, he was only mildly concerned about their forthcoming meeting.

“Pity about what happened to Newt and Philbert,” began the warden, as he stood looking out his office window, taking in the view. He watched with apathy as two pine coffins were loaded into the hospital ambulance, on their way to the prison cemetery.

“I don’t understand,” replied Raymond, who was never a prison gossip enthusiast - never got the inside dope - and had no idea what Warden Stromboli was trying to say.

“The way those two left us… so suddenly. Oh well,” he went on to say… “back to business, right? Do you know why I wanted to see you?”

“Nope,” said Raymond, hoping that the warden’s calm mood might be some barometer of what was to follow. “Is it about the mural? I think it’s really shaping up, don’t you?”

“Splendidly,” replied the warden, smiling back at Raymond, grinning widely as he never had before. “But that’s not what I wanted to talk about right now Mort. Not now anyway…”

“Then… what did you want to talk about?” remarked Raymond with caution, slowly realizing that no good could ever come of their conversation. “If it’s about what happened with Vicky, I can explain. We haven’t seen each other in such a long time… I just didn’t know what I was doing… After a few minutes…”

“No Mort,” interrupted Warden Stromboli. “I don’t care about what happened in visitation. At least… not now, anyway,” he added, folding his hands on his desk in an effort to calm himself and settle the tension in the room. “That’s not what I wanted to talk about either. You see…” he went on, rubbing his eyes as if there was an itch he could not quell, and changing his body posture to again take in the view from his office window. “Because of my job here, I don’t really get out as much as I would like.”

“Yes, you’re job here,” repeated Raymond in agreement. “It’s important, isn’t it?” he answered, as if he was really not sure of the importance of Warden Stromboli’s position, but nevertheless, Raymond was genuine and not facetious. More like the innocent child that had long ago, been beaten out of him.

Choosing to overlook Raymond’s naïve response - which may have been construed as sarcasm – the warden responded only by saying, “It’s about Vicky, Mort. If you don’t mind… I would like to see her.”

“I don’t understand,” said Raymond, fidgeting nervously with his hands. “She’s my girlfriend. I love her, she’s all I have in the world… besides my buddies.”

“I can appreciate that,” replied the warden firmly. “What if there were some agreement we could arrive at? What then?”

“I don’t think you know about her,” answered Raymond, expecting that the form of defense he had on his mind would be enough to deter the warden. “She’s not exactly what she looks like to people… I don’t think you understand.”

“I understand exactly Mort. You don’t have to explain anything to me. I have eyes everywhere in this prison, nothing gets by me.”

“Then… you know?”

“Yes, I know. Now then… you do remember the old saying, ‘you scratch my back, and I’ll scratch yours,’ right? This could work out to your advantage you know. Besides the fine job you’ve been doing on the mural – you do this for me in addition, and I’ll see what I can do about an earlier release then what the state had planned.”

“But the state had three-hundred years planned. How do we get around that?”

“Never mind Raymond, you leave it to me. I’ve been thinking over a work/release program for you in the near future. I have a friend who’s a warden in Indiana. He’s very much interested in getting you to paint a mural for him, too. After all, your fees are next to nothing - only as much as any inmate could hope to make churning out license plates… the state likes that. So, am I coming in clear? You set this date up with Vicky, finish the mural in the next few months, and then we’ll see. I have friends Raymond… friends in high places. So what about it? Will you play ball?”

“Let me talk to her,” said Raymond, astonished and in shock from all he’d heard exude from Warden Stromboli like thick, brown bitter syrup – unrefined as molasses, but nevertheless, tempting enough to take part in.

“What do we do Vicky? He has friends in high places; he can help me get out of here. I’d be free again… free to do anything I want. It’d be just like it used to be, don’t you see?”

“I thought you loved me,” replied Vicky, feeling emotionally abandoned after having listened to Raymond’s suggestion. “I can’t believe you’d ask me such a thing Raymond.”

“Just come over Vicky, I can’t talk to you on the phone like this. When can you get here?”

“Hold on,” she said, responding to Raymond with mixed feelings. Unwilling to let go of her relationship with him; not wanting to leave him in the midst of an otherwise, hopeless situation, where in all probability, Raymond would perish in jail. But still, unwilling to compromise her own body and mind - much of all that anyone could ever possess in the course of a lifetime.

“He’s got some kind of work program on his mind Vicky. He says, if I finish the mural and if you do this for him, he’ll get his friends to help me.”

“You can’t trust him,” replied Vicky, with the same hurt expression on her beautiful face that she’d had during their telephone conversation, but in person, in the visiting room, her pain became much more apparent. “He’s a cop. You can never trust a cop.”

