Chapter 5: Temple of the Spirit School

That night, Larry had eventually fallen into a fitful sleep. Before sunrise, Arlene had admitted two large men. Quietly, they entered Larry’s room and held him down while they injected potent anesthesia.

The next morning he awoke completely disoriented and nauseous. He was in a room with eight cots, six, including his, were occupied by male teenagers. The six windows of the room were covered in heavy chain-link fencing. They were covered with light blankets except for their feet and ankles, his included. They all wore wool socks underneath ankle cuffs connected with chains.

Under each cot was a half-gallon or two liter sized plastic bottle with a spout, which must be used for urinating, he decided. The room was dimly lit by a floor lamp at one end, where a bored looking man was reading a paperback book in an office-style chair behind a plain metal desk. At the opposite end of the room was an ordinary flush toilet, out in the open without any partition walls for privacy.

“Mom put me in a prison! Dad was right; fuck, I’m in deep shit.”

Suddenly, a loud bell sounded. The bored man reached back over his shoulders and hit a switch on the wall, igniting bright florescent tubes up and down the ceiling. Larry carefully swung his feet down to the floor and sat up on the edge of his cot.

Around him, his five fellow prisoners were up on their feet and hurriedly making their beds. Except for one on his left who was loudly passing urine into his plastic bottle, and then he too was occupied with his bedding.

The attendant, a man in his late twenties, walked up to Larry, clearly angry.

“What’s—”

He was instantly interrupted with a powerful slap, driving him from his cot to the floor.

“I didn’t give you permission to talk, Mason, you raise your hand and wait. Before that, fix your bed like everybody else, or that little slap will be just the beginning.”

While Larry was picking himself up and turning to his cot, he moved from cot to cot. If the bedding met with his approval, he would nod his head, and the teen would pick up his urinal and shuffle off to the toilet to empty the contents. Then he would rinse it out and wash his hands at the adjoining sink, then return to his cot.

He scowled at two of them, requiring without words that they make another attempt at perfecting their bedding. At the last cot, the teen raised his hand.

“Mr. Carson, may I use the toilet?”

“Approved.”

While he shuffled off carrying his urinal, Carson returned to Larry’s place.

“I have to teach you everything! Your cot looks terrible, but you’ll fix that tomorrow. Stand at attention when I address you. If I need to hit you, you get back up and stand at attention again. What’s wrong with you?”