[1 of 5] Lost Boys by Jewell Parker Rhodes (2018), 1-13, pages 1-45

Author: Jewell Parker Rhodes

Rhodes, Jewell Parker. “1-13.” Ghost Boys, Little, Brown and Company, New York, 2018, pp. 1–45.

Copyright

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

Copyright © 2018 by Jewell Parker Rhodes

Interior illustrations copyright © 2018 by Shutterstock.com

Cover art copyright © 2018 by Shadra Strickland.

Cover design by Marie Lawrence.

Cover copyright © 2018 by Hachette Book Group, Inc.

Hachette Book Group supports the right to free expression and the value of copyright. The purpose of copyright is to encourage writers and artists to produce the creative works that enrich our culture.

The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book without permission is a theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like permission to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), please contact [email protected]. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.

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First Edition: April 2018

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Rhodes, Jewell Parker, author.

Title: Ghost boys / by Jewell Parker Rhodes.

Description: First edition. | New York ; Boston : Little, Brown and Company, 2018. | Summary: “After seventh-grader Jerome is shot by a white police officer, he observes the aftermath of his death and meets the ghosts of other fallen black boys including historical figure Emmett Till”—Provided by publisher.

Identifiers: LCCN 2017019240| ISBN 9780316262286 (hardcover) | ISBN 9780316262255 (ebook) | ISBN 9780316262248 (library edition ebook)

Subjects: | CYAC: Police shootings—Fiction. | Racism—Fiction. | Death—Fiction. | African Americans—Fiction. | Family life—Illinois—Chicago—Fiction. | Till, Emmett, 1941–1955—Fiction. | Chicago (Ill.)—Fiction.

Classification: LCC PZ7.R3476235 Gho 2018 | DDC [Fic]—dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017019240

ISBNs: 978-0-316-26228-6 (hardcover); 978-0-316-26225-5 (ebook)

E3-20180309-JV-PC

Contents

1. Cover
2. Title Page
3. Copyright
4. Dedication
5. Dead
6. Chicago Tribune: OFFICER: “I HAD NO CHOICE!”
7. Alive
8. December 8: Morning
9. Dead
10. Ghost
11. Church
12. Alive
13. December 8: School
14. Dead
15. Preliminary Hearing: Chicago Courthouse: April 18
16. Alive
17. December 8: Gun
18. Dead
19. Sarah
20. Alive
21. December 8: School
22. Dead
23. Preliminary Hearing: Chicago Courthouse: April 18
24. Lost
25. Real
26. Me & Sarah
27. Preliminary Hearing: Chicago Courthouse: April 18
28. Civil Rights
29. Wandering
30. Preliminary Hearing: Chicago Courthouse: April 18
31. Carlos
32. Preliminary Hearing: Chicago Courthouse: April 19
33. Roam
34. Preliminary Hearing: Chicago Courthouse: April 19
35. School & After
36. Tell No Lies
37. Listening
38. School’s Out
39. Carlos
40. Carlos & Grandma
41. Silence
42. Day of the Dead
43. Alive
44. That Day
45. Dead
46. Last Words
47. Afterword
48. Ghost Boys Discussion Questions
49. Further Resources for Parents and Educators

Dedicated to the belief that we can all do better, be better, live better.

We owe our best to each and every child.

How small I look. Laid out flat, my stomach touching ground. My right knee bent and my brand-new Nikes stained with blood.

I stoop and stare at my face, my right cheek flattened on concrete. My eyes are wide open. My mouth, too.

I’m dead.

I thought I was bigger. Tough. But I’m just a bit of nothing.

My arms are outstretched like I was trying to fly like Superman.

I’d barely turned, sprinting. Pow, pow. Two bullets. Legs gave way. I fell flat. Hard.

I hit snowy ground.

Ma’s running. She’s wailing, “My boy. My boy.” A policeman holds her back. Another policeman is standing over me, murmuring, “It’s a kid. It’s a kid.” Ma’s struggling. She gasps like she can’t breathe; she falls to her knees and screams.

I can’t bear the sound.

Sirens wail. Other cops are coming. Did someone call an ambulance?