“He’s not a cop Vicky… he’s a warden. Besides, if I don’t at least try, I’ll never get of here. What do I say Vicky? What do I tell him?”

“Let this be on your conscience then Raymond,” she said. But if anything at all rested on Raymond’s conscience, the fact that Vicky had willfully consented to making herself an available consort, was about to become the only and loneliest act upon it; considering that nothing at all had ever rested there before - a peculiarity characteristic to the mind of the incredibly flawed human being that Raymond was.

After some months had passed, the mural was looking up and Warden Farfel Stromboli was eager to show it off to his friends and colleagues. It was quickly becoming a monument and testimony not only to the grandiloquent warden, but to the real talents of Raymond - whose patients and labor were soon to pay off.

The warden was planning a party, and although the literal background theme consisted of the obvious and enormous wall painting, the nonliteral, or intangible theme was an unsavory concoction of blackmail, coercion and intimidation, enough to make any common criminal jealous. But to a person like the warden – who’d grown so used to doing such things over a span of many years, and did not seem to be able to distinguish right from wrong - it was a mere continuation in a lifetime of self-justifying injustice. A course of wrongdoing gone unnoticed by all but a few – like Raymond and Vicky – who’d been forced into becoming unwilling participants, and even by the warden himself, whose grandiose ego had proportionately grown to match and to cloak his misbegotten achievements.

One thing was true though, the warden really did have friends and they were born of a similar mold; as corrupt and conniving as he and connected through deeds and abetment, as the tentacles of an octopus called; ‘Government.’

The evening of the party began with Raymond nervously pacing in his cell, wondering which shirt – from a selection of three – to wear. But the problem on his mind would have been no problem at all to most other people, in light of the fact that all three shirts he had to choose from, were identical prison issue... each one light blue and each one long sleeve. And so, choosing one over the other made very little difference at all to anyone but Raymond. It was just such a waste of time and effort – as his friends tried to point out. But at a time like this, when so much depended on everything going right, Raymond could not summon the patience to listen to reason, or to control what little he had left of his worried, distressed mind…

“Just put one on already,” remarked Joe, growing more irritated with Raymond’s indecision, in as much as Raymond had come this far, only to be stopped by one, rudimentary matter of selection. “It don’t matter which. They’re all exactly the same. Besides, nobody’s even gonna be look’in at you. Everyone else is gonna be wear’in suits an ties. Geez.”

“No, that’s were you’re wrong,” began Raymond, feeling obligated to explain himself. “Everyone will be looking at me because I’ll be standing out from the crowd… the only one dressed in a prison uniform.”

“You’re being paranoid,” remarked Lorin. “Everyone gets looked at, an besides… you don’t have a choice, do you? I mean, what’s stopping you? The shirts are identical. What a moron.”

“Don’t start calling him names now,” said Guy. “He needs all the confidence he can get. But Ray, do you mind me asking, what is stopping you? Why can’t you just put one on?”

“You really want to know?” returned Raymond.

“Yes, we’re dying to know,” remarked Dan. “Do explain.”

“You can’t die twice,” said Guy, to what appeared to be a euphemism for something he took very seriously. “And you’re already dead.”

“That’s a matter of contention,” said Dan. “Now then, what’s the problem here?”

“Well, I’ll tell you then…” Raymond started to say, pausing to clear his throat while he searched for the right words. Then, turning toward the one small window in his cell - which provided nothing more to his discussion other then the immaterial, fading light of late afternoon – he added, “I…” But was suddenly interrupted by Officer Johnson, who was making his rounds and couldn’t help but notice Raymond standing Idly, in his cell…

“Let’s go Mort,” he declared, with a loud, metal ‘thud’ of his nightstick to Raymond’s prison bars for emphasis. “You’d be late for your own funeral, wouldn’tcha?”

“Okay, okay,” replied Raymond, reaching out hesitantly for one of the shirts on his cot, but still stubborn to make his choice, stalling for time until the guard had walked away.

“Would you put one on already,” remarked Lorin. “This is the last time I’m gonna tell you.”
“An then what?” asked Joe very poignantly, with no regard for Lorin’s feelings. “You gonna climb down off that shelf with no arms an no legs? Just what are ya gonna do about it, Bub?”

“Nobody’s going to do anything, that’s what,” interjected Raymond. “Except that I’m going to put this shirt on,” he said. Then at last he reached for the nearest one, unbuttoning it and finally, putting his arms into the sleeves.

“Hooray!” shouted Joe facetiously. “He’s finally got one on!” But of course, sooner or later, it had to happen… or so we would like to infer.

