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There were four phones in the camp. They hung like souvenirs of another era on a short corridor off the Counselor’s office. Black and broken on shattered sheetrock, there were calls out only and every call required a code to invisible recorders that recorded every conversation. There were four plastic chairs in front with numbers scrawled on the back with a sharpie. With no privacy, you could hear everyone’s conversation. After a while you got used to it and could care less who was listening. Everyone’s call started with the same pretentious reassurance. Mine were the same, but always trepidation when calling my wife. I had left such a mess: a bankruptcy filing, foreclosure of our residence and lawsuit documents arriving every day. A prison consultant was hired to advise her. But he turned out to be a drunk and my kids resided elsewhere and couldn’t help. We had decided she should remain in Florida rather than relocate near them or me in New England. We had relocated there before my sentence and she had a life there: friends, supporters and a community she was comfortable with. I didn’t want her burdened by the pressure to visit me. 

Few of our calls were uneventful. Things were not going well. My wife had been a housewife, a mother, an artist, a cabaret singer. She had no experience in business. Our fall had been abrupt. In December we were living the high life, in January we were bankrupt, and in April we fled to Florida, and I was headed to prison. She had filed for bankruptcy just before I departed. A legal firm in Palm Beach represented her. A divorced woman about fifty who kept changing her advice every hour, followed by a notice that the cost of her services was exceeding our deposit. Our home was being foreclosed. A court filing required a response.

“She said she won’t file an answer until we pay her another $5,000. What do we do? I just don’t understand these things, and John (our advisor) wasn’t helpful.” 

Her fear, confusion was palpable. My go-to was to smooth over, reassure. 

“All we need is a delay. I don’t get it,” I said. I was trying to be calm. But I wasn’t calm. I knew that I couldn’t do anything, other than rage silently. I realized that the lawyer I had hired was incompetent and dishonest. The worst kind of dishonest. Believing it themselves. Saying such things as “I told you that,” when she said the opposite, and there was no previous indication that there would be more fees, and now we’re in the middle of the bankruptcy and the foreclosure and we have no options, other than to pay her when there is no money, and keep working with her because you can’t change now, can’t afford another attorney, can’t even afford her, and even if you pay her and she does what she says, it probably won’t change the outcome and the bottom line is that we’re fucked and the house is going to be foreclosed, the bankruptcy will fail and my wife has to try and sell the house before she’s evicted by a court order, and find a new place that we have no money to pay for, and despite all of that, she was not angry with me nor blaming me. More concerned with how I was doing.

“I hate telling you this. I feel badly making it harder for you there.”

“No. I’m fine. I’m just worried about you. Leaving all this mess with you. So disappointed with John. We already paid him.”

“I met him for lunch. A place he picked. He was an obvious regular there. The bartender kept sending over beer after beer for him. He didn’t get drunk. But the signs were there.” 

There was a Spanish guy behind me shouting in Spanish. I had worked with him in the kitchen. I never knew his name. He bunked near me for a while. He was about fifty, white hair and a perfectly cut mustache as white as his hair. He was a fastidious guy. His bed made like a Marine. His clothes, always pressed and hung in orderly spacing next to his locker. He had an upright posture, almost bending backwards as he walked. And there was something so aloof about him. Walking through the halls, he was in his own world. I never connected with him. Even when I worked with him in the kitchen. I was invisible to him. He was losing it on his call right in front of me. He even stood up a couple of times. It was so distracting that I lost my train of thought.  

“I’m sorry,” I said to her. “There’s a guy in front of me losing it and I…”

“I hear him. What’s his problem?”

“I don’t know. Look. I feel terrible about everything. I don’t know what to do. Let me think about it and I’ll call you tomorrow. Don’t do anything now.”

“I spoke to Meredith yesterday (our daughter) and she makes me feel so stupid.”

“You’re not stupid. This is a mess. Forget that. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

“The lawyer said I have to let her know right away. The foreclosure hearing is scheduled for Friday. It’s already Wednesday.”

There was a beep on the call which signals that my call will be disconnected. All calls are terminated after ten minutes. I didn’t want to have that happen before I said goodbye.

“I’ll call you tomorrow. We’re about to get disconnected.”

“Okay. I wish I had better news.”

“It’s fine. Sorry for you.”

After I hung up, I sat in the chair for a moment. There were others behind me waiting. Someone shouted to me, and I got up. It was a lost feeling. I said I’d call tomorrow, like I’d figure it out by then. There was nothing to figure out. We had no control. All the momentum to complete the dismantling of our lives was unstoppable, the hurdles overwhelming and my efforts inadequate. Everyone I brought in to help was a disaster. The prison consultant, the bankruptcy lawyer, my appeal lawyer, my original lawyer, our real estate broker, our new accountant, whoever, whatever. I couldn’t afford any of them and most of them weren’t paid. I was a disaster. The prison consultant said that I didn’t understand that I was no longer a wealthy man.
I hated him for that. Probably because he was right. I was making decisions as if I would recover financially. But all the indicators were the opposite. Making matter worse, I employed my usual strategy in the face of all that: denial. My former business partner, Bill, after my outing said I was delusional. Maybe he was right.