I’m still dead. Alone on the field. The policeman closest to me is rubbing his head. In his hand, his gun dangles. The other policeman is watching Ma like she’s going to hurt someone. Then, he shouts, “Stay back!”

People are edging closer, snapping pictures, taking video with their phones. “Stay back!” The policeman’s hand covers his holster.

More people come. Some shout. I hear my name. “Jerome. It’s Jerome.” Still, everyone stays back. Some curse; some cry.

Doesn’t seem fair. Nobody ever paid me any attention. I skated by. Kept my head low.

Now I’m famous.

Chicago Tribune
OFFICER: “I HAD NO CHOICE!”

Jerome Rogers, 12, shot at abandoned Green Street lot. Officer says, “He had a gun.”

December 8
Morning

“Come straight home. You hear me, Jerome? Come straight home.”

“I will.” I always do.

Ma leans down, hugs me. Grandma slides another stack of pancakes on my plate. “Promise?”

“Promise.” Same ritual every day.

I stuff a pancake into my mouth. Kim sticks out her tongue.

I’m the good kid. Wish I wasn’t. I’ve got troubles but I don’t get in trouble. Big difference.

I’m pudgy, easily teased. But when I’m a grown-up, everybody’s going to be my friend. I might even be president. Like Obama.

Kim says she believes me. That’s why I put up with her.

She can be annoying. Asking too many questions. Like: “What makes a cloud?” “Why’re their shapes different?” Telling me: “Minecraft is stupid.” Begging me to help pick out a library book.

“Hurry up. Else you’ll be late,” says Grandma. She hands Ma a lunch sack. At school, me and Kim get free lunch.

Everybody works in our house. Ma is a receptionist at Holiday Inn. Her shift starts at eight a.m.

Me and Kim’s job, says Ma, is going to school.

Pop leaves the house at four a.m. He’s a sanitation officer. He drives a truck. In the old days, there was a driver and two men hanging off the truck’s sides, leaping down to lift and dump smelly trash cans. Now steel arms pick up bins. Pop does the whole route by himself. He stays in the air-conditioned cabin, steering, pressing the button for the mechanical arm, and listening to Motown. The Temptations. Smokey Robinson. The Supremes. Sixties pop music. Lame. Hip-hop is better.

Grandma keeps house. She cooks, cleans. Makes it so me and Kim aren’t home alone. Have snacks. Homework help (though I prefer playing video games).

“After school is troublesome,” says Ma.

Pushing back my chair, I kiss her.

“Come straight home,” Ma repeats, tucking in her white uniform shirt.

Grandma hugs, squeezes me like I’m a balloon. She pecks my cheek. “I’m worried about you. Been having bad dreams.”

“Don’t worry.” That’s my other job—comforting Ma and Grandma. Grandma worries the most. She has dreams. “Premonitions,” she calls them. Worries about bad things happening. But I don’t know what, where, when, or why.

“Sometimes I dream lightning strikes. Or earthquakes. Sometimes it’s dark clouds mushrooming in the sky. I wake troubled.”

Remembering her words, I worry. I know Ma will remind her to take her blood pressure pill.

Pop worries, too, but he usually doesn’t say so. Early morning, before he leaves for work, he always stops by my room. (Kim’s, too.)

He opens the door; there’s a shaft of hallway light. I’ve gotten used to it. Eyes closed, I pretend to be asleep. Pop looks and looks, then softly closes the door and goes to work.

“Jerome?” Grandma clasps my shoulder. “Tell me three good things.”

I pause. Grandma is truly upset. Half-moon shadows rim her eyes.

“Three, Jerome. Please.”

Three. Grandma’s special number. “Three means ‘All.’ Optimism. Joy,” Grandma says every day. “Heaven, Earth, Water. Three means you’re close to the angels.”

I lick my lip. “One, school is fun.” Hold up two fingers. “I like it when it snows.” Then, “Three, when I’m grown, I’m going to have a cat.” (A dog, too. But I don’t say that. A dog would be four good things. Can’t ruin the magical three.)

Grandma exhales. I’ve said exactly what she needed to hear. Fine, I’ve told her. I’m fine.

