In prison, or at least in the facilities I spent time in, masturbation is not something you do openly.  It was generally assumed most inmates did it, but there was an unwritten understanding that it should be limited to the bathroom stalls.  At later facilities I know inmates sometimes talked of "spanking the monkey" in the shower, but in this location the showers were open areas with 6 shower heads, where you almost always had to share the showers with another inmate at the same time while a line of anxious clock-watchers stood waiting for their turn before the hot water ran out.  Despite rumors I had heard to the contrary before I was incarcerated, the bathroom stalls had doors, and most had locks, so privacy could be obtained when necessary.  The more concerned inmates would sometimes use damp toilet paper to cover up the cracks around the door, on the off chance someone might try to peek.  That wasn't really necessary however...if you were going to be quiet about it, there was a general don't ask-don't tell policy about what took place behind the stall door.

I shouldn't have been surprised that Alan didn't abide by this policy.  After all, he never wanted to use the bathroom to take a shower, why would he want to go there to enjoy any privacy?  He had recently had so many complaints lodged at him about his lack of hygiene that he'd started to "fake shower."  He would strip down to his underwear, put on his bathrobe (something most inmates did not have or could not afford to buy), and wander off to get himself clean.  He would generally return less than five minutes later, hair dry as a desert, and start exclaiming (to nobody in particular) "Wow, great shower.  G-r-e-a-t shower!  Boy did that feel good."  Whether this little song and dance routine fooled anybody I have no idea, but I do know Alan would simply put back on the same dirty long-johns, as always.  Even if he had been clean, which I doubt, the odor from those nasty clothes would be sure to irritate even the least sensitive of noses.

One morning a guy who lived in the cubicle next to ours pulled me aside and let me know what I had missed the night before while sleeping.  There was a window between our cubicles, half on our side and half on his, and while it didn't serve any useful purpose, it did at least give a view of what was outside - in this case a few feet of grass and another building.  At night, however, if an inmate in either cubicle was using a reading lamp or the fluorescent lamp on the desk after lights-out, the window was magically transformed into a mirror, transmitting a view of our desk area to the desk area next door, and vice-versa.  Apparently Alan had been up late "reading" at the desk, and took it upon himself to engage in some personal physical activity while flipping the pages of his secret porn stash.  While it was only chance that this neighborly inmate had seen what was going on in the window reflection, the fact is that anybody who happened to walk by the cubicle would have been treated to the same horrific view. 

It wasn't more than a week later that I was dozing off in my bunk one evening when a heard a conversation between Alan and another inmate who I could not identify.  My glasses were off, and considering the tone of the conversation I chose to pretend I was asleep and simply listen.  As near as I could tell, Alan was lying in the bunk below me, and the other inmate was in the walkway outside the cubicle.  Basically it went like this:

Inmate: "Yo man, you need to knock that off, that shit ain't right."

Alan: (nervous laugh)

Inmate: "Don't laugh, it isn't funny.  I'm not kidding man.  Show some respect, your bunky is asleep up there and people are walking by.  I can see what you're doing.  If you want to play with yourself, go to the bathroom."

Alan: "No dude, I wasn't.  I was just scratching."

Inmate: (walking away) "Mighty odd way to scratch yourself, pulling on your dick like that."

Word must have started to get around, because pretty soon Alan was being referred to as "Yanker" behind his back...and occasionally to his face as well.  Our conversations were now as short as I could keep them, often with nothing but grunts in response to anything he might ask me.  The subject itself was never discussed directly, but the icy chill whenever he entered the cubicle should have been enough to tip him off that I hated his guts.

I got a break for about six days, when Alan got sent to "the hole" for inciting a work stoppage in the chow hall.  I kept hoping he wouldn't come back, because after seven days he would lose his bunk and they would assign it to someone else, but as usual I wasn't that lucky.  It was fun, in an evil way, to watch the CO try to pack up Alan's stuff from his locker.  I'm told it normally takes one large bag for the inmate's belongings.  In Alan's case, it took four full bags and part of a fifth, not including all of the crap they threw away.  I don't think the guy had ever seen anything like it.

When Alan came back, he looked worse than ever, and I wasn't surprised to learn he hadn't shaved or showered while he was locked up.  The charge of inciting a work stoppage had been dropped, but he'd lost his job in the kitchen and was assigned one scooping up trash.  He had also now earned a reputation with the guards as a pain in the ass, so life was sure to be miserable for the foreseeable future.

About a week later, I received word that I was being moved to a lower bunk in a different cubicle.  Lower bunks were assigned first by medical necessity, and then by seniority.  Alan seemed surprised that I had accepted the transfer.  "Why would you want to move over there?  We get along pretty good here.  I thought we'd just keep things the way they are?"  Fat chance.  As if I needed a reminder of why I wanted to move, two night before the transfer was to take place, I was awakened about ten minutes earlier than I normally got up to a rhythmic shaking and squeaking of the bed.  It didn't take a Rhodes Scholar to know what Alan was doing down there.  I muttered loudly "You've got to me kidding me!" and sat up in bed.  The shaking stopped, and moments later an obviously fake snore could be heard emanating from the bunk below me.  I'd had enough, but there simply didn't seem to be a reason to confront Alan.  I was moving, and he'd be someone else's problem soon enough.   As it turned out, Alan was transferred to another facility soon afterward.  But to this day, whenever I hear "Another Postcard", I instantly am reminded of Rico's singing, and Alan's shouting and banging on the wall.