Hard News

chest. His uniform didn’t fit well. The glossy blue collar buttons, one stamped with a D, one a C, for Department of Corrections, came just to the level of her eyes. He was silent.
    Randy Boggs didn’t look good at all. He was shell-white and the spray or cream that he used on his hair glued it out in all directions. The eyes were what bothered Rune most though. They were unfocused and still. God, they were eerie. Corpse eyes.
    “It’s you, miss.” He nodded. “You come all the way up to see me.”
    “You going to be all right?”
    “Got me a pretty nice-looking scar. But the knife missed all the important stuff.”
    “What happened?”
    “Don’t rightly know. I was in the yard and I get pulled over backwards and somebody stuck me.”
    “You must have seen him.”
    “Nope. Not a glimpse.”
    “Was it daytime?”
    “Yep. This morning.”
    “How could somebody stab you and you not see it?”
    Boggs tried a smile but it didn’t take. “People get invisible here.”
    She said, “But—”
    “Look …” His eyes came to life for a moment then faded back to lifeless. “… this is prison. Not the real world. We got ourselves a whole different set of rules.” He lifted his hand to his stomach and touched his belly. He leaned his head back into his pillows and pressed his thin, sinewy forearm over his eyes. “Damn,” he whispered.
    She watched him in this still pose for a long minute, wishing she’d brought the camera. But then decided that, no, it was better to keep this private. He was the sort of man who’d never want to be seen crying.
    “I brought you something.”
    She opened her bag and removed an old book, flaky and scabbed. She held it out. The pages were edged in gold.
    Boggs lowered his arm and looked at it uneasily as if no one had ever given him a present before and he was wondering what would be expected in return.
    “It’s a book,” she said.
    “Figured that out.” He opened it. “Looks like an old one.”
    He flipped open to the copyright page. “Nineteen oh four. Yep, that goes back a ways. Year my grandmother was born. How ‘bout that?”
    “It’s not like it’s worth a lot of money or anything.”
    “What is it, like fairy tales?”
    “Greek and Roman myths.”
    At least his eyes were reviving. He even had a slight smile on his face as he turned the pages, glancing at the pictures, which were protected with tissue.
    Rune said, “There’s a story I want you to read. One in particular.” She flipped through the pages. “Here.”
    He looked at it. “Prometheus. Wasn’t he the guy made the wings out of wax or something?”
    “Uh, nope. That was another dude.”
    Boggs squinted. “Hey, lookit there.”
    She followed his eyes to the old illustration. “Yeah,” she said, laughing and sitting forward. Prometheus chained to a rock, a huge bird swooping down and tearing at his side. “Just like you—getting stabbed. Isn’t that crazy wild?”
    He closed the book and picked a couple chips of spine off the thin blanket. “So tell me, miss, you a college girl?”
    “Me? Nope.”
    “How come you know this kind of stuff?” He held up the book.
    She shrugged. “I just like to read.”
    “I kind of regretted I never was smart enough to go.”
    “Naw, I wouldn’t feel that way if I was you,” she said. “You go to college, get a real job, get married, what happens is you don’t ever get a chance to play chicken with life. That’s the fun part.”
    He nodded. “Never could sit still long enough to go to school anyway.” He looked at her for a moment, eyes roving up and down. “Tell me ‘bout yourself.”
    “Me?” She was suddenly embarrassed.
    “Sure. I told you ‘bout me. Remind me what life’s like on the Outside. Been a while.”
    “I don’t know….” She thought: So this is what the people I interview feel like.
    Boggs asked, “Where you live?”
    Houseboats take a lot of explaining. “In Manhattan,” she said.
    “You can stand it there? It’s a crazy place.”
    “I can’t stand it anyplace else.”
    “Never spent much time there. Never could get a handle on it.”
    “Why would you want to live somewhere you can get a handle on?” she asked.
    “Maybe you’ve got a point there. But you’re talking to somebody who’s a little prejudiced. I come to town and what happens? I get myself arrested for murder….” He smiled then looked at her closely. “So, you’re a reporter. Is that what you want to do?”
    “I have this thing