Jesse Bolivia wasn't a particularly good man by any stretch of the
imagination but he didn't deserve this recent development. Black, he had a
juvenile rap-sheet that folded out accordion-like for reams on end. Its
lengthy weight stretched down long where the serrated page's met, allowing
light to pass through. To stand on that infamous Florida blotter stacked
together: he'd gain 2 inches of height.

 But this story is not all about what Jesse did. 
   
 Jesse had just turned 18 on October the 19th.  It was then that a
demonic force inflicted a sonic water-colored assault onto Jesse's world. On
that tragic birthday his life changed forever when he was in the wrong place
at the wrong time.

 A Circle K convenience store worker and an undercover policeman were
shot to death in a botched robbery and Jesse had been viewed by the store's
cameras only minutes before the murder.  In fact, Jesse admitted he was there
but denied the crime. His fingerprints were there. A woman who passed Jesse
on her way out of the store later identified him in a lineup as being at the
scene of the grisly unmentionable. 

 A neighbor who had had a past run in with Jesse over him playing his
music too loud saw the TV report and the ripped-off store's video on a "NEWS
AT 10" broadcast and called it in. The police swarmed Jesse's hood shortly
after receiving word. They found Jesse in a squalid one room brownstone
hovel. Tattered clothes littered the floor. Lacy spiderwebs adorned the
silverware bins. A plotch of unrestrained mildew grew frenetically in the
urine residue of his toilet bowl. The law took one look around and came to
their own quick conclusions about Bolivia and this seedy part of town. 

 The police's home invasion search had turned up several important
items. The same style sunglasses as in the pictures. A ski cap there with the
same insignia...  A flannel shirt that appeared to be very similar to the
clothes worn by the killer in the store's poor quality color film footage.
Jesse even had the same telltale purple afro-pick seen poking out of the
killer's shirt pocket before.  Bond was set at 1 million dollars and Jesse
was sure he would never see the light of a free day again.

 The trial was a farce. From the beginning Jesse was declared
indigent. Too poor not to pay. He was assigned a public defender named Noel
Justin who had tried only one murder case before in his young and fruitless
life. Justin did little in the way of preparation for the case despite
Jesse's increasingly desperate claims of innocence. 
   
 The lawyer quietly despised Bolivia for this admittedly treacherous
crime although outwardly Justin concealed his chagrin well. Everyone said
they were innocent. The counselor tried to dissuade Jesse from saying too
much.
   
 "You leave the talking to me." Justin said confidently as if he had
something beneficial in mind. Meanwhile Noel Justin esquire stayed out late
at night with the members of the town's good ole boy network and made few
legal preparations for Jesse or any of his other clients for that matter.
Noel was interested in spending money though.

 Noel Justin didn't grasp the value of his client's life. He talked
openly about the case in public. He missed key meetings he was to have with
Jesse and failed to ask many penetrating questions that might have shed some
light on the charged man's innocence. The day of trial clambered closer.
Finally -- and tragically, to no one's surprise--Jesse Bolivia was found
guilty. Guilty without much fanfare after his jury deliberated for a scant 20
minutes on the evidence they had seen. Surely, they would confess later, no
one had ever been so guilty. Jesse's heart pounded jackhammer-like against
his chest when sentencing was passed down a week later.

 "Mr. Bolivia men like you don't deserve to breathe free air. You are
sentenced to be executed in the Florida electric chair," and with that the
judge stood and brought the gavel down.

 "May God rest your soul. Court adjourned." The man in the black robe
said and turned away quickly.
   
 Jesse went back to his cell and prayed. Years went by and Jesse
exhausted his appeals. No one visited him. Nappy outcrops of gray hair sprung
up all over his head. The day of reckoning loomed closer with every breathe
he took and he was a mental train wreck. His body jumped to a start
involuntarily in his sleep too many times to count. The system had operated
in an evil, forlorn way once again and no one cared.
   
 Only one man could save him now. "Clemency" was a well worn
catch-phrase bandied about on death row. Only the governor could spare a row
member's life with clemency.     

 Jesse's governor was a man named "Shorty" Shrubs for his diminutive
size and fuse-like disposition. Granting Jesse clemency was the furthest
thing from Shorty's mind though and he said so publicly. Governor Shrubs even
went as far as to make jokes televised jokes about Jesse's plight.

 "We goin to have us a barbecue in Starke come down round October."
The governor twinkled a smile and doffed his ten gallon hat as he continued.   

 "You don't kill a lawman in this state and live to tell about it.
Ya'all come on now you hear. A man like Jesse Bolivia deserves what he gets."

 The governor's good ole boys nudged each other knowingly in the
background with ear to ear grins. Their globs of chewing tobacco spit formed
pools on the ground in front of them. One deputy picked searchingly in his
nose--rooting out crunchy goldmines. Jesse lay in his cell awake that night
thinking about his fate.

