How My Cell-Phone Made Me Spend A Night In Jail (2)
Philip Matthew Alarie

 

- “Seriously!”
-”So what were you doing, up until the point you got arrested, anyways?”
I then explained to him all the events, which had taken place, up until I was arrested outside of that “cursed” phone-booth, outside of Lionel Groulx Metro Station… “Man, that is some REAL fucked up shit!” He replied… “Yeah, I know man!” I replied… I then said; “I hope they catch the son-of-a-bitch, who REALLY did it and they let me go… Soon…”“ For your sake, I hope so too…” He replied sympathetically… He then asked me; “ do you have any prior criminal record and did the “pigs” let you speak with a lawyer?”
- “Nope I’ve never been caught for any of the crazy shit I’ve done before- so I don’t have any criminal record… And yeah, I spoke to a lawyer already…”
I then explained to him all the crazy things, which I had done in the past, which I had gotten away with… He then told me; “well you have no record and seem to have a good case… The lawyer should deal with the judge, without any problems and they’ll probably let you go, tomorrow morning!” “Well, I certainly do hope so!” I replied…
- “Don’t worry about it!”
- “I’ll try not to!”
Even still, I couldn’t help but worry about what might happen the next day…

I then asked Fred; “so, what are you in here for?”
- “Well I drove through a stop sign and was driving with an expired license…”
- “That must suck!”
- “Yeah, it does… Its like the “pigs” came out of nowhere, when they caught me!”
- “Same with me- except like I explained before, I didn’t even do anything wrong… Those fucking bastards!”
- “Yeah, fuck… I know…”
He then added; “in my case, I might go back to prison for another year…”
- “Why you’ve been to prison before?”
- “Yeah, I went for 3 years in a provincial prison and only got out this August…”
- “Shit! What did you do, anyways?”
- “I was convicted of attempted murder…”
- “Fuck!”
- “So since I have a previous criminal record, they’ll probably be harsher than usual with the punishment and send me back to provincial prison for a year…”
- “Shit, that would suck!”

Fred then said; “at least if I go back to prison, I may be able to see my father again… I haven’t seen him in almost 5 years, now…”
- “Your dad’s in prison?”
- “Yeah…”
- “What for?”
- “He was convicted of murder…”
- “Damn…”
- “I want to see him before he dies, too… He started smoking when he was only 10 years old and in his later years, he became a chain smoker. He would even smoke while he was eating his meals! So now he has lung-cancer…”

He then added; “ I myself smoke… I started when I was 12, to look “cool” … Now, I smoke 20 a day and wish I could quit… I’m still young and want to be healthy and I don’t want to die young, because I smoke- its so hard to quit though… My god…”
- “I started smoking last year, because I was under a lot of stress when I was in college and had some relationship problems, so I foolishly started smoking to help take off the edge… In the past, I would have never imagined myself as being a smoker- EVER! And when I started, I thought I could just snap my fingers and I could quit at anytime, without any problems- but, its way more complicated than that! Damn, I only smoke 10 a day and I tried quitting one time and managed to quit for a week… I tried the patch and still it was so hard! The nicotine withdrawal symptoms were BRUTAL for me… After 7 days though I was fine and had absolutely NO desire to smoke at all! But then, I went out with some friends, to go clubbing downtown that night and saw people smoking and although I had NO desire to smoke whatsoever, I had something to drink and I foolishly thought I’d just try 1 last cigarette, just to fit in with the other people… I also told myself that this would be my ABSOLUTE last cigarette… But, I must have drank a little too much that night and lost my discernment, so I tried another and another… Then I stupidly became hooked on the damn things again!”
I then added; “my parents and everyone else who have smoked before me, make it sound so easy to quit smoking… They probably just wanted to forget how hard it was to quit, so they don’t remember the withdrawal effects… I mean I want to try to quit again, but its SO fucking hard! And I absolutely hate the fact that my body has grown to love it! Its just such a filthy habit!”
Then Fred said; “yeah seriously, I know what you mean man! But shit, I don’t want to die young because of lung cancer, or any of that other shit, related to smoking- as I’m sure you don’t want to either, of course… But in my case if I do go back to prison, I have no choice, but to quit smoking, because you can’t smoke in prison anyways…”
- “No, I certainly don’t want to die young… There’s just so much to live for!”
- “True… At least if you’re free that is- which I‘m sure you will be, tomorrow morning…”
- “I hope so!”

