88 SCENE | JULY 2017 beachreads the whole neighborhood droned with crickets frantically bowing their wing violins. This is what worried Adam, though: For the first time in almost three years as a guard at the Guile County Jail, he was hearing this chirr on the tiers. At first, Adam thought he was imagining the sound. Or maybe he was going deaf, like Big Mike and all the other old-timers counting the years on their fingers until they could retire and collect their pensions. Adam had never really adjusted to the din from the cellblocks, which stuffed his ears like a bad cold. At the start of the day shift, the lieutenant flipped the master switch that turned on the TVs mounted along all nine security floors of the Corrections Tower, as well as in the basement, where a 54-inch screen presided over the employee cafeteria. The Sheriff had ordered the knobs removed, so no one could lower the volume, not even the deputies on duty monitoring the intercoms from inside their Plexiglas booths. Above the background blare of car chases and fast-food jingles, inmates argued over the size of their peckers and the rules of rummy, and you always had to listen, not for words, but for trouble, especially in the showers. Of course, the wise guys tried to gross you out, grunting and groaning as they took a dump. There were other noises, too—the clank of ankle chains when a new prisoner stepped off the elevator, the whoosh of insecticide as you sprayed him for lice. Even on your break, just when you’d be enjoying a quiet moment in the can, a voice yelling “sweetheart” would echo up from the bowl, one of the men on Eight who drained the toilets to holler through the pipes to the women on Three. Sometimes when he got off duty, Adam felt as if his head was going to explode. The other guys on his watch said he was crazy to live way out in the county, eight miles from the nearest 7-Eleven, but Adam welcomed the drive. He’d crank down the window of his pickup until it stuck and let the wind suck the pressure out of his ears. By the time he pulled up in front of the trailer, he could hear Jenny through the open window in the kitchen coaxing Mandy to eat her peas, their chatter as gentle as wind chimes. In June, when they took Mandy for her checkup with the ENT, Jenny made Adam ask for a hearing test. He felt stupid, but she insisted. The nurse put him in headphones big as softballs, and whenever he heard a tone, he had to raise his hand, like a kid in class. Dr. Peters told him he had the hearing of a bat. “Maybe I’m going crazy,” Adam said that night in bed, as Jenny nestled under his arm, her ear over his heart. “I doubt it,” she said. “I heard this story one time about a guy who picked up a radio station on one of his fillings,” Adam said. “He thought it was Martians giving him orders.” “I wish a little voice would tell you to quit,” she said. “We’ve been through this before, Jen.” “I could go back to checkout, just part time, while you were looking.” “What about Mandy?” “We’ll find a sitter. If you’re worried about—” “Drop it, please.” “You heard Dr. Peters. Mandy probably won’t need any more surgery.” “Probably we won’t be in a car crash either, but probably doesn’t pay hospital bills. I thought we’d learned that.” “I just don’t want you to turn into Big Mike,” Jenny said. “He’s not so bad.” “He’s not the man he might have been,” Jenny said.
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