After the call, I went to see Jack, the sea-food king. Jack was in the same boat more or less. He still had some assets left, no cash, but a big house North of Boston and a place in Florida. Big liens on them, made selling them difficult. His wife remained in the big house alone. She visited him every visiting day, three days a week. She was a gentle looking woman. Not very attractive, a bit frumpy and house wifey, but always smiling whenever I saw her in the visiting room. Jack said she was always complaining about something in the big house.

“I have to remind her that I’m living in fifty-four square feet with another guy.”

He repeated that often. Never bitterly or angry. More as a joke. He understood that she may have been in the big house. But she was alone. A woman who never had to worry about anything. Now trying to manage liens, letters from the IRS, packages arriving every day, huge Fed Ex boxes, each containing hundreds of pages of legal documents, credit cards and checks often returned or rejected and government officials showing up without notice.

Jack’s bunk was always organized, and he was almost always reading a book, usually mysteries, thrillers and some biography. He was reading a memoir by an unknown Italian, smuggling Jews through the alps and across the border into Switzerland during WWII. He had headphones on but took them off when I arrived.

“You should read this. John,” he said, removing the headphones. He had suffered severe hearing loss in the Marines. So, he listened to music on the headphones when he was reading. “They should’ve made a movie about this guy. Unbelievable what he did on those mountains.”

“Got a minute Jack?” I asked.

“Yeah. Sure. I’ll give this book to you after I finish. This story would be some movie.” Jack put the book down and put in his hearing aids. “So, what’s going on.”

Jack was kind of the camp wise man. He wasn’t the oldest inmate, but he was seventy and had a Dutch uncle persona. He welcomed anyone reaching out. I even saw Izzy, the gangster rapper reaching out to Jack. He just had a way about him that made guys trust him, a natural wisdom about things. And he made doing time almost look easy, which it wasn’t, and accrued to him respect from the other inmates. 

“Things are a disaster at home. Looks like we can’t stop the house foreclosure. My wife’s bankruptcy─ can’t stop it. And the bankruptcy doesn’t even stop the lawsuit against her.”

“Was she in the business?”     

“No. Nothing to do with it. But my former investors are suing her. They know she was not involved in my business but they’re suing anyway. Worst part I can’t stop it and can’t help her. I hired a prison consultant to advise her and manage all of this for her. Paid the guy up front. Turns out he’s a drunk and she doesn’t want to have anything to do with him.” 

“Can you sell the house?”

“It’s on the market now. But it’s a close call if she can find a buyer to stop the foreclosure. That was the purpose of the bankruptcy. But the bankruptcy attorney is another problem. Keeps changing her mind. All her original predictions didn’t happen. Worse yet, she said she never said them. Now asking for more money or she’ll close her file.”

“You know the joke about lawyers.”

“No. Maybe. Which one.”

“You know what they call 1,000 lawyers at the bottom of the ocean?”

“What’s that?”

“A good start,” he said. 

It was funny but I couldn’t laugh. I was too broken. Jack noticed and didn’t let it lay there.

“John, I know. It’s not funny. I know you know this. But you can’t do anything. It’s just going to play out. All you can do is hope she finds a buyer. Any interest?”

“Not yet. The broker I hired isn’t much better than the prison consultant, or the bankruptcy lawyer I hired. I’ve got a perfect record going here.”

“Once we’re on this path. There’s no bottom. Just keeps getting worse. Wish I had some answers for you John.”

“Me too. Thanks for listening.”

“Anytime John.,” a short pause, “Heh. I’ll give you this book when I finish. They should’ve made a movie about this guy.” 

Then he picked up his book and grabbed his headphones.

“Ok. Thanks Jack,” I said and returned to my bunk. It was the middle of the day, the dorm quiet. I sat on my bed trying to conjure up a plan. Nothing emerged. I told Lynn I’d call her tomorrow. As if I’d have an answer, a plan. But I had nothing. The foreclosure would play out as it played out. Maybe a buyer for the house would emerge, but the bankruptcy would go as it goes, and probably not well. Lynn will have to move, but there’s no money for that, and our kids are not in a position to help. I knew it would all end badly and I couldn’t do anything about it. I thought how hopeful I was when I arrived. No good reason for that. But it survived the early adjustment, the search for a routine, learning to ghost, the mess back home and my appeal in no-man’s land. My hands were trembling. I’d have to call her tomorrow, and I had nothing to say. It was over like that. 

I wrote this in my journal:

The sudden moments of despair come without warning. And when they come, like a tire losing air, nothing to hold you up.