leonard cirino		One: Just Desserts   Gary is small and wiry. A Vietnam special forces vet and state champion in lightweight wrestling before he went to the Nam. He’s sitting at dinner when the 240 pound body builder next to him tells Gary he wants his dessert. Gary is quiet and doesn’t respond. The big guy tells him he’ll beat the shit out of Gary unless he gets the dessert. Then he stands up, glares, and throws a punch. Gary tilts his head and slips the blow. Before the guy can move Gary counter punches a short right to the solar plexus. The guy goes down in a flash. Still sitting, Gary continues his meal. The techs run over and ask what happened . Someone says, “He must have fainted.” Two: Meat   Everyone knows John is a racist. One day at lunch, Seth, a black guy, is last in line and the only seat left is next to John. Seth sits and begins eating. With no warning John picks up his fork and stabs Seth in the forearm. The techs rush over and take John back to the ward. When we get there he is being wheeled out on a gurney covered by a sheet. We never see him again. Later we learn the official cause of death says he choked on a piece of meat. We didn’t have meat that meal.   Three:  Fertilizer   Norm is OK for a technician, usually a pretty nice guy, but he has a thing for the rangy Texan. One day in the courtyard Tex says, “Fuck off” to Norm who tells him to pick up his cigarette butt. Tex walks away and Norm circles in from behind, throws a chokehold on him. Tex crouches low, breaks the hold, and pulls Norm over his back. Then he pounds Norm’s head on the asphalt and chokes him. Norm looks up, pleading for someone to help. There are no other techs in the yard. We stand around and Norm’s eyes begin to bulge. Marty, the snitch, comes up from behind and puts a chokehold on the Texan and pulls him off. By then other technicians are there and they subdue Tex and take him to Maximum Security. He gets disappeared. When asked what happened to him Norm replies, “We ground him up for fertilizer and fed him to the flowers.” Four: Ten Years   Steve is the swing shift ward charge. He likes to brag he’s a redneck cowboy. For some reason he hates Virgil. One night Virgil is in line for meds, standing quietly, not causing any trouble. Steve is in the dayroom watching TV. He gets up and moves behind Virgil. Next thing we know he throws a chokehold on him and drags him down. Virgil is small and Steve is husky and strong. Steve calls out and another tech comes with a syringe. Virgil is quiet and just lies there hoping they don’t kill him. They stick the needle through his pants, into his ass. It’s drained of Thorazine. They pick him up and drag him to the isolation room. We can hear him being beaten as they strap him down. Two days later Virgil gets out and sits in the dayroom. His eyes don’t reveal a thing. He’s been here ten years and is used to this.   Five: Revenge   Gene is six feet two and 220 pounds. Solid. Part Pacific Islander and part African-American. He’s in for murder and is about to get transferred to minimum security. One day he gets in a fight at mess hall, which is forbidden because there are weapons there. They take him to Maximum Security. A few days later Bob, the ward charge, goes to check on him. Gene is behind a door laying for Bob and flattens him with a left hook to the cheek and eyebrow. For “depression” they shock Gene five days a week for three months. A month later he comes back to the ward and sits. I had spent every day talking with him for two years and we are good friends. I look at him not sure whether to approach. He gives me a glance and motions it’s OK. I walk up and say, “Hi, Gene.” Very slowly he says, “I can remember your face but I can’t remember your name.”   Six: The Smell   I’ve been transferred to a minimum security facility but have to spend two weeks on the high security ward for evaluation. One night I can’t sleep and hear the lock in the front door. The technicians say, “He’s here,” and I listen while they bring a teenage boy from the adolescent ward into his room. There is a small struggle and I hear the kid yell, “Don’t fuck me.” Then there are some laughs and shouts for about ten minutes. Soon the techs leave the room saying, “That will hold him.” I can hear the teenager crying all night. The next morning when I get up and go to the dayroom the kid is sitting there, smelling shitty. Seven: Tom, Disappeared in Asylum   Tom was a religious young man. Once he told me I knew all the forms of human love, but, that someday I would experience divine love. He was a Christian Scientist who believed his faith meant that he shouldn’t have to take meds. When they would drag  him into isolation and strap him down Tom would astral project out to the cosmos. He told me he had friends and family on some stars and every planet in the universe. One time, after he refused meds for three days, the technicians approached him with a syringe full of Thorazine. Before they got to him Tom hurled an washtray at them. They threw him down, took him to the isolation room and strapped him in. A few days later I asked one of the technicians what they had done with him. All he said was, “We fixed him.” I never saw Tom again.