Cut to the Bone(2)

“Them?” the director said, pointing to the state employees milling about the other side of the viewing window. In the back, arms folded, was the man playing Martin Benedetti, the detective commander who’d arrested the killer and would view the burn for real. “Why?”

“They just sat there, staring. At me. Like vultures and I was roadkill.”

“They were supposed to, Johnny. That’s their job.”

“I know,” Sanders sighed, wriggling against the slats to murder an itch. “I get that they were playacting. But right at the end, when the buzzer went off? I swear they wanted me dead.”

“For real?”

“Yeah. Creeped the bejeezus out of me.”

“That’s great!” the director barked, clapping his hands in glee. “Means they did a hell of an acting job, too. Covington will be pleased.”

“Good,” Sanders said. “That’s good.”

“You got that right, brother,” the director said.

Today was the third in a series of dress rehearsals for the execution of Corrigan “Corey” Trent, whose monstrous crimes rivaled those of John Wayne Gacy and Richard Speck. Covington built the electric chair especially for Trent and ordered these endless rehearsals to “make sure the bastard roasts to perfection.”

Which is why Sanders found himself in a six-by-twelve cell at Stateville Prison, the maximum-security fortress near Joliet that housed Death Row. Sanders, a state historian, was organizing more than two centuries of official execution documents. He’d volunteered to play Trent in the dress rehearsals to get a better feel for the people he was reading about. “Wow, a Method historian,” his boss kidded when Covington gave his blessing.

He was tossed in the one-man cage at noon yesterday, to the jeers, threats, and hurled feces of the real condemned, led by Corey Trent. Correctional officers - “COs” in prison parlance - restored order. Sanders sat in his bunk the rest of the day, heart thumping, chin in hands, wondering what exactly he’d gotten himself into.

At sundown, a flying squad of COs shoved him in an armored car and sped north. A half hour later he was flung into the condemned cell at the State of Illinois Justice Center in Naperville. The staff let him call his “lawyer” for updates on his “clemency petition,” then served his last meal - Coke, cheddar fries, and a rare T-bone. Prompting the center’s director to joke as he swallowed the last bite, “Don’t worry, Johnny, we’ll make sure you’re well done.”

The doctor arrived at nine to make sure Sanders was healthy. “If you weren’t, we’d postpone. We don’t execute sick people,” he’d said, without a hint of sarcasm.

Then it was lights-out. Sanders lay wide awake in the concrete gloom, wondering how even monsters like Trent survived the Row without biting out their wrist veins. Best not to think about it, he supposed. He fell asleep.

At sunrise, the chaplain asked if he wanted to pray. Sanders said no, not now, but he’d sure appreciate a visit just before the sentence was carried out.

“That’s when I’ll really need your help, Reverend,” he explained. “You know, in getting square with the Lord.”

The young chaplain agreed eagerly, and Sanders grinned to himself. Messing with the clergy was fun. They were so earnest.

Then he was shaved, diapered, dressed, manacled, marched down the hall, strapped into the electric chair, ministered, witnessed, and “executed.”

To ensure Sanders wasn’t accidentally injured, the live power cables weren’t attached to the chair. They plugged instead into a test box in the rear of the chamber, which, unlike the remainder of the cement complex, was tiled for easy cleanup. The box was chock-a-block with resistors and capacitors that mimicked the human body. If the power spurted out of the generator and ran the circuits properly, the box would buzz, signaling death.

Which it did.

Which is why everyone was smiling.

“What happens now?” Sanders asked as the guards unbuckled the last of the leather straps that pinned him to the oak.

“You take a break,” the director said. “Have a smoke, hit the john if you need. Then we run through it again.” He pinched his chin divot, thinking. “This time, fight the guards all the way to the chair. Hard as you can. Give us a good show.”

“Cool,” Sanders said.

“Yeah, everyone likes that part,” a guard said.

As Sanders headed to the bathroom, the director dictated notes. Then he strode to the telephone - “safety yellow,” per OSHA regulations - bolted to the wall.

The hotline to the governor’s office in Springfield.