I stuff my books into my bag. I wink, wave bye to Ma.

“Study hard,” she says, both smiling and frowning. She’s happy I comforted Grandma, but unhappy with Grandma’s southern ways.

Ma wants me and Kim to be “ED—YOU—CATED.” She pokes her finger at us when she says “YOU.”

“ED—YOU”—poke—“CATED, Jerome.” Sometimes the poke hurts a bit. But I get it.

Grandma dropped out of elementary school to care for her younger sisters. Ma and Pop finished high school. Me and Kim are supposed to go to college.

Kim is by the front door, backpack slung over her shoulder. Kim’s nice. But I don’t tell her that. She’s bony, all elbows and knees. When she’s a teenager, I’ll be grown. Everybody will worry more about her than me.

Ma always says, “In this neighborhood, getting a child to adulthood is perilous.”

I looked up the word. Perilous. “Risky, dangerous.”

I pull Kim’s braid. Frowning, she swats my hand.

Can’t be good all the time.

Later, I’ll take my allowance and buy Kim a book. Something scary, fun.

We walk to school. Not too fast like we’re running; not too slow like we’re daring someone to stop us. Our walk has got to be just right.

Green Street isn’t peaceful; it isn’t green either. Just brick houses, some lived in, some abandoned. Out-of-work men play cards on the street, drinking beer from cans tucked in paper bags.

Eight blocks to travel between home and school.

On the fifth block from our house is Green Acres. A meth lab exploded there and two houses burnt. Neighbors tried to clear the debris, make a basketball court. It’s pathetic. A hoop without a net. Spray-painted lines. Planks of wood hammered into sad bleachers. At least somebody tried.

Two blocks from school, drug dealers slip powder or pill packets to customers, stuffing cash into their pockets. Pop says, “Not enough jobs, but still, it’s wrong. Drugs kill.” Me and Kim cross the street, away from the dealers. They’re not the worst, though. School bullies are the worst. Bullies never leave you alone. Most days I try to stay near adults. Lunchtime I hide in the locker room, the supply closet, or the bathroom.

Kim slips her hand in mine. She knows.

“I’ll meet you after school,” I say.

“You always do.” She squeezes my palm. “You going to have a good day?”

“Yeah,” I say, trying to smile, searching the sidewalks for Eddie, Snap, and Mike. They like to dump my backpack. Push me, pull my pants down. Hit me upside the head.

Kim clenches her hand, purses her lips. She’s smart for a third grader. She knows surviving the school day isn’t easy for me.

She never tells.

Ma, Pop, and Grandma have enough to worry about. They know Kim’s popular and I’m not. But they don’t need to know I’m being bullied.

“Kimmeee!” a girl shouts.

Kim flashes me a grin. I nod. Then she skips up the school steps, her braids bouncing as she and Keisha chatter-giggle, crossing left into the elementary school. Middle school is to the right.

“Yo, Jerome.”

I look over my shoulder, hugging my backpack closer. Mike’s grinning. Eddie and Snap, fists clenched, thug-posing, stand by his side. Damn. Have to be super careful.

During lunch, I’ll hide in the bathroom. Maybe they’ll forget about me? Find another target?

I can hope.

Just like I hope I’ll win the lottery. A million dollars.

GHOST

The apartment is packed. Ma’s sisters, Uncle Manny, my cousins. Reverend Thornton. The kitchen table is covered with food—my favorites, potato salad, lemon meringue pie, pork chops. If everyone wasn’t so sad-faced, I’d swear it was a party.

I reach for a cornbread square and my hand passes through it. Weird, but it’s okay. I’m not hungry. I guess I’ll never be hungry again.

I move, circling the living room.

People don’t pass through me. It’s like they sense I’m taking up space. Even though they can’t see me, they shift, lean away. I’m glad about that. It’s enough being dead without folks entering and leaving me like in Ghostbusters.

Ma is in my bedroom, lying on my bed with orange basketball sheets. A poster of Stephen Curry shooting a ball is taped on the wall.

Ma’s eyes are swollen. Grandma holds her hand like she’s a little girl.

