“So you can take care of yourself now, eh?”

“I’m going to try.”

“Ain’t this a bitch. I’m the one kept these muthafuckas from stickin dick in you and now you gonna round on me.”

Heads looked up from the T.V., letter writing, reading, and card playing to check out what was going on. Seeing it was Chilly who was responsible for the commotion, their faces showed disappointment. Consistency of style is very important in prison, and Chilly wasn’t staying true to form. He was losing his cool, and in the eyes of those watching was no longer worthy of his name. Chilly sensed the attention he was getting and tried to drum up support for his cause.

“Listen, everybody. I wanna tell you somethin. Brown Sugar here has decided he wants to change up all of a sudden and be a man. In that case, I’m serving notice right now that this punkass muthafucka is wide open. Anybody that wants him can have him cause I ain’t frontin for him no more… What you gonna do now, punk?” he said turning back to me. Unfortunately, Chilly had misread his audience. Their disappointment had now turned to annoyance over the way he was suggesting to them something he wasn’t prepared to do himself. Chilly had forgotten that dudes in the joint are not impressed by words. They are in jail for doing something, not for talking about it. But Chilly kept on talking.

“If you ain’t stuff now, you will be soon. All you need is a little pressure. You just ain’t streetwise enough to survive in here. All you know is them books. But you don’t know nothing about life. You been babied too much. You was already a punk when you got here, so you might as well come on out and be sho nuff bitch…

“It’s too late for you to take your own weight. You should a done that the first day when I walked up and touched you. In the penitentiary a man never lets somebody touch him that he don’t know. But you ain’t no man!”

I looked unwaveringly at Chilly and he sent back a look of shock and surprise scrambling for some face-saving action. There was more to me than he thought, which he took as meaning there was less of him. I could tell he wanted me to say something that would give him an excuse to hit me. But I didn’t make it easy for him. Whatever Chilly had in mind would have to begin with him. And then, as if he were raising his hand to wave to someone, he smashed me hard across the face. I was knocked back against the wall. Out on my feet, I was a stricken sail using its mast for crutches. Chilly stood like a predator, ready to spring for the kill. He really wanted a piece of me. But I wanted no part of him. And then, for some reason, I started laughing. At first there were short breaths from the back of my throat; they built to a big production chuckle and ended with my wheezing and falling exhausted on the bed.