G.W.O.A.T : 2
When Wayne's Whinging Winds up the Wicked Witch of the West Wing.
## Chapter 3: Crash, Boom, Bang
The afternoon was settling into its usual rhythm - that dead-air quiet between lunch and dinner when the unit feels like a held breath. Most of the lads were in their cells, doors propped open, the soft murmur of televisions mixing with the occasional cough or shuffle of footsteps on linoleum. It was the kind of peaceful moment that Wayne seemed to have a radar for destroying.
Ironically, just as I finished writing that sentence Wayne chucked a wobbly when a guard went into his cell to shake him up. Right now it sounds like she is trying to take something out of him.
"Nah, its fuckin bullshit... Since when was that a fuckin rule?" His voice carried that edge it got when he sensed an opportunity for whinging.
The Boss lady, Sandy, doesn't take much to fire up, so between the both of them it was getting loud. "Now Wayne, don't get upset... it's always been that way".
Wayne's response came like a thunderclap. "Yeah, but you don't have to fuckin speak to me like that... you're the one being rude, get the fuck out of my room!"
What followed was a symphony of destruction. The sharp bang of metal hitting concrete echoed down the corridor. Wayne yelling incoherently. Something else - his kettle, maybe, or his coffee jar - smashed against the wall with a sound like breaking pottery. The vibrations traveled through the building's bones, violently disrupting a peaceful morning.
"I asked you politely Wayne and now you're being threatening. You can stay locked in for the rest of the day" Sandy said, her voice cutting through the chaos with surgical precision. Her boot heels clicked a sharp staccato rhythm on the linoleum as she stepped out, the heavy door slamming shut behind her with a finality that seemed to silence the entire block. From my cell, with his behind me, I could feel the sudden vacuum of stillness that followed the storm of his rage.
Admittedly, I got the reason for the argument wrong as I had falsely assumed that the missing newspaper (after Wayne was locked in I looked for the Herald Sun to read but my search came up empty) was the culprit for this disagreement. Sandy (the Boss lady) is a stickler for the rules and it is not unusual for her to go on a bit of a rampage looking for newspapers (particularly if she's yet to read it).
I learned the truth that afternoon when Wayne was released from his concrete timeout for a pre-arranged visit. He returned like a man carrying the weight of fresh injustice, and If I'm being honest...I was rather intrigued to get the lowdown (even if it was to come in the form of a whingefest). Wayne's face was flushed, his movements quick and agitated, the kind of energy that comes from spending time rehearsing grievances.
"The fuckin bitch took me bedside table. Did you hear the bangin and crashin? That was her ripping away the table that I had me fuckin kettle on it. She pulled it towards her tippin it ova with me kettle and coffee goin flyin onto the floor as well. Shit went fuckin everywhere. It took me half an hour to clean up all the fuckin mess she made. Did you hear what I said to her? I said 'fuck Sandy, why'd'ya go an do that for ya fuckin witch, if ya had fuckin asked me nicely I would have given ya the fuckin thing'. She goes... 'I did ask you politely Brendan.' I said... 'no ya fuckin didn't, you've been here all of 10 minutes and you're already pickin on me, the other staff don't have an issue with it. I've been here a week and no-one hassled me. The physio even said that because I'm in a wheelchair I need it... I don't see you hassling the other blokes about their tables, they've got two of them, why is it I can only have one? What am I gonna put me kettle on?"
Wayne actually didn't need a wheelchair. In fact the Physio told him that it was in his best interest not to use it, and to start getting used to using the crutch he had been given, not that he'd listened anyway. People that talk too much never listen do they? If Wayne's mouth was an engine it would be a 2-stroke, loud and high revs that goes fast but can't carry the weight of his words. That's not to say that he's stupid, but he's gone and done some stupid things, like try and win an argument by insulting Sandy. This whole hoo-ha began with Sandy calling us in for the midday count and Wayne trying to get a laugh out of us at her expense.
