Ike Hayes describes the job to Goodson, then both men push carts of dirty laundry to the laundry to be washed. Goodson becomes upset about injustice he is suffering. Ike Hayes poses a question that triggers a tangent from Goodson, which leads him to ask Ike Hayes his views on the struggle for civil rights. 

Ike Hayes is awaken from his dream by Officer Hits who introduces inmate Goodson, and tell Ike Hayes to show him what to do. Ike Hayes has worked alone in the laundry room for months, sort of a punishment, but he is suspicious about Goodson, because it is unusual for a new cock to be given a gravy train job.    

Inmate Hayes is suddenly  awaken from his fantasy of freedom. He's introduced to a new inmate who has been assigned to assist him in the laundry room of the dorm. Hayes has expected a new person, but not a new inmate, fresh from the outside, and certainly not a black one.

Hayes becomes suspicious and starts to suspect the new inmate as a plant, a part of a trap being sat for him.

Poems left by a struggling poet who freed himself by leaping from a window

Testing to teach myself how to work all the buttons

By happenstance our protagonist is reunited with an ex-girl friend and thoughts of love floods his mind, although the picture isn't quite right. 

We start at the return to a kitchen table where we find our besieged protagonist, a wanna be writer, engaged in self-reflection as he taps out words with his fingertips in an effort to finally finish his book.  He has returned home from Chicago, in his view like a dog with its's tail between its legs, to  what he calls his "beginning", and to a place he calls "the killing floor.

Thom arrives at school before the bell rings, and discovers a short period of time, where the students are relaxed and laid back.  He's aware of eyes  upon his new hair style, and likes the attention.  He hears laughter from the classrooms as he walks toward Miss Magazine classroom, where encounters Mr. Lowtower who fully recognizes him from yester day. 
Meanwhile, in Miss Magazine  classroom, there is a riot of fun, led by a popular girl by the name of Betty Snail. The funs ends soon after Thom arrive and the bell rings. It's like the cry "attention"  to a group of solider.

Ms. Magazine is not in the mood to teach when she reaches the school. While she prepares to read the mail from her faculty mail box, it all falls to the floor, and as she gathers it up, Mr. Lowtower appears. As a jokes she invites him to tell her what is in the mail. It is mostly monthly reminders. The only new information concerns a school board ruling forbidding boys from wearing shoulder length hair.  The idea of the boys at Lincoln, causes Ms. Magazine to laugh out loud. Mr. Lowtower stares at her indigently,  questions her laughter  and hints that is racial. Ms. Magazine reminds him that there aren't any white males students at Lincoln; and therefore, the ruling would appear not to apply to the male students there. 
Mr. Lowtower storms away, slamming the door behind himself.