“You’re getting a new cellmate tomorrow,” he says. “Want to guess who it is?” “But there are only two bunks.” “Yes. They found a spot for Hernandez in Med Seg. You want to know who’s moving in?” “What? No!” I wrap my hands around the bars and hear the panicked dismay in my voice, though begging has never done me any good, not once. “She doesn’t want to be in Med Seg. She hates it there. I take good care of her, much better than they do. One little incident and—I mean, I’ve been doing it for eight years.” “Nobody’s blaming you, Mattingly. She’s vulnerable already because of her disabilities. She’s supposed to be in Med Seg anyway, but it’s been overcrowded and she was doing fine with you. But between her injury in the showers and her other health conditions, she needed to be moved back. It’s a liability to keep her in General Population.” I press my forehead against the bars in exasperation. “Why is everything about liability? For God’s sake, her family is all Guatemalan immigrants.