I don’t feel much—like I’m air touching the furniture or Ma’s hand. Maybe that’s what happens when you’re dead? But seeing Ma crying makes me want to crush, slam something into the ground. Inside me hurts; outside me feels nothing. I try to touch her—nothing—just like the cornbread. Ma shivers and it makes me sad that I can’t comfort her.

I turn toward the doorway. Kim is reading a book. She does that when gunshots are fired outside, when our upstairs neighbors, Mr. and Mrs. Lyon, are fighting, yelling. For now, I know she’s okay. Reading makes her feel better.

I stand in the doorway, shocked how my room is filled with family, how it isn’t my room anymore. Isn’t my place where I imagine, dream I’m playing college ball. Or in the army, diving out of airplanes. Or rapping on the radio. Or being president.

To my right, Pop leans into the corner. Like he wants to collapse into the space and disappear. His eyes are closed and his arms are folded across his chest. Who will he shoot hoops with? Or eat hot dogs with while cheering the Chicago Bears?

“I’m here. I’m still here,” I rasp.

Ma, on my bed, curls on her side; Pop’s lips tighten. Grandma looks up, searching.

“I’m still here, Grandma.”

Her face is a wrinkled mess. I didn’t realize it before, but Grandma is really old. She looks up and through me. Her eyes glimmer; she nods. Does she see? Does she see me?

Reverend Thornton moves past me. He doesn’t realize he’s tucking his stomach in and entering the room sideways. Grandma notices. Nobody else thinks it’s strange.

“We should pray,” he says.

“What for?” asks Pop. “Jerome’s not coming back.”

Ma gasps, sits up. “James. We don’t know God’s will.”

“It’s man’s will—it’s a policeman acting a fool. Murdering my boy.” Pop’s fist slams the wall. The drywall cracks. I’ve never seen Pop violent.

“He’s in a better place,” says Reverend. “Jerome’s in a better place.”

Am I?

Ma rocks, her arms crossed over her stomach.

“Every goodbye ain’t gone,” says Grandma.

“Mom, hush with that nonsense,” complains Ma.

“Every black person in the South knows it’s true. Dead, living, no matter. Both worlds are close. Spirits aren’t gone.”

“Superstition,” scoffs Reverend. “This is Chicago. Jerome’s soul is already gone.”

I kneel. “I’m still here, Ma. I’m still here.”

“We’ll bury him tomorrow,” cries Ma and I want to cry, too, though my eyes don’t make tears anymore.

“Sue, I’m going to sue,” says Pop. “No sense why my boy’s dead and those white men are walking around alive. Free.”

“Emmett. Just like Emmett Till,” says Grandma. “He was a Chicago boy, too.”

“This isn’t 1955,” says Reverend, calming.

“Tamir Rice, then,” shouts Pop. “2014. He died in Cleveland. Another boy shot just because he’s black.”

Grandma looks at the space where I’m standing. Her head is cocked sideways; she’s breathing soft.

“No justice. No peace,” says Pop. “Since slavery, white men been killing blacks.” Then, he starts to cry. Ma hugs him and they hold tight to each other like they’re both going to drown.

My heart shatters. Nothing hurt this much, not even the bullets searing my back.

My alarm clock clicks: 12:00 a.m. Nine hours ago I was playing in Green Acres.

Now it’s a new day. I’m here but not here.

Where’s my body? Where do they keep it until it’s laid in the ground?

“Time to wake up.”

I spin around. Who said that?

I leave the bedroom, wandering through the apartment, past eating, crying, praying people, searching for who spoke to me.

In the kitchen, by the window, I see a brown boy like me. His eyes are black velvet. He’s tall as me; his hair, short like mine. He stares and stares as if the world has made him so sorry, so sad.

Scared, I step backwards. He nods, like he expected it; then, disappears.

He’s not in the kitchen. My hands pass through the glass pane. I see the starry night sky, the darkened road, streetlamps attracting bugs.

Across the street, I see him. Wispy like soft rain. A ghost?

Like me?

CHURCH

It’s awful spending days in the apartment, everybody angry and mourning. Awful not being able to lie on my bed. Or eat. Or speak.

