by J. N. Chaney
“Okay,” I said, stepping away from the desk. I turned to the woman and her three children. There were only a few chairs in the lobby and they were all clustered together. I reluctantly took a seat beside the youngest kid.
The woman sneezed as soon as I got to my seat. I felt the desire to get back up and walk right out the door, but suppressed it. Just gotta wait a bit longer, I told myself. So they got you a new parole officer. So, what? Doesn’t matter. I bet Crowley was shit, anyway. What kind of guy has a bird in his name? Probably just another kid-toucher like the one they fired last year. What was his name? The asshole who roughed up Victor. Shelby, I think? Yeah, that’s right. Officer Donald Shelby. Well, not Officer anymore. Not since he was fired.
I shook my head, trying to quiet my mind. My thoughts were all over the place. It always happened when I got nervous.
The door opened on the other side of the room, causing me to stiffen. A boy entered. He couldn’t be more than a year or two older than me. “It’s about time!” snapped the fat woman beside me.
“Sorry, Mom,” the boy answered.
She got up and took him by the arm. “What took so long in there, hm? Were you giving the officer a hard time? What do I have to do to get you to be a good boy for once in your life, Lawrence?”
Someone else entered from behind Lawrence, not five seconds later. “He’s okay, Mrs. Harrow. I was just going over a few things with him,” said a man in an old officer’s uniform.
“Oh?” asked the woman, looking down at her son. “Well, that’s a relief. I just pray you can whip him into shape for me, Mr. Bishop. I’ve nearly spent the life of me trying to right this delinquent son of mine. Really, I’m about ready to die!”
I rolled my eyes. From what I could see, Lawrence wasn’t doing much of anything at the moment, only standing there, straight as a board. I was surprised I didn’t know him, now that I thought about it. He must have come from a different block. Our building had been separated into six different blocks, each with about fifty kids. I rarely got to talk to anyone outside my group, unless I had laundry duty and happened to meet one of them.
Lawrence’s mother scurried over to her other kids. “Let’s go!” she snapped at them. She picked up the youngest. “I need to get home before they give tonight’s numbers. Hurry up now, you damn kids!”
I looked at Lawrence, who seemed unfazed by all of this. He walked to the exit and held the door for his mother and his little brothers, letting them all out before following.
Once the door closed, the entire office seemed to go completely quiet. I turned to see Officer Bishop gone. “Call the next one in!” he suddenly yelled from his office.
“That’s you,” said the clerk, not bothering to look up from his desk.
I looked around to make sure I was the only one still waiting, then walked up to the door. I thought about knocking, but figured there was no point.
As I stepped inside, I heard a whirring sound, like a tiny motor whining. Officer Bishop was in the corner near the window, fiddling with what appeared to be a coffee maker. “Come on in and have a seat,” he told me.
I did as he asked and sat right in front of his desk. The first thing I noticed was his desk was a total mess, filled with papers and stains, probably from the coffee.
He rushed to his chair a moment later, cup in hand, and sat down in raggedy, half-torn chair. “Name’s Officer Bishop,” he said to me, offering me a hand. He let it hang there until I took it, then smiled as we shook. “Barry says you’re fresh out today. That right, Mr…” He paused, looking at the pad on his desk. “Hughes, is it? Jace Hughes?”
I nodded.
“Good for you for showing up, kid. Half the boys just run off on their own, but not you. You’re sticking to it.”
“Yes, sir,” I said.
“Hey, come on. Drop the ‘sirs’ around here. We’re not Juvie. You can talk to me however you want. Just don’t disrespect me. I’m still an officer of the law. Well, sort of. You follow that?”
I nodded.
“Good. Now, first thing’s first. We need to get you situated in the city. Did you check in with your house yet?”
“A few hours ago,” I said. “Mrs. Higgins set me up with a room.”