We then spoke about life in general, for quite sometime… After a while, the jail-guard returned and opened up my cell to bring me somewhere. I went with him and has I left the cell, I told Fred; “take care man!” (I thought it was time to go to court.) He then replied; “Oh, you’ll be back soon…” The jail-guard then brought me into an office… the office had a camera just above the door and there was a finger-print scanning machine. There was also an officer sitting at a desk, in front of a computer. There was also a clock on one of the walls and it was around 4am and it was now Friday, October 18th 2008... The jail- guard then brought me to the fingerprint scanner. He wiped down my hands with a wipe and then took one of my hands to scan the prints… As he was doing this, I was quite nervous and was sweating considerably, so the scanner kept messing up… “Tabernacle!” The frustrated jail-guard cursed, as he pulled away my hand and wiped it some more, with the wipe. This happened quite a few times and with my other hand, as well… After a considerable amount of time with the finger-print scanner, the jail-guard told me to stand in front of the camera over the door… The guard on the computer, at the desk then took my mug-shot… The jail-guard then escorted me back to my cell… As he was escorting me back to my cell, I asked him; “could I have another blanket? Because I’m cold…” “No, sorry we don’t have anymore!” At that same moment, we walked past a closet, which was open and there were plenty of blankets in there… “FUCKING ASSHOLE!” I thought to myself… He then led me into my cell and closed the bars, behind me…

“See, I told you that you’d be back soon,” Fred said… We then spoke a bit more, about life in general, for quite some time… Then the “snoring prisoner” started to snore quite
loudly, once again… As he was snoring, Fred and I made fun of him and then started imitating him- this went on for a while… Then, the “bipolar prisoner” seemed to be “jerking-off,” in his sleep. There was a strange movement under his blanket and he was making strange moaning sounds, between silent snores… We also made fun of the “bipolar prisoner,” (now the "jerking-off bipolar prisoner") because of this, for a while…
After a while, the “snoring prisoner” had quieted down a bit and the “jerking-off bipolar prisoner” stopped “jerking-off” and Fred had fallen asleep… I would then fall asleep shortly after…

I slept alright, for quite some time, when the jail-guard woke up us prisoners… He brought us our breakfasts. He gave us small blueberry-muffins, with small milk-boxes. “Better than the cliché stale bread and water, I suppose,” I thought… I ate rather quickly, as I was quite hungry and hadn’t eaten in a while… I then went back to sleep again…

After a while, the jail-guard had woken me up, to bring me back to the lobby… As I was wearily walking towards the lobby, I thought to myself; “take care Fred!” Aside from his past, he seemed like a pretty nice fellow… In the lobby, the jail guard handed me back my sweater and I put it on. He then had me hold out my hands in front of me and he put handcuffs on me. The time on the clock, on the wall, behind the counter showed that it was now almost 8am.

The jail-guard then escorted me into the small garage, where a prisoner-escort truck was waiting… In the truck, there were about 5 other prisoners. 4 of them must have been around my age and the other one was a middle-aged man, who reeked of booze… I then sat down on the bench along the wall… I could see that there were also 2 female prisoners, around my age as well, on the other side of the wall, inside the truck, whom I could see through a large, rectangular window… The truck then took off, to take us to the municipal-courthouse prison… As we drove off to the municipal-courthouse prison, the other prisoners with me spoke amongst themselves in french. I sat there silently… As we were driving to the municipal-courthouse prison, I could see the sun just beginning to rise, over the skyscrapers, through the stainless steel meshed window, in front of me… I hadn’t seen the sunrise in the longest time, since I usually wake up at ridiculous hours in the afternoon! Too bad that the first time I would witness this in a while, was in the back of a prisoner-escort truck… And as I sat there, I sat there silent... I was quite anxious, as to what could happen to me…


V
( MY DAY IN THE MUNICIPAL-COURTHOUSE PRISON)

So we then arrived at the municipal-courthouse prison. The truck then parked in a garage. The jail-guard then opened the door of the truck and led us to an elevator. Then he made us get into what seemed like a cage… The female prisoners went in first, then us men followed. As we were in the elevator, the other male prisoners were whistling and saying things like; “hey baby!” To the 2 female prisoners. They were getting all excited, like they had never seen a woman in their lives! The 2 female prisoners just looked at them, like they were a bunch of idiots…

The elevator took us up to a large hallway… It was there, that a prison-guard came and removed our handcuffs. He first brought the 2 female prisoners to their holding-cell. He the returned and opened a large green metal-screen and escorted us to a large holding-cell, which had a large column in the middle of it and a small sun-roof on the ceiling. The holding-cell had benches along the walls. The walls were covered in all sorts of graffiti. There were also about 5 phones along the front wall. There was also a small washroom on the side.

I then tried to use one of the phones but kept getting some message in french and couldn’t figure out how to get it to work… I then went to one of the benches along the wall and lay down, to get some more sleep… I slept alright, for quite a while… The other prisoners started joking around in french and their laughter woke me up...

