A Promising Youth

Chapter 3 Your Help

After being pulled out by the guards and beaten half to death, I was thrown into the confinement room.

Instead of feeling fear, I felt an indescribable sense of security in the dark in the dark and small space.

No one could hurt me in this house of brass and iron. Above my head, the palm-sized air vent, mapping

in a beam of light, looked like that beautiful girl.

“It will be fine”, I would always remember this sentence. Where there was darkness, there must be

light. If I follow that light, one day I would find the meaning of living.

From then on, I fell in love with the feeling of confinement. The isolation and the taste of being able to

fantasize about the beautiful girl without distractions became a rare moment of happiness in my life.

So whenever someone bullied me in the prison, I'd run up and bite them!

As long as I could not tear off a piece of flesh, I would never let go, because I have resentment in my

heart. I treat all those who bullied me as my family to vent my anger!

So what if I got your head bashed in?

So what if I got clubbed by a prison guard?

All I knew was that after biting someone, I could be confined, and I could enjoy being in prison to have

rare happy time.

And then later, all my cellmates were afraid to mess with me, they even thought I was a pervert!

Because I was the only one, who every time I came out of confinement, still managed to stay mentally

sane, and the only one who was never afraid of being confined.

There was a time when I was unusually grumpy and my eyes were bloodshot because I could never

swallow that anger. I hated my family. My brother had committed the crime and I was enrolled by a

college, but because of my parents' partiality, I was a prisoner, and my brother, that uneducated

bastard, went to my college under my name.

What made me terrified was that the pretty girl in college would consider my brother was me. My

brother was horny and had a smooth mouth, so at that time I was afraid that the pretty girl fell in love

with him.

An honest man like me was cowardly and humble, but when I was pushed hard, I would do anything!

The most that was on his mind at the time was how to kill my parents and kill that bastard brother when

I got out of prison.

The desire I wanted to kill them was written on my face, so that the people in the cell avoided me. The

man sleeping in my upper bunk held urine at night, afraid that he would wake me up and that I would

fight with him. Suddenly, I became the devil in the cell. Two meters around, no one dared to approach

me.

After a year like this, the resentment in my heart gradually decreased. I never believed that prison

could change a man, and it was the words of the strange girl that prompted my transformation, “It will

be fine.”

The words were like spring rain, sprinkling dew on my parched heart, stitching up those furrowed

wounds.

A year later, the prison was revamped and inmates were called upon to actively study culture. The city

launched an essay campaign to create a prison culture newspaper, encouraging inmates to actively

submit articles, and those who wrote well and could be published in the newspaper had the opportunity

to have their sentences reduced.

How could I pass up such a great opportunity when I was knowledgeable and educated?

And I had to get out of prison early to find that girl and tell her that guy wasn't me. He was my brother

and a total asshole!

She could not be fooled by him ......

So as soon as I could, I headed to the prison library. Over the course of a week, I wrote over 2,000

words in an essay called, “It will be fine.”

I couldn’t remember the specifics content, but the general idea.

‘It will be fine. Despite the darkness we are in, there is always a light inside;

‘It will be fine. There will always be a glimmer of goodness in the world, even though we are not

understood;

‘It will be fine. Despite life's numbness, we can't give up on ourselves and those who have helped us.’

I couldn't stop the tears from flowing as I wrote. I had poured all of my encounters over the years into

the tip of my pen. Every word contained a scarred life, but I had never given up hope, because “It will

be fine”.

This article, which was printed in the prison culture newspaper, the front page of the first issue, had set

off a frenzy of thought even in the city's prisons.

The guards turned their attitude towards me and the inmates treated me with respect and awe.

Therefore a tiny sense of accomplishment grew within me. A feeling of being recognized by others

proved the meaning of my existence in the world.

Half a month later, I inexplicably transferred to another prison, which was under the jurisdiction of R

City and was dedicated to special prisoners.

The quality of the inmates here was generally higher, and the environment was much better than the

average prison. The cells were double bed, and it was here that I met the “Master” who changed my

life.

He was a man in his early 40s, with dark hair but graying temples, handsome brows and gleaming

eyes.

“Why did you get into prison?”

That was the first sentence he said to me.

“Wrongly accused.”

Not being a good speaker, I was brief and concise.

“Heh, everyone who came here is wrongly accused, and the prison is full of good people, isn't it?”

He looked at me half-jokingly and had been a cellmate ever since.

I learned through conversation that he was the initiator and chief writer of the Prison Culture

Newspaper. My article, which deeply impressed him, was the reason why I had the opportunity to break

the rules and transfer to this luxurious prison to create a newspaper with them.

Life after the transfer was like a step from hell to heaven for me. There were no bullies and no tedious

physical work. It was more like a place to retire. There was anything except for freedom.

My master was popular in the prison. Everyone including guards and prisoner called him “Leader’. I

didn't know whether if he used to be a big leader or if he was the chief writer of the newspaper, but

there was an unwritten rule in the prison.

“Never pry into someone's business.”

Of course, even if you inquired, the information you got was, in all likelihood, false.

Master treated me well, not only instructing me in literary creation, but also teaching me a lot about

being a human being. Whenever I was in the library, he would also talk with some people, discussing

ancient and past events, analyzing the current situation, economy, philosophy and humanities, all of

which were very informative and beneficial to me.

Master had rheumatism in his left leg and it would be in pain in winter. In return for my kindness, I often

took my own bedding and covered him with it, and even got under the covers before he went to bed,

using my body heat to help him get rid of the cold.

Later he believed that I was really wronged. A child who knew how to repay kindness and had a good

heart would not break the law and commit crimes.

He listened attentively to my family, my life encounters. When to the depths of his emotions, he was

teary-eyed, sighing at the sadness of life and the ruthlessness of human nature.

“Matteo, do you want to succeed?”

That night, Master sat at his bedside and asked me this with immense seriousness.