by Angel Lawson
Despite the coming storm, every cell in my body warms in a flood of relief. “Would you?” I watch as he punches in my number, giving me a grateful smile of his own before walking to the door.
I try to draw it out further, but it’s no use. Before I know it, Reyn’s dad is closing the door behind him and my parents are turning to me, waiting.
I’ve been running from this for a long time—too long. Even just yesterday, I would have done anything to avoid this. I can blame Emory and my parents all I want for being so isolated the last three years, but it wouldn’t be entirely honest. It’s been the secrets—the addiction—that truly pushed me into that dark, lonely place.
I lift my head when I look at them, refusing to go back there. “Let’s talk.”
Coming clean for Reyn’s sake was an easy decision to make.
Now, it’s time to come clean for my own.
38
Reyn
I don’t bother trying to sleep.
The holding cell is over-warm, bright, and too quiet, even with the two other guys in here with me. There aren’t bunks anyway, just two long, low benches. Against the wall opposite me is a sink and a urinal. There’s a drain in the middle of the grungy floor and the whole place smells like old piss and armpit funk. One of the guys is older, maybe mid-thirties, and I’ve been calling him Big Ben in my head. The other guy looks around my age, surly and quiet. He’s absolutely covered in paint.
There are two payphones on the wall, but I’ve already called my dad. No point calling anyone else, even if I did have their numbers memorized. Which, I don’t.
Instead of sleeping, I try to make myself still. This used to be something I was good at—passing long lengths of useless time being still as a statue, avoiding any trouble. Now I keep getting there, into that frozen headspace, and then finding some part of me slowly fidgeting out of it.
I look down at my bouncing knee, forcefully stilling it for the hundredth time.
Big Ben keeps walking to the reinforced glass that neighbors the heavy door and banging on it, angrily pounding his fist. No bars here, just cinder block walls, glass, and that steel door. The sound breaks my concentration, penetrating my brain fog and making my knee bounce in agitation.
“Do you mind?” Paint Guy sneers. He’s laying along one of the benches, arm thrown over his eyes.
Big Ben keeps banging. He was already here when I arrived, but Paint Guy was brought in five hours ago, twitchy and radiating energy. Drugs, for sure. Whatever he was on has clearly worn off.
“I’ve been here sixteen hours!” Bang bang bang. “This is unconstitutional!” Bang bang bang.
Paint Guy and I ignore this. We get regular updates like these from Big Ben. That’s why I call him Big Ben—because he informs us of every hour that passes. Like clockwork.
I finally snap, “They have twenty-four hours to arraign you!”
This doesn’t slow him down. “Hey! You can’t hold me without a charge!”
Paint Guy’s arm falls away from his face and he gives me a look. It’s full of exasperation and annoyance. “You want to shank him, or should I?”
I jerk my chin toward the camera in the corner. “You shouldn’t joke. Anything can and will be used you.”
I know how I look. I’m still wearing this grungy, blood-stained suit. My face has graduated from swollen bruising to deep, dark, tender patches. My lip is throbbing. I try again to get into my stillness, closing my eyes and thinking of the way Vandy looked before I left. Laying there in the bed, all nestled in beneath her covers. Eyes bright and soft. Safe. Warm.
My come probably dripping down her thighs.
My knee starts bouncing again.
I better keep that memory close, because the chances of me seeing Vandy again are pretty much nil. Even if my dad bails me out, Mr. and Mrs. Hall think I broke into their house and did God knows what. I’m sure Emory knows by now. My probation officer knows, so the school probably knows. Expulsion is a given. Mountain Point would be too, but I’ll be a bit busy, what with the being in prison and all.
They take Big Ben at four in the morning, right after the shift change. No one is as happy as me and Paint Guy, who are finally left in silence. Paint Guy sleeps and I go over it again and again—just how fucked I am.
Mom’s going to give up on me. That much, I know. I was already skirting the fringe of her scant tolerance. Coach, the team. They’ll be disappointed. The Devils will be one man short. I wonder who they’ll recruit to fill my place. Someone better at academics and worse at breaking and entering, no doubt.