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## Chapter 4: The Wicked Witch
The midday count was called in due to an incident happening elsewhere, and although the entire prison gets locked down for such events, in the hospital ward things aren't so strict. The slow shuffle from common areas back to cells, the brief head count, it's a mundane ritual of institutional life. But Wayne, fresh from whatever victory he thought he'd scored in the morning, was feeling bold. As we filed through the doorway from outside to go back inside, he couldn't resist a quick quip to Sandy.
"Who's running Hell while you're down here looking after us?" Wayne announced, loud enough for the whole corridor to hear, delivered with a shit eating grin spreading across his handsome face like he'd just landed the punchline of the century.
Sandy barely looked up from her clipboard, but I caught the slight tightening around her eyes. She'd heard this kind of smart-arse routine before, probably from blokes tougher and smarter than Wayne. Her response came without missing a beat. "I can make it Hell down here for ya's if ya don't get back to your cells for count. There's no run-outs today so we won't be lockin ya's in."
Wayne's joke had landed with the enthusiasm of a dead fish, but instead of cutting his losses, he doubled down. As Sandy walked back toward her desk, her boot heels clicking against the linoleum, he muttered just loud enough for everyone to hear: "I should have told the fuckin witch to get on her broomstick and fuck off."
The corridor went dead quiet. Even the usual background hum of the unit seemed to pause, waiting. I nudged Wayne softly, keeping my voice low. "Mate... you're game."
But Wayne, riding the wave of his own imagined cleverness, puffed out his chest. "Nah... Sandy and I go way back."
If they truly went way back, then Wayne was about to learn something fundamental about the woman he'd just insulted. Sandy waited - and the waiting itself was a weapon. She let the count finish, let us all settle into the false security of routine. Then, with the methodical precision of someone who'd been underestimated one too many times, she walked straight into Wayne's cell and systematically removed his bedside table, hence creating the disruption of peace I heard earlier.
I also go "way back" with Sandy - she was the first prison officer I spoke to when I arrived at St Johns Ward 15 months ago. Back then, and still now, she cuts an intimidating figure. Tall and lean, with a slight forward hunch that makes her loom over you even when she's trying to be pleasant. Her raven-black hair, streaked with premature grey, falls in wiry strands past her shoulders, framing a face that's all sharp angles - high cheekbones, a hooked nose that looks like it could cut glass, and dark eyes that miss nothing. But it's her hands you notice most. Those impossibly long fingernails, painted black as her hair, click against everything she touches - clipboards, keys, desk surfaces - like a constant countdown to something unpleasant.
She was a hard-nosed, sour-faced, cold-hearted, foul-mouthed, treacherous beast that demanded to be addressed with manners and respect. Fair call for Wayne to label her the "Wicked Witch from the West," but if he'd only had a brain, he would have realized that… as a prisoner, he was nothing but a strawman on the yellow brick road to nowhere.
Sandy heads up the union for prison officers and can get quite passionate about issues that affect working conditions. We'd all heard her in full flight before - her voice carrying down corridors like a battle cry. "That cunt can get fucked and go suck on my big fat hairy twat!" she'd bellowed just last week at some administrative decision she disagreed with. You can't un-hear something like that. Some of the more sensitive prisoners might wake up in cold sweats, their imaginations assaulted by nightmares of an imagery no man should ever have to endure.
Not only did Wayne's pathetic attempt at heroics cost him his table, but we suspected Sandy had also torpedoed his girlfriend's visit. Wayne had shown up at the visitors' centre expecting to see both his mum and his girlfriend, only to find his mother sitting alone, her face drawn with the kind of disappointment that comes from delivering bad news. His girlfriend had been denied entry because they "couldn't find the form that needed to be approved," leaving her crying at the gate.
The bureaucratic cruelty of it was breathtaking. She'd spent the morning preparing - shower, choosing clothes, hair, makeup - then two hours traveling across town, another hour being processed, body-searched, questioned. All to see the man she loved. And the prison staff had let her go through the entire humiliating ritual knowing she'd be turned away at the last moment. Someone, somewhere in that chain of command, had gotten a perverse kick out of watching hope die in real time.