The Weight Read Online Free PDF Page B

splitting even
inside
the colors. Like Puerto Ricans and Cubans, they’re both Spanish, right? But they didn’t mix. The PRs were mostly born here, but all the Cubans I ever saw, they got shipped in.
Marielitos
, the PRs called them. I didn’t know what that meant, but I knew it wasn’t no compliment.
    The yard was divided up into what they called “courts.” You couldn’t step onto any crew’s court without their permission, and the strongest crews claimed the best spots.
    I was raised in a city where just being caught in the wrong neighborhood could get you seriously fucked up, so it kind of made sense to me. Besides, there was what they called the DMZ, places where anyone could go.
    But even there you had to be on the watch. Like the weights. They’d have them out in the yard for anyone to use, and no crew ever tried to claim them. But they claimed the
time
to use them. So it wasn’t just the yard that was divided up, it was everything
in
the yard, too.
    That was the part I didn’t know. And that was how I got my name. I was doing one-handed curls when the Muslims sent some guys over to talk to me. I saw them coming, so I was already slugging by the time they landed.
    Lucky for me, they weren’t carrying. I think seeing me with the weights was such a surprise that they didn’t plan anything, just rushed me.
    Everybody saw it, but nobody did anything. They just watched. Even the guards.
    When they finally broke it up, they could see nobody was cut, so everyone got tickets for fighting. I got thirty days; I don’t know what the Muslims got.
    I know they got visits, though. Even in the bing, if you had religion, you could always get to see someone. Like me, I was down as Catholic, so the guards asked me if I wanted to see a priest. The Muslims, they were a religion, so there was this—I don’t know what to call him—he came around every day.
    One day, he stopped by my cell. He was wearing one of thoselittle round hats. I went over to the bars, carrying a towel wrapped around my hand in case he was there to stick me. I
had
to come to the bars, or they’d think I was weak.
    He had a strong, calm voice. Kind of talked all around what he had to say, but what it came down to was that the Muslims had no beef with me. They got it that I didn’t know the rules about what times you could use the weights. And they also knew I’d told the DC—the Disciplinary Committee—that I couldn’t tell them who else was in the fight. It all happened so sudden, I didn’t even remember what color the other guys were.
    It’s kind of complicated, but it wasn’t like the Muslims were giving me a pass if I ever did it again, just saying I didn’t need to look over my shoulder when I unlocked.
    I didn’t believe him, but it turned out he was telling the truth.
    A few months later, I still didn’t have a crew, but there was some guys I was all right with. I hung with them when they lifted. We spotted for each other—and not just on the weights. I was on my way over to them one day, just passing by this little court, when I heard something in Spanish. I figured it was about me, but I didn’t want to challenge anyone without making sure I had to.
    One of the guys I worked out with, his girlfriend was Latina. The first time he told me that, I thought that was her name, Latina. But I’m never dumb on the same thing twice.
    Eddie was a real short guy, but he had huge arms and a big chest from pumping every day. Sitting down, he looked bigger than me. When I first came in, he could out-bench me, too. Not by the time I left, though.
    Everybody liked Eddie, even the guards. He was always joking around, playing cards, goofing off. Had a smile for everyone. And he could tell some
great
stories—he only took vacations from jail to get some new material, is what he said.
    One of the things that made his stories so good was how he could make his voice sound like other people’s. He used that trick even when he wasn’t telling stories,