 "God I didn't do this. Some men look just like others, to others.
Please show me a way."

 A bright light shone down suddenly into his cell. The alarmed
tiptoeing cockroaches scrambled quickly for safety into the paint chipped
cracks of the baseboard moldings.

 "A good deal of injustice goes on down here my son but sometimes
only the biggest events come before my attention."

 The voice boomed into the recesses of the bounce-plex without
drawing any attention from the otherwise noisy cell pods.

 "I have watched from above how this farce has played out." God
supplied.

 "What?!" Jesse looked serenely placated as his anticipation grew.

 "Retribution comes to those who wait. Vengeance is mine sayeth the
lord."  The ubiquitous being commanded. 

 With those intrepid words something truly bizarre took place. Jesse
felt something strange as if he had become fuller in his own skin. He was
certain that he was now sharing his body with not one but two other people.
At once all the selves were seemingly in conflict with one another.

 What the hell are you waking me up for at this time of the night?
Said one voice that sounded distinctly like that of the governors.

 "Hey scoot over. What am I doing in here?" came the clearly wining
voice of Noel Justin the attorney. Jesse's mouth flailed agape.

 Jesse had a flash of divine wisdom and he knew what had just taken
place.

"Ha, ha, ha," Jesse laughed.
   
'Now you two will know what its like to walk a mile in my shoes.'" The selves
felt at their own Jesse body than looked closely at the unfamiliar colored
face in the cell's high polish steel mirror.
   
"This can't be!" Cried the governor self.
   
"Were ruined! lamented the former attorney.
   
"This cell is so small. Its cold and everything is hard as a rock." The
governor started. Their wasn't a dry eye in the 6 X 6.
   
"It stinks like old egg farts in here." the lawyer said feeling at Jesse's
vocal chords.
   

"You guys pipe down in there" came a voice from the cell right across from
them. A black man that looked like Jesse came out of the shadows of the back
of his cell. Out of obscurity. He bore the insignia of a strangely familiar
tattoo on his forearm. He stood there glaring. Listening intently. His
presence could not be overlooked.
   
The selves exchanged unexplainable flashes of intuition at this. Jesse
remembered. The Governor went to pieces and Jesse fell to his knees.
   
"We're scheduled to die tomorrow, The governor spat. 'That's real electricity
they're getting ready to pump us with. I think I'm going to be sick.'"
   
"Maybe we can just tell them what happened," the lawyer quibbled.
   
"What are you fucking kidding?" The governor was a trembling pile of eunuch
jelly.
   
The three entities went on bickering amongst themselves like young children
forced to do fatal chores. Meanwhile, the governor and the attorney's old
bodies lay dormant--sleeping. Finally the last night came before the
scheduled execution of Jesse Bolivia. He ate a last meal of fried chicken.
Three hours left till the end...
   
"My God I had no idea it was this bad." it dawned on the governor.
   
"This is medieval. What the hell are we doing to these people? Cringed the
attorney.
   
The hour grew nearer. Genuflecting occurred. Soon Jesse would  leave that body
taking the governor and the lawyer with him. To many people had conspired to
pre-ordain his untimely fate.   
   
Then more surrealism occurred. Jesse awoke in the governor's body. He looked
down at his white outstretched arm-- its hue of fine porcelain. A hat rack in
the corner with several 10 gallon Stetson's. Jesse looked at the pictures
decorating the room. Dust-eating cowboys being cranium stomped by wild-eyed
cattle beasts. Action photos of men with thrown lassos hanging in mid
air--teeth bared mares so elusive. Jesse noted the discernable blur around
some pictures caused by shutter speed to slow to capture the fast fury.
Sometimes pictures did lie. On the floor a brass spittoon held floating
graveyards of stringy tobacco afterbirth.
   
The morbidity of the state's execution dance could not be translated into
sane words. The now Jesseless Jesse was led kicking and screaming to the
electrical moment of atonement. Wired nodes were connected to his ashen
chestnut-colored face.
   
The attorney and the governor trembled in Jesse. Sheer horrifica. 
    
Jesse's body had been strapped to the chair. A wet sponge dripped its morbid
dribble down his head in sweat staining rivulets. The water would get the
juice flowing to his brain more readily. Unsightly veins pulsed unimpeded.
   
"And in the name of the father..." The priest muttered something frantic in
mutated Latin. Gothic echoes stirred in the executioner's atavian
hearts--unremoved by time.
   
The door to the death chamber burst open suddenly. The body of the governor
himself, Shorty Shrubs walked in waving a piece of paper dramatically.
Stop what your doing! I'm ordering clemency for this man. Let him go!