When people began arriving, Raymond couldn’t believe his eyes. He just couldn’t understand how he could play such a key role in the whole event, and that the greatest sample ever of his work overshadowed everything else, either animate or inanimate - regardless of class distinction; power and wealth; or function. And the fact that he’d arrived in his prison uniform only made him stand out more from the crowd, as he rightfully guessed it would, but visitors flocked to him one after another, keeping his mind so busy with their questions and activity that he was not even able to do what came naturally to him… which was to hallucinate. In fact, even negative thoughts could not penetrate, or find their way to Raymond’s occupied mind until all at once, the entire tempo of the gathering began a descent, not for everyone mind you, but for Raymond, and for one newly arrived guest, who for a short space in time, had been lost among many more immediate and pressing human exchanges.

“You have no idea what he puts me through,” said Vicky, looking as beautiful as the day she’d first met Raymond near a famous, bustling, six corner intersection in Chicago, Illinois.

“I’m not sure I understand,” replied Raymond, lightly grasping her chin in an effort to redirect her gaze from the floor to his own face – a milestone for Raymond, who was once too shy to meet practically anyone at anytime. “…But I’m glad you’re here,” he added. “These people have been buzzing around me like flies since this thing started… I never got attention like this in my life. I just can’t believe it.”

“I’m talking about him!” she returned, nearly frantic with emotion, locating Warden Stromboli amongst a small crowd of people in an effort to point out the object of her frustration. “You’re not even listening to me,” she went on to say, making eye contact with the warden, who returned her stare and continued to watch her as he spoke very cliquishly to others. “Don’t you know what I’m going through for you? Don’t you know what you put me through?” she reiterated.

“I’m sorry Vicky. Please believe me,” Raymond struggled to say - speaking earnestly for one of the very few times in his life, focusing his attention on the only living person in his existence who mattered to him. “If there was only another way… but he said, he’d help me. I can’t stand it in here anymore. I’m going crazy. Everyone I meet here Vicky… they’re all so nuts. You wouldn’t believe it if I told you. Please…” But Raymond’s plea for forgiveness went mostly unheeded, as Vicky could no longer put Raymond’s feelings before her own, as hurt and humiliated as she was.

“I don’t know,” she said. “I don’t know if I can go on like this. I don’t know if I want to.”
“What are you talking about?” asked Raymond. But before much more regard could be given over to Vicky’s dreaded disclosure, the wife of one of the warden’s longtime acquaintances suddenly, but innocently, intervened in her attempt to meet the newly emerging artist responsible for the entire event…

“It’s you, isn’t it?” she guessed rightly - poised elegantly with a drink from the open bar in one hand, and a cigarette in a long, pearlescent handle in the other. “You’re the one who did this, aren’t you?” she said, waving her right hand, balancing in it a glass of champagne between her forefinger and thumb, gesturing toward the mural, drawing attention to it as she spoke. “It’s not everyday I meet someone who can do that. You’re Raymond Mort aren’t you?”

“Yes, I am.”

“I would ask you to a party I’m giving next week,” she began to say with a note of sarcasm. “But I’m just betting you’re busy,” she remarked smiling, referring to Raymond’s lengthy prison sentence. “What’s it like?” She went on to ask.

“What is ‘what’ like?” replied Raymond, who had no idea what this very cosmopolitan looking woman was alluding to.

“Oh, the whole thing… you know.”

“What whole thing?” asked Vicky, who was normally fairly quick to catch on, but this time, just as baffled as Raymond.

“Well… killing someone of course,” she commented quite boldly. Flourishing in that talent or facet of human nature which can only be described as a desire to cause pain, while somehow, simultaneously avoiding any further and enduring conflict. An ability practiced and engaged in by many, but abstained from by few. “Killing someone,” she reiterated, as Raymond stood looking on, frozen into position like a rabbit… afraid to move and unsure how to react. “And just how do you vacillate from one thing to another… from say, cutting someone to pieces, then painting so beautifully? Tell me… What’s it like?” she repeated, sipping casually from her glass then thoughtfully puffing from her cigarette - taking up the lax time in which Raymond found himself too surprised to say anything.

“I… they’re… they’re my friends,” stammered Raymond. “They’re with me all the time.”

“Really, they’re your friends… interesting. And how does that work?”

“Raymond doesn’t have time for this,” interrupted Vicky, just as the conversation was getting increasingly embarrassing for an artist who did not have the ability to draw the figurative line between life and death – a concept abstract for a man whose schizophrenia had left parts of his mind underdeveloped. The Theory of Mind - of self and others around him - or other cognitive abilities, never seemed to take hold, respond and grow, except in their application to the world of art. “He doesn’t have to tell you anything,” Vicky went on to say. “You’re just trying to make some weirdo out of him… you don’t even know him. Why don’t you leave him alone?”