The prison-guard then brought in about 3 more prisoners, around my age… “Shit!” I thought to myself- “its like most of the criminals are around my age!” The prisoners spoke and joked amongst themselves, as I just sat there silent, in my anxiety…

The prison-guard then came back and escorted back to the elevator and put us in the cage. We took the elevator a couple of floors down… He then led us into a smaller holding-cell, which had bars… There was a clock on the wall, outside the holding-cell and it was just before 10am…

I just silently sat on the bench, for quite sometime… Then I noticed that one of my fellow inmates figured out how to use the phone, so I asked him how to get it to work and he told me. You have to press “0,” to place a collect call, before dialing the number that you want. I then thought that I would call up Jason... So I called him and explained to him the whole ridiculous situation... After calling him, I went down to sit silently on the bench, once again…

The prison-guard then returned with about 5 more prisoners. They looked like a bunch of “crack-heads!” The prisoners then started speaking amongst themselves in english, about the thing they had got arrested for… I started to speak with them When they asked me what I was arrested for, I told them; “well you know, I work with Al-Qaeda, killing people and I make bombs and shit like that… Nah, I’m just joking! But that’s what I think that the “pigs” think…” I then explained to them my ridiculous situation and we had a good laugh about it… They actually seemed pretty nice, as we were friendly with each other, throughout the rest of my time in custody… I then became restless and started pacing around the cell, anxious about what the outcome would be…

It was now noon and the prison-guard then returned and escorted us back to the large holding-cell… There they served us our lunch… Ham-sandwiches and juice-boxes… They didn’t even let you have the straws, for the juice-boxes though… (Maybe because the prison-guards think that those could be used as weapons too? Who knows?)

Then a prisoner, with his German friend tried to speak to me, but I couldn’t understand what they were saying… I then sat down and spoke with one of the other prisoner’s (who’s name I believe was Chuck- a middle-aged, bearded-man) and he gave me some advice for me, if I did go to prison… He told me advice like; “when you shower in prison, shower with your back to the wall and if you drop your soap, don’t pick it up because you might get ass-raped!” I heard this once before… (I guess that’s why they invented soap-on-a-rope!) He also told me; “don’t whistle in prison, because that will give you a death sentence!” I never heard that before, but anyways, good advice I suppose… he also told me ; “don’t flush the toilet after 10pm, or you’ll disturb the other prisoners and get beaten up the next day!” More good advice, I suppose… He also told me that there are ways to smuggle cigarettes into prison and that there are certain times of the day, when the guard is off duty in certain blocks of the prison and you could smoke in your cell… “I would definitely try that out, if I go to prison!” I told him… “Oh, you certainly won’t go to prison though…” He reassured me… We then spoke about life in general, for a while…

The prison-guard then came back and escorted us back down, to the smaller holding- cell… It was now 2pm… I sat down on the bench for a bit, silently, when a jail guard called our names 1-by-1 and then he called my name. I went over to the bars and he told me to put my hands through the opening, in the bars… He the placed handcuffs on me… He then led me into a room, where there was a lawyer… I then, once again explained to the lawyer my ridiculous circumstance and told her that I would plead “not guilty…” The prison-guard then escorted me back into the holding-cell and when I was inside, he took off the handcuffs…

I then called up Jason again, to let him know what was going on… He had 3-way calling on his phone and I spoke with Holly as well and explained to her the whole situation… I also told her that I hoped to see her soon and told her that I love her VERY much… I then called my mother, to tell her about my ridiculous situation. She then asked me if I knew the name of the lawyer, but I had forgotten it (I have terrible short-term memory!) I then went over to the bars and called one of the guard’s over… I then asked him the name of the lawyer and he just replied; “I dunno…” He then yawned and sat down on a chair… “Motherfucking pig! Like hell you don’t know the name of the lawyer!” I thought to myself… I then told my mom about the “pig” and she reassured me that everything would be alright and then I let her go… I then sat down on the bench again, for a little while…

It wasn’t long before a prison-guard came and called me to the bars… He then told me that he would bring me to see a psychiatrist, for an evaluation… He then escorted me to the large holding cell, where I would stay for a bit and then he brought me to a small cell… This cell was filthy like the last one, but a little worse, because there was tons of graffiti on the walls and ceiling…