I can’t sleep. No rest for the dead.

I watch my family crying, talking in whispers. Ma seems like she’s sleepwalking—shuffling about the apartment like she’s still looking for me. Pop is always shouting into the phone. Talking to lawyers, newspaper folks. I can’t think of anything worse than watching my family hurt.

At night, the living room fills with shadows. Misshapen, ugly things. I don’t go into my bedroom. Too sad. Ma sleeps there now. Kim, whose bed is the couch, whimpers while she dreams. Afraid to sleep, Grandma stares at the ceiling. Pop, tangled in sheets, sleeps on his back, both arms crossed over his eyes.

No one rests well.

Is there someplace I’m supposed to go? I hope it’s heaven. A good place. But I’m still here—which is nowhere, not able to help anybody.

Grandma hums gospel and wherever I move, she seems to know. She looks at me standing near the television. She turns when I follow Ma into the kitchen. She leans forward, humming louder when I sit on the chair beside Pop.

If she could really see me, I’d be alive and she’d be telling me to “clean my room,” “take out the trash,” “wash my hands.” I miss her ordering me to do chores. Or saying, “Homework. No TV.”

Today, Ma, Pop, Kim, and Grandma dress for church. It’s my funeral. I sit with them in a black Cadillac—it’s the nicest car I’ve ever been in.

“An open casket,” murmurs Ma. “‘I want the whole world to see what they did to my boy.’ Isn’t that what Mrs. Till said? Isn’t it?”

Grandma gets out of the car first, then Kim, Ma, Pop. Then me. Grandma whispers at the air, “Time to get going, boy. Time to move on.”

I’m stunned hearing Grandma speak to me. But I can’t move on. I don’t know how. Or where to move on to. How am I supposed to know how to be dead?

I follow them up the steps. Kim reaches for Pop to pick her up. He does and she buries her face in his neck.

“Señor Rogers. Sir, sir.” It’s Carlos. My new friend. (Old friend now.)

Pop doesn’t hear him—he’s busy comforting Kim—but Grandma does. She waves Carlos to her. Wiping tears, he hands her a piece of paper. Grandma looks at it. She presses the paper to her heart, then hugs Carlos—a big stomach-crushing hug, the kind she used to give me when she was happiest.

The thick church doors open.

Organ music swells. “Amazing Grace,” Grandma’s favorite.

Carlos runs down the steps. He’s still wearing a hoodie. Never mind the cold and snow.

Deacons and church ladies in white dresses swarm about my family, fanning them, guiding them from the vestibule into the church.

I start to follow. Suddenly, my ghost friend is beside me.

“Don’t go in there. You don’t want to see.”

“Who’re you?”

“Someone I wish you didn’t know.”

I stare. His skin is paper-thin, dull. His shoulders are broad; his cheekbones, high. His clothes are funny. Old-timey. He’s wearing a white shirt with a tie. He holds a rimmed hat.

“I’m you.”

Nothing makes sense. I reach out to touch him. Maybe ghosts can touch ghosts?

He disappears.

I sit on the church steps. Stay outside.

Maybe it’s better this way? Not seeing myself in a casket. I try to imagine what Carlos wanted to give Pop. What Grandma saw.

What would, just for a second, make Grandma happy at my funeral?

December 8
School

Mr. Myers is one of only two men who teach in the whole middle school. I know he wasn’t a cool kid. He keeps making it hard for us uncool kids. It’s like he didn’t learn anything growing up.

Right now, he’s introducing a new student. Seriously. Like standing in front of the class is going to make you feel welcome. It’s like giving a kid a sign saying KICK ME. The new kid knows. He looks grim. He wears baggy jeans and a hoodie. His hood’s up. Mr. Myers pulls it down and you can see curly black, shoulder-length hair, almost like a girl’s. I groan.

“Carlos is from San Antonio, Texas,” chimes Mr. Myers. “He’s lucky. He had classes in Spanish and English.

“Eddie, you speak Spanish, don’t you?”

“I speak Dominican. Don’t know Texas Spanish.”

Everyone in the class snickers. Carlos’s face reddens.