“Aren’t you afraid of becoming one of his friends,” replied the woman coldly. “From what I’ve heard, they’re just a bunch of insensible, talking heads.”

“I’m not just a friend,” said Vicky in response, turning to look into Raymond’s blank, bottomless eyes - a view she was fond of and had identified with. “I’m his lover,” she stated proudly.

“My,” replied the well dressed, immodest woman. “Aren’t you the lucky one?” But Raymond’s frustration did not end as the difficult guest walked away. Instead, more problems had been left upon her departure in Raymond’s mind, than had been present before ever speaking a word. Another talent of some, attributed to the ‘art’ of conversation and the human condition – a condition for which we are all held liable and responsible.

“I don’t know,” muttered Raymond, watching the woman as she engaged easily in a more welcome conversation, amongst guests she considered her peers. “I don’t know who’s worse… the nuts in here, or the ones on the outside? People like her make me feel like I’m not missing anything being in here. You know what I mean?”

“He’s coming this way,” mentioned Vicky, suddenly very much detached from Raymond’s train of thought. “What do I do?”

“Huh?” returned Raymond, grasping his girlfriend’s hands in his. “Who? Who’s on his way?” But Raymond did not have long to wait before finding out…

“Why Vicky, I didn’t expect to see you here,” remarked Warden Stromboli, facetiously and with ill intent. “I hope you weren’t rude to her, Mort. That was Warden Cilantro’s wife I saw you talking to. She could be very influential to your case.”

“No, I wasn’t rude. We weren’t rude, were we Vicky?”

“I certainly hope not,” replied the warden. “How are you two getting along these days?” he asked, knowing full well the stress he’d put upon Vicky and Raymond’s relationship, wondering if it had suffered as a result. “Still friends?”

“We’re more then friends,” Vicky found herself saying. Finding that she was even more committed to Raymond then she’d thought herself in the past. “We’re more then friends and nothing will ever change it… nothing.”

“Fine then,” returned Warden Stromboli, newly charged with resentment for not having caused a more dire conflict. “I’ll see you first thing tomorrow morning Mort,” he added. Determined in some way at least to stir up the occasion, refreshing his own diminished spirit with the life’s energy of others, as a fictitious vampire might feed upon its victims, enslaving them in the course of time – or like some people we’re better off never having met.

That night, as Raymond lay thinking to himself, conversing with his friends, Joe could not help but recall the difficult time Raymond had selecting a shirt for that night and as curiosity compelled him, he came out and asked - with what audacity had grown common to him through the years… “Ray, what gives? What’s the story on the shirt, anyway?”
“Yeah, while we’re at it,” asked Lorin. “Why’d you have such a hard time picking one out? You never did tell us why.”

“I don’t know, really,” began Raymond, staring blankly at the ceiling which in turn provided a stark background – like the screen for a film - in which Raymond could imagine anything he could conjure up… from images of Vicky, to concealed thoughts that if revealed, may have landed him another life sentence. “I guess I just wanted to look my best. What’s wrong with that?”

“No deep reason?” asked Dan, “nothing else on your mind? You’re telling us that all that hesitation was just a case of indecision?”

“I don’t know why you guys need deep meaning all the time?” returned Raymond, surprising Dan and the others with a sudden and firm resolution to his defense. “Maybe one had a spot on it… maybe one was just pressed better then the others… how should I know? You know what?” he added, working himself up before an audience that existed only in his mind. “If you wanna send a message, go to Western Union.”

“What the hell sense does that make?” asked Lorin. “How could indecision possibly correlate to sending a message?”

“You wanna know how?” Raymond replied, turning on his left side, simultaneously shutting down the mostly sanguinary visions he’d conceived. “I’ll tell you how…” he started to say, reflecting on the last thirty years or so of his brutal, unfortunate life. “You people are always looking for some kind of deep meaning to everything. You think God runs the show or something, and you know what? We’re all alone… sometimes there isn’t any meaning. Sometimes, shit just happens.”

“Well put,” replied Guy. “I wish I’d said that.”

The warden was conciliatory – a stark contrast to Raymond’s many meetings with him in the past, making Raymond feel uncomfortable and especially vulnerable. “I’m glad you could make it this morning Mort,” he said facetiously. But on previous occasions and on the part of Warden Stromboli, very little attempt had been made that even approached humor, as he deliberately directed the hierarchy of their relationship, maintaining a dominant role. “Why so jittery today Raymond?” he asked, instinctively pleased with Raymond’s lack of ease.

