Pop loved Walking Tall. She preferred a straightforward movie storyline, with maybe a little romance thrown in. If the movie was sappy, she would cry, and I would make fun of her, and she would tell me to shut up. She wept at Radio, while I rolled my eyes at the Italian Twins.

After House of Sand and Fog, she turned to me. “Did you like that?”

I shrugged. “Eh? It was okay.”

“I thought that was your kind of movie.”

I would never live down the shame of having enthusiastically recommended Lost in Translation when it had screened earlier in the year. The ladies of Danbury widely and loudly declared it “the worst movie ever.” Boo Clemmons laughed, shaking her head. “All that talking, and Bill Murray doesn’t even get to fuck her.”

Movie night was as much about eating as anything else. Pop would prepare a special Saturday movie meal that was a respite from the endless march of starch in the dining hall dictated by the BOP. The competitive tension of the salad bar on a rare day when broccoli or spinach or-miracle of miracles-sliced onions appeared was a welcome change from the monotony of cucumbers and raw cauliflower-I refused to live on potatoes and white rice. I would wield the plastic tongs with a smile, eyeing Carlotta Alvarado across the salad bar as we both tried to fill our little bowls with the good vegetables faster than the other-me to wolf down immediately with oil and vinegar, she to smuggle out in her pants to cook later.

Chicken day was pandemonium. First of all, everyone wanted to get as much chicken as the kitchen line workers would give them. This is where it came in handy to be in tight with Pop. The rules of scarcity govern prison life: accumulate when the opportunity presents itself, figure out what to do with your loot later.

Sometimes, however, there were plans for that chicken. Often on a chicken day Rosemarie would plan to cook us a special meal. Toni and I would be asked to abstain from chicken-eating in the chow hall and to instead stick the bird in our pants, to be smuggled out for use in some elaborate, quasi-Tex-Mex creation later that evening. This required a plastic Baggie or a clean hair net, procured from a kitchen worker or an orderly. Slip the foodstuffs into the appropriate wrapping at the table, shove it down the front of your pants, and stroll out as nonchalantly as you could with contraband chicken riding on your hip bone.

The list of important things a prisoner has to lose is very short: good time, visiting privileges, phone access, housing assignment, work assignment, participation in programs. That’s basically it. If they catch you stealing onions, a warden can take one of those things away, or can give you extra work. Other than that, the only other option is the SHU. So will a warden be willing to lock up onion thieves and chicken smugglers in Seg?

Let’s put it another way: room in the SHU is a finite resource, and the warden and his staff have to use it judiciously. Fill the SHU up with chickenshit offenders, and then what are you going to do with someone who’s actually done something serious?

BIRTHDAYS WERE a true oddity in prison. Many people refused to reveal theirs, whether out of paranoia or simply because they didn’t want it observed by others. I was not one of these holdouts and was trying hard to be upbeat about celebrating my birthday in Danbury, telling myself things like “At least it’s only one,” and “At least it’s not forty.”

In a peculiar Camp ritual, a prisoner’s pals sneak in the dark of night to decorate her cube with handmade “Happy Birthday” signs, magazine collages, and candy bars, all of which they would tape to the outside of her living quarters while she slept. These illegal decorations were tolerated by the guards for the day but then had to be taken down by the birthday girl. I hoped I would get a Dove chocolate bar.

The day before my birthday found me doing my laps after the dinner meal, when Amy materialized by the side of the track. “Pop wants you, Piper.”

“Can’t it wait?” This was highly irregular.

“She says it’s important!”

I trotted up the steps and started toward the kitchen.

“No, she’s up in the visiting room.” I followed Amy up through the double doors.

“Surprise!”

I was really stunned. Card tables had been pushed together to make a long banquet, and around the table were an odd assortment of prisoners, my friends. Jae, Toni, Rosemarie, Amy, Pennsatucky, Doris, Camila, Yoga Janet, Little Janet, Mrs. Jones, Annette. Black, white, Spanish, old, young.

And of course there was Pop, beaming and gleeful. “You were really surprised, weren’t you?”

“I’m shocked, Pop, not just surprised. Thank you!”

“Don’t thank me. Rosemarie and Toni planned the whole thing.”

So I thanked the Italian Twins, proclaiming the effectiveness of their surprise strategy and thanking everyone profusely. There were lots of Tupperware bowls filled with goodies. Rosemarie had worked “like a Hebrew slave” to produce a prison banquet. Chilaquiles, chicken enchiladas, cheesecake, banana pudding. Everybody ate and chatted, and I was presented with a big birthday card hand-drawn on a manila folder featuring a celebrating Pooh Bear winking lecherously. Jae slipped me her own handmade card, featuring leaping dolphins, the cousins of my tattoo. What she said in that card was echoed by the notes the others had written in the group card: “I never thought I would find a friend like you here.”

After the party had broken up, Pop summoned me to her cube. “I got something for you.” I sat down on her footstool and looked at her eagerly. What could it be? Pop wouldn’t have gotten me anything from commissary-she knew I could get anything I wanted myself. Maybe it was some treat from the depths of her giant locker-SPAM, perhaps?

With great ceremony she presented me with my gift-a beautiful pair of slippers that she had commissioned from one of the skilled crocheters, a Spanish mami. They were ingeniously constructed: double soles from shower shoes were bound together and then completely covered in pink and white cotton yarn crocheted into intricate designs. I held them in my hands, so moved I couldn’t speak.

“Do you like them?” Pop asked. She was smiling, a little nervously, as if maybe I wouldn’t appreciate the gift.

“My god, Pop, they’re so beautiful, I can’t believe it. I can’t even wear them to walk around in, they’re so beautiful I don’t want to ruin them. I love them so much.” I hugged her hard, then put my new handmade slippers on.

“I wanted to get you something special. You understand I couldn’t give to you in front of that whole crew? Ah, they look nice on you. They’ll look nice with your pajamas. Don’t let a CO catch you with them!”

That night, not long after lights out, I heard whispering and tittering immediately outside my cube. Amy was the ringleader of the decoration team, and her couple of shadowy helpmates sounded suspiciously like Doris and Pennsatucky.

In typical form she was soon cursing her accomplices under her breath. “Don’t stick that picture there. What are you, stupid? Put it over here!”

I kept my eyes shut and breathed deeply, pretending to be asleep. It must have been my dreams that were making me smile.

The next morning I stepped out of my cube to survey their work. Glossy photos of models and bottles of liquor decorated my cube, along with “Happy Birthday Piper!!!” I had my Dove bar taped to the wall, plus more candy than I would ever eat. I felt great. All day I received birthday wishes. “Thirty-five and still alive!” said my boss in construction, laughing when I made a face.

In the afternoon I found a delicate little white paper box perched on my locker, hand cut into lacy designs, with a card from Little Janet.

Piper, on your birthday I’m wishing you the best of everything good-health, strength, security, peace of mind. You are an extremely beautiful person inside and out and on this day you are not forgotten. You have been such a good friend I never thought I’d find that here. Thank you crazy girl just for being you. Stay strong and don’t ever feel weak, you will soon be home with the people who love & adore you. I hope you like the little box I made for you:) I made it thinking about you, of course it’s not much but it’s something that should make you smile and it’s different. I will have you in my heart from now and always.