When the door opens again, I figure they’re taking Paint Guy. Instead, the officer says, “McAllister, your lawyer’s here.”
“I don’t have a lawyer.” I’d specifically asked my dad to not call Steven. The guy doesn’t give a fuck about me and we can’t afford him anyway.
The officer looks at me impassively. “Well, you do now. Let’s go.”
Reluctantly, I stand, following him out the holding cell and down a brightly-lit corridor, past the booking desk, past the medical office where I’d been seen after being brought in. He leads me into a cold room with a Formica table in the center.
There are no chairs.
I stand behind the table and wait.
The woman who walks in is completely unfamiliar to me, but she’s dressed smartly, hair pulled back into a long braid. There’s a stack of folders shoved under one arm and a plastic shopping bag clutched in her hand.
“Reynolds,” she greets me, holding out a hand. “Nice to meet you, my name is Becca.” I reluctantly take her hand. She looks around, noting the lack of chairs, and just shrugs, setting the folders and bag on the table. “I believe you know my daughter, Gwen?”
I watch her, feeling absolutely lost. “I don’t think so.”
She looks surprised. “Oh, well maybe my twins. You go to school with them. Michaela and Micha Adams?”
The name rings a bell and I’m reminded of the little flippy kid on the cheerleading squad. I haltingly offer, “I think I’ve seen Micha around.”
“He’s hard to miss, my boy.” She opens a folder, beginning, “So your hearing is scheduled at seven. Your dad sent these clothes,” she nods to the bag. “Nothing fancy. Don’t want to ham it up too much, but you can at least look clean.” She shuffles through the papers. “I have the arresting officer’s statement, the security guard, the Halls’. All I need you to do is stand there and look as innocent as possible. Think you can handle that, Reynolds?”
I stare blankly at her in response. I don’t look innocent. I look like I just got into a massive parking-lot fistfight.
She seems to sense the vibe I’m putting out. “Well, do your best and let me do all the talking. If things don’t work out the way we planned, then you’ll need to enter a plea. Not guilty, naturally. That’s the only point in which you’ll be expected to speak. It’s very important that you remain quiet.”
She goes on about where to stand and where to look. There’ll be a camera—the magistrate won’t be physically present—and I’ll have to sign some papers.
“Any questions?” she asks.
This isn’t my first hearing. The only thing I really need to know is whether or not Vandy is okay. But asking that would invite its own series of questions, and I’m not going to answer them. “No,” I reply.
Things go fast after that. The lawyer leaves so I can change into the pair of jeans, shirt, and hooded sweater my dad sent. Shedding the grungy suit is like peeling away a layer of skin. I shove it all into the bag and it just sits there, all crumpled up, looking like crime scene evidence. If I manage to actually get out of here, I might just burn the fucking thing.
The room the hearing is in is cold and eerily quiet. Every breath, every shuffle of paper, every pen click is amplified harshly. I don’t know where my dad found this lady, but she sends me the occasional glance, a warm smile softening the concern in her eyes.
I want to tell her not to worry. I know what’s going to h
appen here. I know so acutely that I pretty much space out when the magistrate appears on the screen and the lawyer starts talking. Possession with intent. I brace for the breaking and entering charge, but it never comes. Doesn’t matter. Breaking and entering is a misdemeanor. Possession with intent is going to bulldoze right over any hopes I might have had for a normal life here.
I don’t really tune in until I hear her say, “…the statement from the minor and her parents regarding the ownership of this medication and the special circumstances regarding his possession of it, we’ve requested a dismissal from the state, which the district attorney has generously suggested, and with prejudice...”
“Wait,” I say, head snapping up. “No, it wasn’t—”
The lawyer instantly covers the microphone, eyes shooting daggers at me. “You need to be silent, Reynolds!” She looks beyond pissed as she whispers, “Silent!”
My heart hammers in my chest and I know.
I know Vandy’s trying to take the fall.
Before I can think of a plan to save it—to save her, her future—the magistrate is dismissing the case. The screen goes blue and I stare at it in numb, stupefied horror.