“I don’t know. I’m just not feeling good today,” he replied, looking down at his hands as he did his best to answer. Then suddenly and without warning, Raymond came out and began to describe the way he really felt – a milestone for a schizophrenic murderer, who only mildly understood himself… “You ever feel like everything hits the fan all at once?” he explained. “Like a bunch of bad things happen all at the same time and it all just brings you down. You ever feel like that?”

“Why Mort…” began the warden, leaning back in his reclining office chair, folding his arms over his chest to complete a very contemplative body posture. “I think we’ve all felt like that at times. What’s the problem?” he asked with irony. Having had a very good idea of what it was that was eating away at the small amount of emotional strength inherent to Raymond’s character.

“For one thing… Vicky,” he let out truthfully, not knowing what kind of reply he might get in return.

“Is that all? Is that it, or is there more? This is unexpected Mort. You know, I’m not qualified to make psychological evaluations. You’d have to make an appointment with the prison doctor for that, but if you want my opinion, I’d say you’re chronically depressed.”

“Well…” Raymond continued, searching for the right words to say. “It’s more then Vicky. It’s just everything. It’s being here… locked up. It’s last night too. The warden’s wife - at the party - she asked me weird questions.”

“Oh she did?” asked Warden Stromboli, rising from his chair to come closer to Raymond, taking a seat just in front of him, on the edge of his own desk. “What did Mrs. Cilantro have to say? You were nice to her weren’t you? She’s the reason I wanted to see you today.”

“I can’t think of anything bad I might have said. I don’t think I offended her.”

“Good, good,” expressed the warden. “Because she said she likes you, and her husband wants you to come out to Indiana.”

“She does? I mean,” continued Raymond, having a hard time believing what he was hearing. “He wants me to come to Indiana? How do I do that?”

“I told you I might be able to work something out for you, remember? This is it Mort… a part of the agreement we made. I’m a man of my word… you may think other of me, but I am a man of my word.”

When Raymond got back to his cell, his four insentient friends were eager to talk, although at a glance, anyone but Raymond might have difficulty believing that true. “What’d he say?” asked Joe, mindful of the fact that Raymond had just undergone what everyone familiar with Warden Stromboli called, ‘The Treatment’, but was not looking as depressed and withdrawn as when he’d first left the cell – an appearance or condition no one would have expected. “Did he give it to ya?”

“Give me what?” replied Raymond, not overlooking the possibility that Joe had facetiously indicated innuendo, and Raymond did not appreciate the sexual undertone, especially at a time like this.

“You know…” continued Joe, as lucid as any clay sculpture could hope to be. “The treatment… did he give ya the treatment? Did he grill ya like usual?”

“No, if that’s what you mean. He didn’t bother me much. In fact, I’m going on a little vacation.”

“A what?” asked Dan incredulously, thinking Raymond had multiple life sentences to serve and would never be allowed past the walls of the prison/hospital.

“I’m going on vacation… sort of, anyway. To Indiana State Correctional, to paint another mural.”

“Cool Ray,” said Guy, an admirer of Raymond and his polished skills for a very long time. “You’re not gonna leave us here, are ya? We’re go’in too, aren’t we?”

“Of course you are,” returned Raymond. “If you don’t mind traveling in these,” he added, pulling out several pillow cases he thought were appropriate for the occasion.

“Are you kidd’in? I love ta travel,” replied Joe. “What’s the food like in Indiana? I can’t wait.” But contemplation of culinary delights to a clay bust seemed pointless and ultimately, the end result of such thoughts unattainable - even from Raymond’s astonishing viewpoint - and suddenly realizing this, everyone felt quite uneasy.

The very next day, Officers Peters and Johnson escorted Raymond out of the cell block and eventually, through the enormous vestibule of the prison in which Raymond had painted his very first mural.

Overwhelmed by the fact that such a small, unimposing figure of a man could have tackled a project of such magnitude, Officer Peters could not help but comment… “Someone must’a helped you Mort. Who helped you do that?” And even though the task was a sole venture of Raymond’s - and the warden, including every inmate cognizant enough to hold a rational conversation, knew that it was Raymond alone who’d painted the mural - the officer’s remark still touched a painful nerve, as Raymond always believed that his friends had helped him with suggestions and helpful criticism.

“My f-friends helped,” Raymond stammered, spilling what he believed to be the truth.