Mr. Myers blinks. “It’d be nice if everyone helped Carlos feel welcome here in Chicago.”

Everyone groans. Mr. Myers is making everything worse—making him stand out, be needy, expecting us kids to help when all we want to do is survive.

Hopeful, Mr. Myers scans the room.

Carlos looks like he’s going to cry. He’s not tough enough for this school. I feel sorry for him.

“Hola,” I say, then wince. What’s the matter with me?

Carlos smiles. Mr. Myers acts like he wants to shake my hand. He points for Carlos to sit in a chair next to me.

There’s always empty chairs near me.

I glance back at Eddie. He makes a fist, twisting it in his palm. He’s going to kill me. It won’t be as bad as Carlos’s beating. New students are beat-down magnets.

In Chicago, some kids speak Spanish at home, never at school. On Parent Night, if Eddie has to speak Spanish to his mom, he covers his mouth and whispers. He thinks speaking Spanish in school isn’t cool. He makes faces when his mom tries to talk with his teachers.

I wish I could speak another language. “Hola” is all I know.

Truth is, I have enough trouble speaking the right words in English and not having crews like Eddie, Snap, and Mike picking on me, saying, “Stuck-up.” “Teacher’s pet.” All because I don’t act bored, disrespectful in class, or pushy, loud at recess.

I wish I were done with middle school. I get tired of dreaming about how life’s going to be different when I grow up. Right now, it’s stupid, stupid, stupid.

“Hey. Hey!”

I walk faster, trying to escape Carlos.

“Lunch?”

Carlos tugs my arm. Dead winter, his hoodie isn’t going to protect against the cold. I take pity on him. It’s not his fault his family moved to Chicago.

“This is how you do it,” I say. “Follow me.” I walk quick and Carlos follows me into the cafeteria. “No mushy food. No plates.”

Carlos nods. Then, wary, he looks around for Eddie. I don’t tell him Mike punches the hardest. Snap likes to bite.

“Don’t slow me down,” I warn.

I cut the line; some kids howl; I don’t care. Being patient during lunchtime can get me whipped. I grab a sandwich, apple, and carton of milk. Carlos does the same.

There’s stitching on his T-shirt.

Our school gets all kinds of poor. There’s a little bit poor, more poor, then poorer than poor.

My family’s a little bit poor as long as both my parents work. Carlos’s family might be worse.

I think: Today is a red-hot EMERGENCY. Without Carlos, it’d just be yellow.

“Come on.” I run; Carlos follows, tripping up flights of stairs.

“Here.” The bathroom on the highest floor is nearly always empty. Kids like to walk down, not up.

Usually I take the stall furthest away, next to the window, but I let Carlos have it. “Plant your feet on the seat. No one can see your shoes. Eat.”

Carlos stares at me like I’m crazy.

“It works.”

I go into the next stall, lock the door, and unwrap my sandwich. I listen close. After a minute, I hear Carlos unwrap his sandwich. I wonder if he got tuna fish?

“Thanks.”

“No problem.”

School toilets don’t have covers. We both squat over toilet water eating sandwiches. My apple is in my pocket. Milk balances on the toilet paper roll. Funny, it feels better not doing this by myself. Less lonely.

“Bearden isn’t a bad school,” I say, trying to be helpful.

“In San Antonio, school’s always trouble. Everyone fights. Everyone’s afraid. I hope it’s better here.”

The tuna’s dirt dry. I almost choke. “We fight here, too,” I say, honest. “That’s why we have security guards. Metal detectors.”

I hear Carlos breathing. He knows what I’m saying.

Chicago is probably worse than San Antonio.

“I wasn’t trying to lie, Carlos. Not really. I didn’t want you to feel bad.”

Carlos laughs. “It’s okay. Maybe every school is bad? But, here? Lunch over a toilet? That’s a new one.”

I laugh. What can I say? The bathroom is my favorite hiding place. No one looks for me here. Even if a kid comes in, they don’t bother with the end stalls. I stay quiet until I hear a flush, hand washing, and the door swinging open and shut.

