Straight Life - Art Pepper [154]
I got up on my bunk and just sat there. Then I happened to look out of the cell and I saw these hands coming up over the floor of the walkway in front of the cell! I see these arms, and I think, "How can anybody come up over the bottom?" As I watch, a guy climbs up. He looks all over. He's holding a can about three inches wide and a foot long, and it has a little handle on it. I see that it's something that would fit through the bars. Another hand appears over the side, and a second guy climbs up. They both look loaded to me but not loaded from stuff. They're giggling and all that. The first guy was a white guy with curly, sandy hair, freckle-faced, a nice-looking guy in a rugged sort of way. Blue eyes. He had the look of someone who'd just stolen a dime out of the church box. He had a little shit-eating grin on his face. The other guy had black, curly hair. He was one of those white, white Mexicans with milky skin, not a mark on him, not a blemish, doubly handsome. He looked like one of those old Spaniards. They were both wearing the prison blues. The first guy was clean but rumpled and relaxed looking. This other cat was all starched, his shirt collar; everything fit perfect. His pants were a different color than the ordinary blues. Later on I found out that these were blues made from the old material, which everybody wanted. They had been bleached out so they were very light and real pretty.
I noticed that both these guys had the same animated look about them, and their eyes were sort of red. Right away I thought, "Juice!" They each had a can. They whisper, "Art Pepper?" And I say, "That's me." The first guy says, "I'm Don Proffit, man." He says, "I've been a fan of yours for years. I'm an actor. I heard you were coming. This is my friend, Huero." Huero says, "I've known a lot of cats that have known you. They say you're good people. We figured since you just drove up it must be a little scary, so we brought you something to take the edge off." Huero puts his can through the bars and Don puts the other one through. It's pisco, a drink they make out of all kinds of things, fruit and yeast. It's home brew. It looked like a dull orange juice, kind of pissy looking, and it tasted like rotten beer. I looked at the other cat in the cell. They asked him, "Who are you?" Huero said, "I hope you realize that in a place like this if someone does you a favor you never say anything about it or get them in trouble. You're with our friend and we don't want to leave you out, so remember, if anything happens, you get too drunk or you get busted, you ride the beef." The guy was so sad. I said, "He'll be alright."
We started drinking this stuff and talking. Don told me about his acting. Huero loved my music. All four of us got really loaded; we had a ball. We finished the two cans, so Huero climbed back over the walkway, and a few minutes later I saw his arm coming up again and this can, and here he comes after it. They went through this whole scene and never got busted. It was like the thing that happened in Soledad. I was afraid San Quentin would be different, that there was some other breed of people here. But I saw that it's just people, and there's groovy people everywhere. I drank so much I got sick. They left and they said, "We'll see you tomorrow." I vomited, and I got up in my bunk, and I thought, "Well, maybe it's not so bad after all." And I got that warm feeling of having friends, male friends, good people; I was liked and it made me feel good. I passed out.
All of a sudden I heard this clanging of gates. It was a horrible sound, and I woke up and looked down and saw this toilet with vomit all over it. My