Ellis Boyd "Red" Redding – Character Quotes

— Chess. Now there's a game of kings.
— What?
— Civilized. Strategic.
— And a total fucking mystery.

Rumor has it you're a real cold fish. You think your shit smells sweeter than most. Is that right?

They send you here for life. That's exactly what they take.

If I were you, I'd grow eyes in the back of my head.

The first night's the toughest. No doubt about it. They march you in, naked as the day you were born, skin burning and half-blind from that delousing shit they throw on you. And when they put you in that cell, and those bars slam home... that's when you know it's for real. Old life blown away in the blink of an eye. Nothing left, but all the time in the world to think about it.

— Feel bad about it if you want to, but you didn't pull the trigger.
— No, I didn't. Somebody else did. And I wound up in here. Bad luck, I guess. Yeah. It floats around. It's got to land on somebody. It was my turn, that's all. I was in the path of the tornado. I just didn't expect the storm would last as long as it has.

— I understand you're a man that knows how to get things.
— I'm known to locate certain things from time to time.

The Pacific Ocean? About scare me to death, something that big.

Old life blown away in the blink of an eye. Nothing left, but all the time in the world to think about it.

I wish I could tell you that... but prison is no fairy-tale world.

I've had some long nights in stir. Alone in the dark with nothing but your thoughts.

I could see why some of the boys took him for snobby. He had a quiet way about him. A walk and a talk that just wasn't normal around here. He strolled... like a man in a park, without a care or worry in the world. Like he had on an invisible coat that would shield him from this place.