“Old Mrs. Tam! She’s a feisty one, but don’t pay her any mind. She yells because she cares.” He took a sip of his coffee. “Anyway, you’d be best to stick to the schedule I give you. Come down here once a week, every Thursday, and we’ll see about getting you a job. It’s too late for school this semester, since it started a month ago, but you’ll get in on the next round. Maybe.”
“Maybe?” I asked.
He shrugged. “They say they’re full up, so it really just depends on how many drop out or graduate. You Juvie kids take the lowest priority, since you’re delinquents and all.” He chuckled. “Don’t feel bad, though. All you need to do is pass the test every year to qualify for a diploma. That’s not so hard. Mrs. Tam has a system worked out where the boys tutor each other.”
“How’s that work?” I asked.
“Well, there’s six tests to take, one for each grade. Let’s say you’re about to take test 1, but someone else already passed it. That person would tutor you to make sure you passed, then once you made it, you’d do the same for the kids behind you. While you’re doing that, you’re also learning from the older boys for the next test. It’s all one big system of give and take, you see?”
I slowly nodded.
“But don’t worry too much about all that yet. First thing’s first. We need to get you set up with your job. Now, what kind of work would suit a guy like you, huh?” He leaned forward, eying me very seriously. “Maybe a sweeper? No, not that. Can’t really picture you with a broom in some factory. How about the assembly line? You any good with your fingers?”
I shrugged.
“Hm. Maybe not, then,” he said, taking a pad and flipping through a few screens before setting it down. “Eh, we’ll find something. Don’t you worry, Hughes. There’s always a job if you’re hungry enough. You follow what I’m saying?”
“Yeah,” I said.
He continued looking over the pad, checking my portfolio. After a few minutes of silent reading, he finally let out of laugh, taking me by surprise. “Hot damn, did they really pull you in for stealing from a priest?” he asked, whistling at the thought. “What made you go and do a thing like that?”
“He wouldn’t share his food,” I muttered. “And he was an asshole.”
Bishop laughed again. “Says here they found you drunk on his booze.” He raised his eye. “Hold on. This priest had brandy in his house?”
“A case of it,” I said.
Bishop scoffed. “How’d you even get inside?”
“I knew if I went in through the front door, I’d get caught, so I climbed the neighbor’s side ladder and went in through the overhead window,” I explained, a little proud of myself.
“Too bad he had a silent alarm set up,” said Bishop, shaking his head. “Still, that’s pretty resourceful. Not bad, kid.”
I wasn’t sure how I felt about being complimented for my thieving skills by a cop, but I smiled all the same. “Thanks.”
“It also says here that they found a stockpile of food in your bunk. A lot of it, actually.”
I didn’t say anything.
He continued to stare at the pad. “Over thirty containers! Man, what were you doing? Stockpiling it in case of emergency?” he asked. “Hey, kid, don’t worry. None of this matters anymore. So you stole some food? It’s fine now. All that shit goes away once you walk out. Well, unless you killed someone.” He raised his eye. “You didn’t kill anyone did you?”
I shook my head.
“Right, I didn’t think so. You don’t got that ‘I’ll-shank-you-in-the-back’ look to you, and believe me, I know the type. So, what’s the story, Jace? You gonna tell me?”
I decided telling him the truth didn’t matter. My file already said I did it, which meant I was already guilty, s
o nothing else could really happen to me at this point. I’d already done my punishment and served my time. “People get hungry at night. You give them food, they leave you alone,” I explained. “Sometimes, you can even get something you need if you know who to talk to, like protection.”
“Protection, eh?” he asked. “Well, the report says you did it. Ain’t no question there. But I’m more interested in what it doesn’t say, like how you did it.”
“How?” I repeated.
He turned the pad around on the desk so I could see the screen. It had my entire identity laid out—at least, the parts that mattered to the State. They were highlights, mostly. My weight, height, hair and eye color. All my infractions. It even had a list of personality behaviors from that time they made me take a psych evaluation. Fear of commitment, overly critical of himself, unrealistic goals, difficulty forming friendships, history of abuse. Beneath that, all of the things I’d stolen, listed by date and time discovered. The list continued to the next page.
