Maybe you’ve seen one of those cop shows where they fit a guy up with a wire under his shirt. You don’t need those anymore. Not if you have a cell phone. You dial a number, you put the phone back in your pocket, you act like nothing is going on. Whoever is listening can hear everything.
Before I go to the Locals’ house the next day, I dial Officer Friendly’s number again. I make sure he can hear me talking. I put the phone back in my pocket. I act like nothing is going on.
I told him that if they came to that house, they would find a lot of drugs and a lot of guns. Those are two things the police find very interesting. So this morning a bunch of his cop friends are waiting around the corner. They’re going to stage a bust. A bust I helped set up.
Criminal justice.
My code word is wonderful. When the cops hear that, they’re supposed to come charging in.
I go into the house. I get handed my bag for the day.
“Wonderful,” I say.
The lieutenant who hands me the bag is named Dawg. He gives me a funny look. But he doesn’t say anything else.
Why haven’t they kicked the door in yet?
“Boss wanna see you before you go out,” he says.
“Wonderful,” I say.
So I get taken once again to the backyard.
No cops yet. Where are they? Is my phone broken? Is the battery dead?
Boss is still sitting in one of those lawn chairs. He looks like he’s been awake for three days straight. He’s jumpy. His eyes are glazed over. There’s a big gun on the table in front of him. A .45-caliber pistol.
“How you like your job?” he says.
“Wonderful,” I say.
I can hear engines revving outside. Cars are pulling up outside the house.
“Yeah, well, you gonna have to produce, or else—” He picks up the gun and waves it at me. I think he’s going to shoot me right there.
But then there is shouting. I hear a door being knocked in.
And then gunshots.
I don’t wait around. The yard is surrounded by a cinder-block wall about six feet high.
“Rasheed!”
I turn. Why? I don’t know. I’m not as smart as I think I am, I guess.
Boss is pointing his gun at me.
“You do this?” he asks.
“Hell yes, fool,” I say.
“What about your daddy?” he asks.
“What about my sister?” I ask him.
I’m halfway up and over the wall when I hear the shot. Then there are more shots. I feel something hit me.
Then I feel nothing.
For a long time I don’t know where I am.
I open my eyes. I can’t see anything but light. It’s so bright. It should hurt, but it doesn’t.
It doesn’t hurt because I don’t have eyes anymore. I don’t have a body. I’m in some weird place. It’s not a place on earth. It’s a place that doesn’t exist.
“Rasheed,” says a voice.
It’s a voice I haven’t heard in a long time.
My pops.
I see his face over me, big and warm. I haven’t seen him in a long time, but I would know him anywhere.
He starts talking to me. I can’t remember everything he says. I know he says he’s sorry. He made some bad choices. Some stupid decisions. But he didn’t know what else to do with his life. He did the best he could. He sees now that his best wasn’t very good. He wants my forgiveness.
And I give it to him.
He tells me that everything is a choice, even the life you’re born into. He chose that life because he had things to learn. And because he had things to teach. But his life is over now. It’s my turn.
That’s how I know for sure my daddy is dead. Because I visited him in the afterlife while I was dead myself.
My time is not up yet, he says. I can go back if I want. And I can make my own choices. I don’t have to do what other people want for me. What other people have laid out. I can make myself into whatever I want. And he will be watching.
“Do you want to go back?” he asks me.
“Yes,” I say.
I can see that I have a lot left to do.
THIRTEEN
If there’s one thing I love, it’s french fries.
This hospital has great french fries. The rest of their food is terrible. But there’s a food court in the lobby, and there’s a little place there that sells better food. Real food. Best fries I’ve had since Officer Friendly took me out to lunch.
That seems like a thousand years ago. Another life. Was it really just a few weeks ago?
When Boss shot me, he almost killed me. That’s what he was trying to do.
But it was also the last thing he ever did. Cops came in and took him out right after he pulled the trigger on me. He tried to shoot them too. You can’t do that and expect to live very long.
Then they saved my life. They gave me CPR and kept me alive until the ambulance got there.
So I guess the cops are all right after all.
I don’t remember any of that. That’s when I thought I was in Heaven, talking to my daddy. I still don’t know if that was real or a dream. Felt real enough. When I woke up, I felt like he had just been in the room.