“I knew it,” responded Peters, feeling as though he’d solved a crime and the truth of the matter had finally emerged, revealing itself to the light of day, just as the three were walking out the very intricate, tempered, reinforced steel mesh, glass doors of the prison. “He had help,” the guard exclaimed, pushing Raymond head first into the waiting police vehicle. “Yer just a fag runt, ain’t you Mort?” he added, to emphasize his complaint and help purge himself of jealousy. “You didn’t paint that shit alone, did ya? Well I got news for you Mac… you’re go’in it alone this time. An when you screw up, Stromboli’s gonna bury you.”

“Why don’t you let him worry about it,” remarked Officer Johnson, stepping on the accelerator pedal of the car. “We got a long drive ahead, an ya know what? It ain’t my problem. Whadda you care anyway if he comes through or not… you get paid the same.”

“I just wanna see ‘im step in it,” replied Peters. “No crazy ass with a three-hundred year sentence deserves this kinda good treatment if ya ask me.”

“Yeah, but nobody’s ask’in you Peters – you dick.”

When Raymond arrived in the small town of Salem Indiana, he found Warden Cilantro not only expecting him, but that he’d given orders to bring Raymond to his office as soon as possible. This urgency seemed to stress the importance of the new project and to reapply the same pressure that Raymond had sustained while working on the first mural – a job oriented struggle that he had no other choice but to endure. Unfamiliar to him, since he’d never before worked in a manner of such importance and never before had been caught between a job or task and the enormous ego which empowered it – which in this case, was exclusively in the custody of Warden Cilantro, a man who owned many things, but could never own up to himself.

“Have a seat Mort, I’m glad you could make it,” remarked Raymond’s new boss, in such a way, that for a few seconds, Raymond had to reassure himself that it was not Warden Stromboli speaking, and that in fact, it was Warden Delmonico Cilantro… the head administrator of the Indiana Correctional Center for the past ten years. But that was an error that had never, and never would be resolved.
“Have a good trip? It’s better then a fall, get it? Better then a fall,” he said, repeating the same punch line of a joke he’d heard as a boy, helping to shape the personality of the man he was today – the embodiment of sixth grade humor with all the refinement of those he oversaw.

“Yes, I think I get it,” answered Raymond, slightly disoriented from his journey, not having been beyond the same prison walls for quite some time but nevertheless, keen to the warden’s notion of humor. “So… you want me to paint?” Raymond asked modestly, never having been one who might plan to act differently then what their true feelings might portray. In other words, Raymond had never been practiced in the art of deception – something very much unnatural to him.

“Exactly right,” announced the warden, still feeling amused with himself and giddy with the power of his position. “Think you’re up to it? Never mind,” he added jokingly. “You don’t have a damn choice, do you? You’re gonna do it whether you like it or not.” And then, Warden Cilantro, in the midst of celebration, slammed his open palm down into his desk, enjoying the hilarity that unfortunately only he could appreciate or even perceive. “That’s right Mort,” he continued on in the same vein. “Whaddaya think about that? Never mind… it don’t matter what you think. I do the thinking here,” he went on to say, turning suddenly much more serious and provoking. “I do the thinking, and you do what I tell you to do.” But before Raymond could even try to comply with Warden Cilantro’s thoughts and admonitions, two guards, Officers Knob and Wang burst through the warden’s office door and very much according to plan, dragged him by his arms all the way to a cell in solitary confinement. An effort to show Raymond that not only was he not special because of his artistic talents, but that he would never be given better treatment because of them, especially not under the auspices of Warden Delmonico Cilantro – a man, who among other things, did not believe in reform, or the very system which he represented.

After five days had gone by without seeing a soul, Raymond was more then malleable, he was a beaten man. Reminiscent of what his own father had done to him many years before, he remarkably, still could not bring himself to hate Warden Cilantro as he still did not – at least on a conscience level – admit to hating his father… learning to take out his arcane hostilities on others more unsuspecting. “I think we’re ready to get to work now,” remarked Warden Cilantro. “Have any thoughts you’d like to share?” he asked of Raymond, who was back in the very same chair he’d been dragged from five days prior.
“I…” began Raymond, thinking rightly that anything he said would find a way of working against him.

“Never mind,” continued the callous administrator. “I know what you’re going to paint. I got it all up here in my noodle,” he went on to explain, pointing to the side of his forehead as he spoke. “You’re gonna paint my ceiling, how do ya like that?”

“Paint what?” Raymond muttered, unable to contain his curiosity.

“You heard me Mort. The ceiling… just like in the church that Michelangelo painted. You’re gonna paint the ceiling of the vestibule, so when people walk in, they’ll get used to looking up right away. Then they’ll see me up there, right where I belong. Any questions?”

“I guess not.”