“You stole that brandy from the priest, but you got caught,” said Bishop. “But after that, you only got caught after you did the deed. Seems you learned a thing or two sometime between the two.”
“I just paid more attention,” I said.
“Sure, I bet you did,” said Bishop. “Tell me how.”
“I knew someone who helped out in the store. A week after they brought me in, I decided to make friends with him. He told me about the blind spot in the back and the loose tile. You see, there’s a laundry closet on the other side of the wall, so I volunteered to be on the laundry crew. That gave me access to the closet, and then I just had to use a spoon I got from my friend in the kitchen to dig through the wall.” I smiled, surprising myself as I continued listing off my accomplishments. It was the first time I’d ever spoken about all of it out loud before. Not even the other boys knew how I did it. “There was water damage in the wall, which is why the tile was broken, so I’d wait until no one was in the store and I’d move the tile off the wall and take whatever was sitting on the rack on the other side.”
“No one noticed the missing food?” asked Bishop.
“I only took one pack at a time. The only reason they caught me was because someone ratted me out.”
“Why’d they do that?” he asked.
I clenched my jaw, still angry about it. “I wouldn’t give him two meals when the deal was for one.”
“Sounds like he tried to screw you,” said Bishop, shaking his head. “That’s a shame. You had a solid system going, except for distribution.”
“Distribution?” I asked.
“If you’re stealing the goods, you can’t be the one selling them. That job needs to go to someone else. Someone who doesn’t know how you do what you do, but you still trust them to keep their mouth shut.”
I considered that for a moment, staring at the desk.
“Hey, don’t sweat it. You didn’t know any better, and you were doing pretty good for a kid in Juvie. More than most I’ve seen. It’s not every day I get a real talent that comes through my door, like that other boy you saw on your way in.”
“You mean Lawrence?” I asked.
“That’s the one,” he said. “Kid’s got an eye for spotting vulnerabilities, let me tell you. If you drop him in front of a guarded building, chances are he can find a way inside.”
“Whoa,” I muttered.
“You know, Jace, all these jobs I’ve been showing you,” continued Bishop. “They don’t really do a kid like you justice. Not with those kinds of talents.”
“What kinds?” I asked.
“The slippery fingers kind,” he said. “That’s a real shame, too, since I can tell you’re a smart one and you know how to get things done. Yeah, a real, real shame.”
He took another drink and gulped, then set the cup down, spilling a little coffee on his thumb, which he wiped on his sleeve. “Hey, here’s an idea,” he said, tapping his desk. “Why don’t you come by tomorrow afternoon. We close at five, but I want you to show up at 5:30. There’s some other kids I want you to meet. Good guys, this lot. You’ll like them.”
“What for?” I asked. “Do they work at the factory?”
“Nah, nothing like that,” he said. “These boys are freelancers. They do what needs to get done. That sort of thing.”
“Does that pay?”
“Hell yeah, it does,” he said. “I’d offer you a job with them, but they need to meet you first. What do you say? Lawrence will be there, so you already saw him, and I’ll be there, too, so you know it’s legitimate. Sounds better than some dumb factory job, right?”
“What do I have to do?” I asked. “What kind of work is it?”
“All kinds of stuff,” he said. “But I can’t talk about it here. They do jobs for clients, so it’s all confidential. You know what that means?”
I nodded. “I think so.”
“Good. I knew you’d get it. Just keep all this between us, alright? If the other kids hear about this, they’ll all want in, and there’s only one spot open right now.”
“I won’t say anything. I swear, Officer Bishop.”
He got to his feet and extended his arm for the second time today. We shook, and he smiled. “Good to hear, kid. I’ll see you with the rest of the crew tomorrow. Don’t be late.”
* * *
I showed up at the office right as the sun was going down, filling the city street with a red glow. The parking lot was empty, suggesting I was the only one here. Was I too late? Did Officer Bishop already leave with the other boys?
