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ONE

Freddie

If you're going to be stupid, you've got to be tough

That was my first hard-won life lesson And, as with ly

I had to have my freedom taken away froe inside a cage inside a cage

There was a perpetual chill there, so that burrowed under the skin, whittled away at the bone to settle in the ain

I still felt it, even clad in ain for the first time in a decade Jeans of the boyfriend variety skirted the heel of e sandals On top, I had a siht jacket My aunt would call it a windbreaker And me, well, I didn't knohat to call it And I didn't really even know if it would be in style anymore Or if I would walk outside and everyone would knohere I had been for the past ten years

The e buried because there was no one around to judge without being considered a hypocrite - welled up stronger than it had been on the day when I had first shuffled shackled feet through the cinderblock walled halls

I wondered as I accepted uard behind the desk - a man wholly disinterested in the enormity of his position, of his daily iet used to The prickling, unco me for what I was At least on paper And on paper was all that really mattered, wasn't it?

A felon

Ex-con