The lawyer touches my arm. “There’s going to be some paperwork, it might take a few.”
I look at her hand, throat constricting. “What’s going to happen to Vandy?”
She gives me a strange look. “You don’t need to worry about her. You need to worry about yourself. You just dodged a serious bullet, young man.”
But I hadn’t. Vandy had taken it for me.
I’m so exhausted by the time they dump my bag of personal effects in my arms that I can’t even muster any excitement about leaving. The door opens with a harsh buzz and I shuffle through to the sally port. My dad’s waiting there for me, hands stuffed in his pockets, propped against the windowed counter. He looks a lot less pissed than he sounded on the phone yesterday. A lot less confused, too.
“Got everything?” he asks, like I’m being picked up from camp instead of lockup.
I hold out the bag containing my wallet and car keys. My picking kit is toast, probably gathering dust somewhere in a seizure locker. “Yeah.”
He claps a hand on my shoulder. “You look like shit, son.”
I grimly assure him, “The outside matches the inside.”
He gives me a small shake. “Let’s not keep her waiting, huh?”
I figure he’s talking about the lawyer, who’d sat with me over the paperwork. God only knows what her billable rate is. I don’t know how my dad isn’t foaming at the mouth about it, but he’s not. If anything, he looks… settled.
But when we exit the sally port, crossing into a long corridor and entering the lobby of the main entrance, the lawyer isn’t there.
Vandy is.
She’s right by the door we enter through, eyes fixed to a plaque on the wall. Her blond hair is pulled up into a ponytail, sweater wrapped tight around her, and she looks almost as tired as I feel.
When she hears the door open, she whips around. Her eyes go alight when they land on me, and I’m not expecting it. I’m not expecting her to be here. I’m not expecting the way she looks at me, so full of fear and something soft and assured. She jumps to throw her arms around me, and I’m so stunned that I drop the bags to catch her, instinctively folding her into me.
“Oh my god,” she gasps, clutching my neck. Her cheek is smashed against my jaw, but she turns her face to press a quick kiss to it. “I’m so sorry! Are you okay?” She pulls back to take my face in her hands. “They kept telling us to wait and wait, and the guy who took our statement wouldn’t tell us anything, and Gwen’s mom—”
I cup the back of her head and haul her back into me, squeezing tight. Her hair smells clean and flowery and I bury my nose into it, breathing her in. “You shouldn’t have done that,” I whisper, voice hoarse. “You’re going to have a record now.”
I can’t stand the thought of her going through what I’ve had to. Everyone always watching you, waiting for you to fuck up. Watching other kids get away with shit that would send you packing. Knowing that the smallest infraction could topple your house of cards. Vandy doesn’t need it. She has enough to worry about.
She makes a confused sound into my neck. “What? I’m not going to have a record.”
Puzzled, I say, “But… you told them.”
“I did,” she confirms, squeezing me back. “I told them everything. I told them they were mine and why you took them, and I’m—I’m not in trouble, Reyn. At least,” She pulls away, giving me a look, “not the legal kind.”
It’s only now that I notice the other people in the room. Mr. and Mrs. Hall are rising from a pair of lobby chairs, watching us. I step back like I’ve been burned, banging my elbow on the door behind me in the process.
Vandy rolls her eyes, bending down to collect my bags. “Relax, they know.”
There is absolutely nothing relaxing about that statement, so it achieves the exact opposite.
Before I can properly indulge in the imminent freak out—her mom does not look pleased—Emory barges through the door of the station. He’s got a pair of shades perched on his nose and a tray of coffees in his hands. His jaw is a whole rainbow of blues and purples.
“Oh, they set you free,” he says, handing the coffees to his parents. “About time. We’ve been waiting here since the crack of Vandy’s phone alarm.” He whips off his shades and I suck in a hiss. His eye is seriously fucked up.
Wincing, I say, “Sorry.” I think he probably knows I’m apologizing more for the eye than the wait.