The doctors say I am lucky to be alive. The bullet went in through my back and came out through my chest. It took out a lung. They were able to repair that. It missed my spine, which was also pretty lucky. I’m not paralyzed. Not like Neeks. But I came close.
Those Locals were trying to kill all of us, I guess. My whole family.
The cops busted them up pretty good. I guess there was a lot of shooting. Some Locals are dead. Lots more are in jail. It was a bad day for the Locals. A good day for my neighborhood.
And all because of me.
Now I’m sitting here in my wheelchair, with the sun beaming down on me. The doctor said I could go sit outside. I haven’t felt fresh air in weeks. I feel like I’m king of the world. I’ve got a plate full of french fries. And across from me sits Lanaia. What else could I want in life?
“You better eat every one of those fries,” she says. “You gotta keep your strength up to get better.”
It’s the first real food I’ve eaten since I woke up. I’ve had two surgeries. Man, it takes a long time to get better when you get shot. It’s not like in the movies. You don’t just tough it out and keep going. It changes your whole life.
Lanaia and I have been talking. Well, mostly she’s been talking. I still don’t have a lot of extra energy. But she has plans for me.
I need to get my GED. That’s first.
Then I take the SATs and apply to the university. I will have to get money from somewhere, but she says she can help me with that. Turns out there are a lot of ways to find money for school. Scholarships and grants, mostly. I didn’t know about any of them. Well, I know now. There are lots of people who will help me if I show them I am willing to try.
Then I start taking classes. Criminal justice. That’s what I want to do. I want to help make the world a better place.
The first way I can do that is by changing myself.
The second way is by helping other people.
And the third way is this. If I can’t help them, and if they won’t change themselves, then they get locked up. Boom. Normal people have a right to a normal life.
There are things about my life that are still not perfect. My mom is still sick. Daneeka will always be paralyzed. I’ve got a long way to go before I get back on my feet.
But right now I’m alive. I’m sitting in the sunshine, talking to a girl I like and eating french fries. What better way is there to spend an afternoon?
And when it comes down to it, what else do we really have in life except for this moment right now?
WILLIAM KOWALSKI is the author of the international bestseller Eddie’s Bastard, winner of South Africa’s Ama-Boeke Prize, and, more recently, The Hundred Hearts. His work has been translated into fifteen languages. Four of the titles William wrot
e for the Rapid Reads series have been nominated for the Ontario Library Association’s Golden Oak Award. He lives with his family in Nova Scotia. For more information, visit www.williamkowalski.com.
978-1-4598-0327-5 pb, 978-1-4598-0328-2 pdf 978-1-4598-0329-9 epub
Mother Anqelique runs a shelter for homeless mothers and their children in the inner city. When newly orphaned Jamal arrives at the shelter, he tells fantastic stories of a man named Jacky Wacky, who protects the poor children of the city and punishes the adults who harm them. Angelique doesn’t believe his stories at first, but strange things begin to happen, and she is forced to admit there are some truths that her faith cannot explain.
“Worthy and positive…and its hopeful message for exploited and abused inner-city youths… Appropriate for adult literacy and ESL programs.”
—Publishers Weekly
978-1-4598-0013-7 pb, 978-1-4598-0014-4 pdf 978-1-4598-0015-1 epub
Linda is a young, hardworking single mom struggling to get by from paycheck to paycheck. Her son Dre needs a kidney transplant, and the only one who can help Dre is his half-brother LeVon, a drug-dealing gangbanger who thinks only of himself. Somehow Linda must get through to LeVon in order to save her son.
“Linda’s voice snags readers’ attention with the first sentence…[and] there are several nifty twists…Marked by an authentic plot and realistic characters, this slim volume delivers what it advertises and deserves a bright spotlight.”
—Library Journal
978-1-55469-244-6 pb, 978-1-55469-245-3 pdf 978-1-55469-440-2 epub
2011 Golden Oak Award Nominee
2011 SLJ’s Top Book Choices for Youth in Detention List
Rosario Gomez gave up gang life after his brother was killed in a street fight. Now all he wants to do is finish night school and be a good father. But when an old friend shows up to ask him why he left the gang, Rosario realizes he was fooling himself if he thought his violent past would just go away.
“While the story can be seen as a cautionary tale about the dangers of gang life, it’s never preachy…Recommended.” —CM Magazine
Jumped In Page 5