“Good then. Get busy right away. Knob will show you to your new home, wont’cha Knob?” commanded the warden, but in his urgency, he’d forgotten that Officer Knob was not present. Reaching for a microphone that stood idle on his desk, the fearless leader quickly flew into action… “Get in here Knob, an make it snappy. Escort Mort here to his room, and be quick,” added the warden. “The room was a broom closet we cleared out for you Mort, nothing fancy, but it’s nice an close to the vestibule. You’ll save a lot on fuel walking to work… get it? It won’t cost you anything cause you can walk ta work, get it?”

“I get it,” Raymond replied, “It’s just that I’ve never seen the Sistine Chapel. Do you suppose I could look around in the prison library, just to get some ideas?”

“The Sistine what?” answered the warden.

“You know… the place where Michelangelo painted the ceiling. I’d like to know more about it before I begin.”

“Oh sure,” answered Warden Cilantro. “Knob will take you there, won’t you Knob?” But later that day, after making his bed and putting on a new prison uniform that made him look like any other inmate from Indiana Correctional – he finally found himself in the prison library, gradually beginning to wonder how and why he was the only one there.

“There ain’t nobody here but us chickens,” remarked Joe. “Hey, when ya gonna get our heads outta them pillow cases Ray? It’s dark in there.”

“Just as soon as I find something on the Sistine Chapel… boy, he’s got me worried. I’ve never painted a ceiling before.”

“No problem,” interjected Dan, coming to Raymond’s rescue with technical assistance. “You can make a pretty stable scaffold out of four ladders if you can find some scrap two by six’s.”

“That’s swell,” remarked Lorin. “But he’s still got no idea what he’s painting.”

“Who appointed the warden?” asked Guy, very pragmatically.
“I don’t know? The governor I guess,” thought Lorin.

“Then doesn’t it just fall into place,” explained Guy. “You need the governor giving Warden Cilantro the power to rule in the center panel. Just like God gave life to man in the real painting… don’t you see? The two figures will be just barely touching each others hands… beautiful… Whaddaya think?”

“Idyllic,” added Dan, impressed with Guy’s logic, and ability to think the project through.

“I think yer both off your rocker,” said Joe. “But so is Cilantro. I bet he likes it.”

It didn’t take Raymond very long to locate the small collection of art history books. They were old and of little value to men who were mostly in need of law books and the like, trying desperately to appeal their cases to higher courts which had not yet turned them down. But to Raymond, these books were sources representing some of the most fantastic works of art from around the world, and some contained fine photographic images of the Sistine Chapel – the ceiling of which was to be the focus of his very own creation, in likeness and in metaphor both. For Raymond could easily adapt to another painters style, but the imaginative approach and depiction of the warden accepting the powers of justice bestowed on him by the governor in the likeness of Adam accepting life from God was a triumph for Raymond, even though he unselfishly gave full credit for the idea to Guy.

“This is great Guy… a great idea,” said Raymond, as he thumbed through the pages of a most impressive art history book, complete with color plates of some of the more important works. “But I can’t just paint the two images alone,” he remarked aloud, even though anyone watching would have thought he was talking to himself. “There’s just not enough going on.”

“You need to paint in the angels that help support God, don’t you?” asked Lorin, on a similar path of logic. “For instance, there’s one he’s got his arm around, and then they’re others who’re there as well, right?”

“Yeah, I see what he’s getting at,” said Dan in agreement. “They’ll help fill up a lot of empty space and balance the whole big picture.”

“Not just that,” continued Lorin. “But think about it… who helps Cilantro out in real life? The guards do right? So… paint them in. They’ll all love it!”

“Hey yeah, that’s a great idea!” said Joe, as the wisdom of the idea finally took hold. “Knob, Peters, Johnson and Wang… all of ‘em help’in the warden out just like in real life. Boy, I wish I thought a that.”

“You did in a way,” replied Raymond, reluctant to give too much credit to one friend over another - a possible catalyst to jealousy and hard feelings.

“I can’t believe what Michelangelo went through,” said Raymond, realizing for the first time what it felt like to draw in such a contorted body position. But the scaffold he’d made out of ladders didn’t shake much and provided a sound base from which he could work. Even so, his four quiescent helpers remained on solid ground, preferring that to the possibility of falling and hurting themselves.

“Yer not gett’in me up there,” warned Joe, as Raymond struggled to arrange the ladders and create a platform between them.

“Yeah,” agreed Guy. “What if I fall? You know what happens ta clay when you drop it from a height like that. It shatters. I’ll die a shattered, broken man.”