“All’s well that end well, or however that goes.” He punctuates this by pulling me into a one-armed hug that takes me by surprise. He mutters a quiet, “Thanks,” slaps me hard on the back, then flattens a sweaty palm to my face and shoves me away. “Idiot.”
I bat him away, dragging a hand down my cheek. “What’s everyone doing here?”
Vandy’s mom opens her mouth to speak, but Emory beats her to it.
“Oh, this one here,” he jabs a thumb in Vandy’s direction, “could not be contained. Mom wouldn’t let her come unless they came,” he jabs a thumb in their direction now, “and I’m here because this is all hilarious. Also because it gets me out of school.”
Vandy mutters, “Shut up, Em,” and laces her fingers in mine. “Maybe we can all get some breakfast. I know Reyn has to be hungry, and we didn’t eat before—”
“Before you dragged us all out the door,” their dad finishes dryly.
Their mom sees our clasped hands and looks like she wants to flay me with her eyes.
“That sounds like a nice idea, Vandy.” My dad looks at Mr. Hall and says a touch too cheerfully, “Wouldn’t that be nice, Rob?”
Rob says just as cheerfully, “Very nice,” but he’s looking at his wife in much the same way someone might approach a wild animal. It doesn’t exactly take a genius to get the vibe going on here. Everyone is either cool or, at the very least, down with faking it.
Except Denise Hall.
“So.” When I get into the car with my dad, he shoots me a long look. “Vandy, huh?”
I groan, thumping my head against the window. “Yes, okay? It was Vandy.” It was always Vandy.
He just shakes his head, pulling away from the station. “You don’t make things easy for yourself, do you?”
“No,” I agree. “I really don’t.”
We all meet at The Nerd.
To say shit is weird is an understatement of epic proportions.
I’m in a booth, wedged between Vandy and my dad. The rest of the Halls are sitting across from us. I’m so tired that the idea of this being some strange lucid dream isn’t even entirely out of the question.
I get a cup of coffee and sip it gratefully, because I might be tense enough to feel muscle aches at the strain of sitting so straight, but I’ve also been in jail for twenty-two hours.
Rob is scanning the menu when the waitress walks up. “I think I’ll have the trad
itional breakfast platter.”
Em flings the menu aside, agreeing, “Same.”
My dad says, “I’ll have the pancake platter.”
Vandy smiles tightly at the waitress. “I’m not having anything.”
Her mom makes a sharp sound of disapproval. “Vandy, I haven’t seen you eat anything in days.”
Vandy’s jaw goes rigid. “Mom. Leave it. I’m not hungry.”
“You need to eat something.”
“And you need to get off my back!”
The waitress shifts uncomfortably.
I bump my shoulder against hers, leaning in close. Quietly, I say, “Get something, and whatever you don’t eat, I will.”
Vandy’s lips are all puckered angrily, but she squishes them to the side, abruptly pensive. “Maybe… maybe just the ham platter.”
When I shift my gaze to her mom, she’s watching me with an astonished expression. I send her a brittle smile, because she is so clueless. Anyone who knows Vandy at all understands that she hates wasting food. I should know, being the recipient of their household’s leftovers for quite some time now.
When the waitress eventually leaves, we fall into a tense silence. It’s missed by Emory, who’s focused on his phone, thumbs flying over the screen. Vandy’s got her thigh pressed to mine and she kicks her leg back, hooking our ankles together.
“No,” her mom suddenly says. She shakes her head. “I’m sorry, but no. You’re not ready for a boyfriend, Vandy.”
I carefully put down my coffee.
Vandy doesn’t look up from the menu she’s still reading. “I wasn’t asking, was I?”
“Vandy, tone,” her dad warns, but it’s halfhearted. He looks like maybe this is more the middle of a discussion than the beginning of one.
I share an awkward look with my dad, who seems like he’s just trying to stay out of it.
Her mom continues, “Reynolds, this has nothing to do with you. We understand and appreciate that you were just helping her. But Vandy isn’t ready to be with a boy, especially not one with your…” She chews on an aborted word before settling for, “Special background.”