The lights inside were off, but I knocked and tried to open the door. It was locked, which didn’t surprise me, given how empty it looked. I was about to turn around and go home when I heard footsteps from the side of the building.
I turned to see Lawrence hugging the corner of the wall, inside the alleyway. He motioned with his chin for me to follow, so I did, neither of us saying a word. They must be in the back, I thought as I rounded the corner, heading into the shadow of the building. Probably can’t use the office after hours.
The rear was larger than I expected, full of concrete and two picnic benches. It even had a soda machine.
The boys were gathered around one of them, while Officer Bishop paced along the far wall, talking on his phone near an old soda machine. Lawrence didn’t say anything as we joined the group, taking our seats.
All three of the other boys stared at me as I sat down. “New kid, eh?” asked one of them. A scrawny, mousy looking guy with a scar etched into his forehead. “What block you from?”
“C-2,” I muttered. “You?”
He eyed me for a moment. “E-5,” he eventually answered. “We had a guy from C-3 with us before. He moved.”
Another kid looked at him. “Trent died, Matty. Why you always gotta say he moved?”
Matty shrugged, then got up and went to the soda machine.
Lawrence sighed. “Don’t pay any mind to Matty. He was friends with Trent. They lived in the same house.”
“What happened to him?” I asked. “To Trent, I mean.”
The second boy looked at Lawrence, like he was waiting to see what he’d say. Lawrence hesitated. “He fell.”
“What’s your name, kid?” asked the second boy, changing what seemed like an uncomfortable subject.
“Jace,” I answered.
“I’m Prisby,” he told me. “Prisby Dayton. I was in the same block as Lawrence here. We go way back. You got any friends from your block out here?”
I shook my head. “I knew a few, but they’re not in my house. I think they ran away.”
They both gave me a knowing nod,. “Happens a lot,” said Prisby.
“Don’t it?” asked Matty, sitting back down with a bottle in his hand. He twisted the cap and a little fizz bubbled to the top.
Prisby ignored him. “Almost did it myself. I came all the way here, stood right outside the front door and thought about just leaving.”
“Me too,” said Lawrence.
Hearing that surprised me. I’d almost done the exact same thing yesterday. Did all ex-Juvies feel an urge to run as soon as they got out? “I almost did it, too,” I admitted.
Prisby laughed. “No surprise there! Most kids do it. Only the stupid ones, though. Well, except Matty here. He’s pretty dumb.”
“Eh, shut your hole, Prissy Prisby!” Matty shoved his friend.
“Hey, don’t call me that!” he growled.
“That’s enough, boys,” said Officer Bishop, who had apparently finished his phone call. He walked to the side of the table, sitting so that his feet were on the bench. “You should try to make a good first impression on Jace here. You don’t want him thinking you’re nothing but a bunch of hooligans.”
Prisby and Matty scoffed at one another, but then laughed. “We’re just messing around, Jesson. Ain’t no harm done.”
Bishop nodded. “Jace, did these three introduce themselves yet? You guys get acquainted?”
“Sure,” I said.
“Yeah, we’re fast friends,” joked Matty. “Real fast. He’s already saying I can have his share.”
“My share?” I asked.
“Of the pay,” said Lawrence. “Your cut of the money.”
“Oh,” I said, still trying to piece this whole thing together. “Do we get paid together and then split the earnings? Is that how it goes?”
The three boys snickered at my ignorance. Something felt odd about this. What kind of job was this, exactly? And why couldn’t Officer Bishop tell me upfront about the details? This whole thing smelled strange to me.
Bishop leaned in, prompting the three kids to do the same. “Let me ask you something, Jace,” said the probations officer. “What do you think is your greatest talent?”
“My greatest talent?” I asked, repeating the question. It was more to give myself time than anything, since I wasn’t sure what to think of it.
“Sure. Your greatest talent,” he said again. “What do you think it is? Have you ever really thought about it?”