I didn’t have to wait long for the psychiatrist to come… He then asked me questions like;
- “so, how are you doing today?”
- “Well, if I wasn’t here, I would say that I am doing rather good!” (We then both laughed a bit)
- “why do you take the medication that you take?”
- “I take it for bipolar disorder and OCD.”
- “Do you feel like hurting people?”
- “NOT AT ALL!”
- “Do you feel like killing yourself?”
- “NO, not in the longest time!”
-“Do you hear voices in your head?”
- “Heck no!!”
- “Do you use any illegal drugs?”
- “Nope!”
- “Are you currently being followed by a psychiatrist?”
- “Yes, I have an appointment with him soon…”
He then wished me luck and went off on his way and the prison-guard came back and escorted me back down, to the smaller holding-cell…


VI
(MY COURTROOM HEARING)

I then sat on the bench for an hour… It was now around 4pm… The guard called some names 1-by-1 and then called me to the bars again… He once again told me to put my hands through the opening in the bars and put handcuffs back on me again… He then escorted me into the courtroom and stood next to me… Before the trial began, the lawyer whispered to me; “I’m pretty sure she’ll let you go, so don’t worry about it!” I then felt EXTREMELY relieved! The judge then explained what it was that I was charged for and then asked me; “how do you plead, Mr. Alarie?” “Not guilty!” I replied… The lawyer then explained my situation to the judge and then the judge told me; “continue to be a good citizen, Mr. Alarie!” “Oh I will your honor!” I replied, with utmost joy!

The guard then escorted me back to the small holding-cell and took of the handcuffs… I started to pace around restlessly, as I was filled with joy!


VII
(FREEDOM!)

Then the guard came back and escorted me back to the larger holding-cell, where I would wait to sign my release papers… While I was waiting, I went and told Chuck how they were going to let me go and he was quite happy for me. I then engraved my initials on the large column, amidst other graffiti, with the plastic piece on the string, from my sweater. Then a guard came to get me and I said “take care, Chuck!” “You too! And god bless! You’ re a good guy Phil!” He said…“ “I try to be…” I replied… He seemed like a really nice guy… I then went into a large office, where I signed my papers for release… The guard then brought me into a room where the had my stuff… I then put back on my belt, necklace, ring and shoelaces and took my knapsack and left the municipal-courthouse prison…

When I was outside, I noticed that the guard had forgotten to give me my medication- I then went back inside and I sent him back to get it and he returned it to me… I then found that he also had forgotten to give me my wallet- I then sent him back to retrieve that and he returned it to me… He seemed a bit irritated with me… “Incompetent “pig!”” I thought to myself…

I then exited the municipal-courthouse prison, once again…It was now 5pm and freedom had NEVER felt so good to me before! And it was such a beautiful day- the sun was shining so brightly and warmly and the breeze was gentle! I then lit myself a cigarette and it made me feel so good, as I didn’t smoke in almost 20 hours! There was also a prisoner who had been released at the same time as me and I offered him a cigarette and he gave me a 5 dollar bill! “What the hell?” I thought- “you could just go to a corner store down the street and buy a pack of 20 light, cheap cigarettes, for that much money! But whatever I'll take the money and buy myself another pack of smokes, when I run out!” To award his generosity I gave him 3 more of my cigarettes…

I then reluctantly went over to a phone-booth and called up Jason… As a joke, I told him that I was found guilty, of being a terrorist and that I would be sent to a maximum security prison… And that I was sentenced for 5 years, without any chances of parole and that he wouldn’t be able to see me for a HELL of a long time… I scared the shit outta him and Holly at that moment, because they had believed me! I then told him I was joking… We then made plans to meet up later on…

We then met up near Acadie metro, in the Town of Mount-Royal… I was so happy to see Holly again- when I saw her, I gave her a big hug and a big kiss! I was really happy to see Jason again and I gave him a big hug! We then had a good night, as we spent it around Mount-Royal… When I got to Jason’s apartment that night and went to bed, I slept better than a baby! Its so good to be free! I went through all that shit, JUST BECAUSE OF A DAMN CELL-PHONE!! But oh well, at least I was free again! The really messed up, bad dream was finally over! The eternity had ended!

Since that fateful night, I have a fear of public phone-booths and a fear of losing my cell-phone…


VIII
(MORALS)

1. Perseverance and a good sense of humor, could get you through just about anything!
2. Its good to have loving and supportive family and friends (and girlfriend… Yes, you my love, Holly!)
3. If you commit a crime you will most likely have to pay for it somewhere in your life!
4. If you commit a crime and get away with it, you may cause innocent people to suffer for your actions…
5. Don’t EVER take freedom for granted!
6. NEVER lose your cell-phone
7. Cops CAN be “pigs” SOMETIMES (I’m not trying to generalize, but I am assuming that some of them can be “pigs” sometimes)…
8. Smoking is bad for you! If you don’t smoke now, NEVER start! Seriously…

 

 

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Copyright © 2008 Philip Matthew Alarie
Published on the World Wide Web by "www.storymania.com"