120 Days (Patreon)

I'd done time before, so prison time didn't scare me. Sure, 120 days was longer than any previous stints, but you quickly find your pace, zone out everything, and before you know it you are out again. This new place felt weird from the second I arrived.

No other inmates helping out during intake processing, just a no-nonsense prison guard that could just as well had been a drill sergeant. Told me to strip naked, which was odd, and place my clothes in a sealable plastic box with a barcode on it. Then hosed me down with cold water and handed me just a single pair of shorts. No towel, no slippers, no orange outfit, no bed sheets, nothing.

I'd barely put the shorts on when the nightmare began. Four guards dressed as leather gimps from a Mad Max movie marched in and quickly secured me in restraints that would better belong in a BDSM dungeon than a state prison. Just as effective at keeping you and your movement under control though, if not more. They led me through brightly lit, white corridors to a cell with a weird contraption in it that they secured me to in an uncomfortable position, and left.

I don't know how long they left me there, it's hard to keep track of time in silence staring at a white wall, but they returned way past all my muscles were burning from being in that position for that amount of time. Without a word they just released me, walked me to a different room, and secured me in a different way.

I quickly lost count of the various rooms and positions I was in. Sometimes it was dark, often it was well lit. Sometimes it was hot, sometimes it was cold. Sometimes there was music or white noise playing, most of the time it was dead silence. Frequently they change whatever bondage is locked on my body. Collars, hoods, shackles, mittens, I've been through it all.

Telling time is impossible. I can honestly say I don't know if it was a week or a month into the sentence when I got the first tattoo. I was strapped to a bed and wheeled into the tattoo parlor, a bright white room of course. A man dressed in black suit, white shirt, black tie, black latex gloves, black balaclava, and ski goggles asked "Would you like to get a tattoo?" It was the first word I'd heard since the intake. "Yes," I whispered, surprised I even had a voice.

Somehow, despite the dull pain the tattoo needle was spreading, it felt like a relaxing vacation from the torture I'd endured so far. I fell asleep, waking up in a different room as I was being roughly lifted out of the bed and swiftly secured to a different contraption that essentially was a squat machine. I could either sit cramped, or stand as best I could holding up the weight on my shoulders. The weight was light, so it wasn't much of a problem, but I knew given enough time either position would suck. I would be switching between the two, basically being forced to do high-rep, low-weight squats.

I knew two things. I would look very different coming out of this place, and I couldn't wait to get back to the tattoo room.