“No you won’t,” reaffirmed Raymond. “I’ll rebuild you, and as long as you’re in my mind, you’re alive. Don’t worry about death anyway. People believe that life is eternal.”

“Okay then,” began Joe. “If that’s the case… I’ll take a hot stack with plenty ‘a syrup; bacon; an two eggs over easy, an you can pop for the tab,” he said, meaning that Raymond could pick up the check - probably because he was the only one among them with the hands and arms to do it.

“I can’t help you there,” conceded Raymond. “I’m too busy right now to think of breakfast.” And as he began to draw for the first time upon the ceiling, he felt as if he was really making his mark on the world, not just as his dark chalk glided through the outlines of images he wished to paint, but as thoughts of having people recognize his name; his work, and the good in him circulated in his mind, making him wonder about what the near future would bring – regardless of those he’d decapitated in alleys and befriended in death. ‘Was fame now too much to ask for?’ he thought to himself, as he lightly sketched in the warden’s huge head, or was it waiting for him like a stroke of good luck or the obscure stroke of genius which guided his brush? Of that, neither he, nor any of his friends could really say one way or another. But it did appear that Raymond’s designs of late were working out more so in his favor then not.

“I like what you’re doing up there,” remarked Warden Cilantro, as Raymond lay prone on his back, painting shadows to bodies that made them appear like athletes in the prime of their life. “You keep up the good work now and who knows… the system may find a way of rewarding you.”

“Oh really?” asked Raymond, who was getting spattered by his own paint, as it had a tendency to drip back down on him when he wasn’t careful.

“Yes really. I’ve been talking to Warden Stromboli, and he agrees with me. You keep up the good work and you’d be surprised to find out what we can do if we put ourselves to the task. By the way Raymond,” continued Warden Cilantro, unable to contain his interest and curiosity. “When will you be done?”

“I don’t know,” remarked Raymond with spontaneity. “When I’m finished, I guess.”

People had spoken out from behind prison walls many times before, but none so far with the voice of one like Raymond. His art work was more like a spectacle then a story, or like a performance Raymond could participate in from afar without having to reveal himself to any discerning crowd… those who might see past his talent and into his own personal history – an imitation of life led by a man who could at best portray only a crude caricature of it. One he’d grown used to drawing out and living, even from behind bars.

But slowly, as all things and the course of many events are prone to change, so did Raymond’s life behind bars as his prison work program became more like a prison release program, when time after time he scored the favor of his employer by completing murals so amazing, even people who rarely thought about, or looked at works of art realized what a skilful and consummate artist Raymond was.

In two years time, and with the help of Warden Stromboli and other high ranking government officials, Raymond was given back nearly all his freedom, and had only to report his timely efforts to a parole officer who kept close ties with Raymond and knew where he was and where he would be. What made things easier for Raymond was the fact that his new job was just a continuation of what he’d been doing all along… painting, and most of the work he’d done was commissioned through state funded projects, controlled for the most part by Warden Stromboli and others like him, who realized the benefits of having someone like Raymond work for very little money. Freedom from the confines of the psychiatric prison was what motivated Raymond mostly and that included the luxury of seeing Vicky and visiting her at the nightclub where she still worked; Martha’s Vineyard.

“I’ve waited so long for you Raymond,” she said upon seeing him, so sincerely and wholeheartedly that Raymond knew he could never leave again, for any reason. “I’ve missed you so much… promise me you won’t ever leave me again.”

“I have money Vicky,” he replied, having something very important to him on his mind at the time. “Not a lot but, enough for awhile I think. Will you come with me?” he asked, full well knowing how important a question he posed, but seeing no other way other then to ask.

“Where Raymond? This is such short notice… don’t I need to pack? What about my job?”

“Don’t worry about clothes. We can buy them when we get there. And tell the nightclub you had a family emergency come up. I do feel like our family’s growing lately, what with my good friends, and now…”

“God Raymond,” Vicky interjected. “I suppose I can go. You know I want to be with you. Where though? Do you have somewhere on your mind?”

“Mexico I think. I bet I can pay off the border patrol. I just don’t want them snooping around in the trunk. I’ve got some personal effects in it. I’ll show you if you want.”

“Surprise me later,” she said, having some idea what Raymond was talking about, but her enthusiasm really centered on the trip itself and not so much on what was in the trunk of the car.

“Okay, it can wait.” Meaning that the surprise could wait until they got beyond the border and besides, Warden Stromboli and Warden Cilantro had many old times to catch up on. Things that, in Raymond’s mind, needed to be addressed if they were all to be together and get along. And they were both doing their share of talking too - for decapitated heads - in Raymond’s mind at least. But then, what else mattered?