I smack the green stall. Carlos smacks back. Smack… smack. I add syncopated slaps. He does, too. Slap-a-slap-slap. I slap. He slaps. Slap-slap-slap. Smack, goes Carlos. Smack. Smack. Slap. Carlos hums, whistles.

Soon, we’re playing a rhythm on the graffiti-covered stalls like we’re playing bongos. I decide Carlos is cool. He’s smart enough to latch on to me. If I was new, I’d latch on to someone, too.

“Amigo?” he asks, tentatively.

Friend? I’m not sure how to answer.

Middle school is like a country. Alliances are hard, dangerous. Other kids’ fights become your fights. You have to worry about your friends’ friends, their gangs on the streets and in school. Everyone’s in a crew. Except me.

Sure, I get picked on—mostly when Mike, Eddie, and Snap are bored. I’m an easy target. They can bully me but not have to war with any friends. The only advantage of being lonely is not worrying about being anyone else’s backup.

“Friend?” Carlos asks again. “If this were San Antonio, I would’ve said hi to you.” He pauses. “We can look out for each other.”

I shudder. I can’t see his face. But I hear the hope. By fifth grade, I gave up on friends. It’s pathetic. Seventh grade, Carlos is still hoping to be cool. To have a friend.

“I didn’t want to move, but my dad’s a foreman now. For River North Construction. It’s a big deal. Good for my family. More money. My mom’s having a baby.” Carlos quiets.

I can tell he’s a worrier. His voice strains like mine. He probably tries to be good all the time, too.

Carlos blurts, “I didn’t have friends in San Antonio. It isn’t fair to live in two different cities and not have any friends.”

“Yes,” I say, not believing myself. Not believing I’d risk it. “Friends.”

We can’t see each other’s faces, but I know we’re both smiling.

I think Mr. Myers would be proud of me. Grandma, too.

“Sssh.” The bathroom door squeaks, then slams. Whack. Even though I can’t see him, I sense, like me, Carlos freezes.

Rubber soles squeak, boots stomp (Mike!), and then bam, they hit a bathroom stall door. “Empty,” hollers Snap.

Bam. Bam. Bam, bam.

Bam. They hit my stall door. It’s locked. I see Snap’s Air Jordans, Mike’s boots. Eddie bends, trying to see in. I keep still. He can’t see above the toilet’s base.

Bam. The last door flies open. No-no-noooooo. Carlos didn’t lock the stall door.

“Got you,” Eddie crows.

“Stop, stop.” Mike is dragging Carlos. I can see his legs kicking, hear him gripping, grasping, trying to cling on, stay in the stall. “Leave me alone.”

I slide the lock. “Leave him alone!” I holler.

Eddie pushes me and I fall onto the toilet, scrambling to stay dry.

Carlos is crying. I rush out, pulling Mike off him. Mike punches me. Eddie grabs my collar.

“Stop, leave him alone.”

“You’re nothing in Chicago. Say it.” Snap twists Carlos’s arm. “Say it, ‘I’m nothing.’”

Carlos glares.

“You’re a jerk.” Snap twists harder. “A pimple like Jerome.” Mike and Eddie laugh.

Angry, Carlos jerks free. His leg swings back. “Don’t,” I warn. Carlos kicks. Snap howls, grabs his knee. Carlos punches, but his fist barely hits Snap’s shoulder.

Mike punches Carlos. He falls backwards. Then, Mike and Snap are both kicking Carlos. In the stomach. The head.

Carlos is twisting, his arms flailing. Eddie holds me back. I tug hard. “I’m telling,” I scream. I don’t care if I’m a snitch. “I’m going to tell.”

Eddie slams me against the wall.

All three look at me, faces snarled. They’re furious. They didn’t expect me to stand up to them.

I’m shaking. At least Carlos isn’t getting kicked. But they’re going to hurt me. Really hurt me. Scared, I brace myself.

I’m not going to beg.

Eddie laughs. His goofy, creepy laugh. Mike shoves my shoulder. “Don’t tell anybody,” he threatens.

“Yeah,” adds Snap. “You won’t be telling anybody anything.”

“Muerto.”

We all turn. Carlos has a gun.

DMU Timestamp: October 09, 2022 16:20