CHAPTER XXII
08:00
Bolo finished his tenth set of "around the world" exercises: fifteen pullups, forty pushups and twenty dips. He started spinning the yard with a Blood nigga he knew from the block. The yard was an open recreation area, not really a yard, but jail jargon applied anywhere and everywhere. The recreation area really was too small for the amount of detainees outside but the Boat only had so much space. They were talking about some chicks they knew from the hood. Nut was doing laps around the rectangular rec area. The day before, Bolo had barely spoken to him; the tension between them was palpable. After a few more laps, completing one hundred, Nut began stretching.
Even the other detainees noticed that the once inseparable duo was anything but now. It had started yesterday afternoon after the lawyer and the boss's associate had paid them a visit. When they got back to the housing unit, Bolo had pulled Nut to the side and asked him directly if he had raped his cousin.
"No, nigga. Why the fuck you even ask me something like that?"
"Bro, that Detective Perez nigga talked about your DNA! We all know what that means, in ninety plus percent of cases." Nut had visibly paled. "You gotta call the lawyer and tell him yo." Nut opened his mouth to proclaim his innocence. "Stop, bro! Just stop! I grew with up with you yo. I seen how you was in high school... and I seen the bruises some of your bitches ain't open they mouth about. But niggas saw you though!" Nut had paled again. "We saw you and God forgive us, we ain't say nothin' and nobody did a damn thing 'cause y'know, mind your business and all that other stupid shit that's been getting bitches killed since bitches existed."
"Yo man. I told you I ain't do no shit like that. Da fuck!" Bolo pursed his lips and backed up a bit.
"All I'm saying is... if you did, call the lawyer! It ain't just you on this case. It's other niggas who don't play that shit, and if some shit like what I'm thinking later on comes out, that's yo ass, nigga. I ain't with it. I can't do that kinda time. And I'm not doing it, nigga. I saw the boss's wife and I thought it was just 'cause Chulo had caught her cheating but, apparently, there was something else. Make that shit right." In the pen, you have to be a quick study to just survive, quicker still and ruthlessly effective with violence to thrive. So after Bolo spoke with Nut, only a blind man wouldn't have been able to see that some schism had parted the codefendants. The next thought would be: why? Other thoughts in the minds of detainees would abound, such as: maybe one is going to snitch on the other, or maybe they want separate trials, or perhaps they just found out their charges ain't adding up, and the like.
However, nobody fucked with either Bolo or Nut individually. Niggas knew these two from the street and also knew they were on another level of fuck you up: broken bones, deviated septums, orbital fractures, blunt force trauma, ad infinitum. There was no way Bolo was doing time for rape or any sort of sexual assault. No one would put any kind of them kind of crimes on his record, if he were to have a record.
But he wasn't no snitch, either.
A few other Blood gang members came over to kick it with Bolo. The United Blood Nation (UBN) was formed on the east coast, specifically New York, on July 16, 1993, by O.G. Mac and O.G. Deadeye. It was formed as an organization directly opposed to the oppression of Black prisoners by Spanish gangs such as the Ñetas and, more frequently, the so-called Almighty Latin King and Queen Nation. The UBN was a successful counter to the Spanish gangs - it grew huge and took over New York and neighboring eastern States. It was the "umbrella" nation under which all Blood "sets" (subfamilies)were originally formed. O.G. Mac and O.G. Deadeye founded the Nine Trey Gangsters, the first Blood set under the UBN. Soon enough, the UBN got so big, so quick that other Blood sets needed to be created. Some of the earliest sets were: Gangster Killer Bloods (of which Bolo had been a member), Blood Stone Villains, Valentine Bloods and One Eight Trey Gangsters.
All of these subfamilies had one or two or, rarely, three "O.G.'s" (Original Gangsters), recognized as the founder(s) and leader(s) of the set. Bolo rarely gave that testimony but the Original Gangsters under whom he had grown up, including Phoenix Shine, an uncle of his from that first generation of around when the UBN was created, and were now up north serving long prison sentences knew Bolo and spoke well of him. The money orders he periodically sent let the gangsters know he hadn't forgotten about them.
A c.o. blew his whistle, letting everyone know it was time to go back inside. The rec period was usually an hour long, longer if the corrections officers allowed it, but it had to meet the minimum NYS DOC mandated requirement of being one hour long. They lined up in double file as their housing units were called and were escorted back inside with several corrections officers escorting each housing unit back. Bolo got in the shower as soon as he got back, having prepared his shower items beforehand and the clothes he would wear. Several other individuals got in the shower also, Nut among them. There were individual shower stalls and water was available anytime from 06:00 until 23:00. The shower area was visible from the somewhat large OIC, positioned directly in-between two dorms. The c.o.'s couldn't see inside the individual shower stalls themselves but they could see the shower stalls and whether or not someone occupied them.
After showering, Bolo dried off and got dressed in a Sean Jean sweatsuit brought for him the day before. Detainees were allowed to wear their own personal clothing. It was a right, because they were still unsentenced citizens presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law, at which point their clothing and housing changed shortly afterwards, depending on how much time to which they were sentenced. He had on some all white Ups and went to break his fast in the "Rec Room," usually a single room where detainees amused themselves with recreational and educational games such as Scrabble, Monopoly and some card games like Poker, Casino, and the like. Of course, there was gambling but it was surreptitious and kept to a minimum because of niggas that wouldn't or couldn't pay their debts because of who gave a fuck what reason! If you gambled and could not or would not pay your gambling debts, you got what you had coming to you.
There was also a large plasma screen t.v. in one distant corner where the volume was kept low to not disturb others. A weekly schedule of preplanned programs was posted was posted under the t.v. and on the wall. It was at exactly 09:00 when the OIC called out Bolo's and Nut's last names. The dorm instinctively became quite as a few other names were called, then finally: "On the packup!" The Rikers Island buses had come.
