Unnerving

Whatever problems I may have had at my previous facility, I was never locked on a unit because of a riot. It is not too stressful, more irritating. I want to get back to the faculty room and plan for the next day. There is only one computer there that is useful to me owing to the vagaries of New York State's IT. I don't particularly appreciate having to wait to print.

My student, despite his rap sheet, is pleasant and keen to do my work. We then watch an episode of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. (It was playing when I arrived and continued unremarked upon through my lesson. It may not be in the best taste to offer high security adjudicated youth this sort of entertainment, but that is outside my area of responsibility.)

I pushed the button to be released -- none of my keys work in the unit door to prevent a resident from attacking the staff to try to escape -- and through the static, a voice tells me that I'm not going anywhere. From the shouting on the radio that I keep as low as possible, I have some sense of how things are going.

I have an hour until my shift ends, at which point I will feel more stressed about being detained. If I can't leave this unit, will there be enough staff to let any teachers out of the facility? Are they going to be too busy being assaulted and trying to prevent further assaults?

After half an hour -- before seeing who abandoned the baby on Law & Order -- I hear YDAs returning my girls to their unit. I ask the YDA, who is less pleased by my continued existence and my apparent inability to help his brothers in arms protect themselves from the residents, if he thinks I could get out now. He shrugs and says that I had better try before the next onslaught.

I press the button and, after a long, silent moment, the door buzzes open. I make haste to the faculty room. There, the teachers are alternately baffled and furious that this was allowed to happen. I am unclear on precisely what did occur and so piece the event together from their horror.

Boys on one unit jumped a YDA. Residents injured at least three YDAs.

A teacher I was working with only half an hour before the disturbance reports that the resident looked at him while tearing the unit apart and said, "Nobody touches Mr. [Name]," which is an odd reassurance. Better than being labeled a target, though far better still that there were no targets.

Police from five departments, including the Department of Environmental Protection, converged at the gate with Tasers and dogs.

I email Amber and my parents, assuring them that I am fine, knowing that this will end up on the news. How could something this sensational not? I expect to get home before it is reported, but it is better to allay their fears while I can.

When I leave for the day, police are everywhere. I count at least ten police cars and two ambulances. A large section of the fence is open to accommodate their bursting in to rescue the facility.

I consider if I ought to weave between the police cars and ambulances to go out through the gate but hover near the door where I am buzzed out every afternoon.

When I drive to the exit, two officers directing traffic consider me carefully (do they suspect that I might be a resident in clever disguise?) before waving me out. As I pull away, I see a car from CBS 6 parking on the side of the road.

Today marks my first week at the facility. An optimistic man might say that it can only go up from here, but I know better. On the news later, camera people with telephoto lenses captured my coworkers as though they were paparazzi, and the sight of teachers and YDAs ending their day was newsworthy.

When I show up the next day, the guard wanding me in says off-handedly, "I don't know why you came in. You aren't going to get any work done."

I shrug and say that I am here because it is my shift. I'm here to do my job.

last watched: What We Do in the Shadows
reading: Waypoint Kangaroo