Inside the bag were two cheeseburgers, a large fry, a salad, and a Coke. I ate the salad, fries, and one of the burgers and saved the other. No one else showed up there that day so I decided I’d spend the night there. I went to the trash can and got part of a newspaper and gathered wood and started a fire in the barbecue pit.
When it got dark I let the fire die so no one would see it and tried to sleep. I was tired but I just lay there most of the night awake.
The next morning I walked back to the city. There were a few restaurants downtown that had outside seating near the sidewalk. I picked one and stood next to a parked car and when a table got up I’d walk over and see if they had left anything and if they did I’d grab it. I ate alright that way for a couple days until a waiter yelled at me and I started running and I wasn’t looking and I knocked into an old man who was holding hands with a kid. I knocked him over and he fell to the ground. I stopped and looked at his old body lying there, and you could tell he was hurt. He was dressed up and the kid with him was dressed up too, and I knew I’d ruined whatever they were doing. I started running again and went back to the river and hid in the bushes for the rest of that day. I felt horrible about myself and decided then that I’d get out of Boise and try to hitchhike to Wyoming that night.
I began walking towards the highway, but I was already hungry and knew I’d need food and water while I waited out a ride. Near the outside of town I found a mini-mart on the corner of a pretty quiet street and went in. There were two customers. One was a middle-aged man looking at the beer cooler and the other was a woman buying cigarettes. It took me until the woman was gone to find the canned foods. I grabbed a can of soup and a can of chili and a gallon of water. The clerk was an Asian man. When he rang up for the man buying beer I went for the door, but when I did another man came from behind the counter and grabbed me by the shirt. I hadn’t seen him and he was strong and he didn’t let go. He took the water and the two cans from my hand.
“I already paid,” I said.
“You didn’t pay,” he said with a thick foreign accent. “We have tape. You gonna pay now?”
“I don’t have any money,” I said.
“You don’t have any money?”
I shook my head and I knew just looking at him that I was going to get it.
He kept hold of me until the man who was buying beer left, then he said something to the cashier in a language I didn’t understand. The man behind the register got up and went to the front door, locked it and turned around the sign to read closed. Another man came from a back room carrying a baseball bat, and they took me to their office.
I sat in a chair. The guy behind the register went back out front but the other two stayed and watched me. Maybe an hour passed when two police officers came and the store owners told them what had happened. The whole time they were all looking at me.
“What’s your name?” a woman officer finally said to me. She had short blonde hair that was cut like a man’s and it looked like she lifted weights.
“Del,” I said.
“Del what?” she asked.
“Del Montgomery.”
She wrote it down in her book.
“Do you have any ID, Del?”
“No,” I said.
“How old are you?”
“Fifteen.”
“Where do you live?” the other officer said. He was bald and short and heavy. He had a big moustache and his face was tan except around his eyes, where they were white.
“I’ve been sleeping by the river.”
“By the river?” the woman officer said.
“Yeah,” I said.
“Where did you live before that?” the other officer asked.
“All around.”
“You don’t have any family.”
“No,” I said.
“Where do you go to school?” the woman officer said.
“I don’t go to school.”
“At some point you must have.”
“Not really,” I said.
The man officer asked the store owner what I tried to steal and he showed them.
“Why were you stealing the cans?”
“I haven’t eaten since yesterday,” I said.
He nodded, then told me to stand up.
I did and he handcuffed me. We went through the store and to their police car and they put me in the backseat and drove to the main city jail. It was a big old place and I got so nervous I thought I’d start bawling but I didn’t. They got me out of the car and took me in and sat me down in a chair in a room by myself. I was there for a long while, then the woman cop came back and sat down in a chair across from me.
“Del, we’re going to take you to Ada County Juvenile Detention Center. If you give us more information we can help you, but until then, and since you say you’re only fifteen, that’s where you’re going.”
She told me to stand up, then took me back to the police car and they drove me to the juvenile center. It was the middle of the night when we got there so I couldn’t see much except that it was a big tan concrete building.
The woman cop led me into a room and took my handcuffs off. I sat on a bench seat and she left and I never saw her again. After a while another officer came and took me to a room where they took my picture and fingerprinted me. The officer asked me my name and where I was from. I said I was from Los Angeles, California and that my name was Del Montgomery. He took me into another room and told me to get completely undressed. So I did and I stood there like that and he looked through my clothes and put them in a sack. He gave me a towel and a set of issued clothes and pointed to a room where I was supposed to take a shower. I put the towel around me and went in there and cleaned up. I dressed in the underwear, socks, blue pants, and green T-shirt. He gave me tennis shoes, then led me to a cell that had a green mattress, a pillow, a blanket, and sheets. On a small table there was a paper cup, a cup of toothpaste, a comb, a small bar of soap, and a handbook with the rules of the place. I went in there and sat on the mattress and the officer left.
I made the bed and lay down. As uneasy as it was, it was nice to sleep in a place where I knew it was alright to sleep. It was sometime later when another man woke me up and led me to an office where a big man with gray hair and a gray beard sat behind a desk.
“My name is Harvey,” he said and put out his hand and I shook it.
“You were caught shoplifting, is that correct?”
“Yes,” I said.
“Why were you shoplifting?”
“I was hungry.”
“It says you stole two cans of soup.”
“A can of soup, a can of chili, and a gallon of water.”
“Where were you going to cook them?”
“I wasn’t. I eat them cold.”
“It says you don’t have any family?”
“No,” I said.
“Everybody’s got somebody.”
“I’m not sure I do,” I said.
“Have you ever been in lockup before?”
“No.”
“Where did you go to school.”
“A lot of places.”
“Name one.”
“I went to elementary school in Los Angeles but I can’t remember what it was called.”
The man sighed.
I tried not to look at him but I knew he was staring at me.
“What’s your mother’s name.”
“I don’t know.”
“Do you have a mother?”
“Sort of,” I said.
“If you aren’t honest I can’t do a thing to help you,” the man said and leaned back in his chair. He was frustrated with me. He asked me a few more questions, then ended the meeting and I was put back in my room. I was let out again for dinner. I stood in line with other kids, but I didn’t say anything to any of them and they didn’t say anything to me. I got a tray of food, went back to a table, and ate. It was meatloaf and mashed potatoes and cooked carrots and a roll. I ate the whole thing and then went back
to my cell.
The next morning I ate breakfast and was told to take another shower. I did and then I was taken to a juvenile magistrate. She was a fat old lady who wore glasses and had a big mole on her chin and she asked me the same questions the other guy did. If I did drugs, where I slept, what I ate. She asked me if I liked sleeping by the river, and if I had any friends that slept there too. What states I’d lived in, how I got from one place to the next. She asked me what my favorite subject was in school, and if I was abused by my parents. She asked the same questions over and over. She’d change them around a little to confuse me, and it went on but I liked her alright. When it was over I was sent back to my room.
I ate lunch and nothing happened but at dinner a kid started saying things to me while we ate. I didn’t say anything back, I just looked at him. He was part Indian and he was a lot bigger than me and he had tattoos on his hands. I thought he was going to want to fight but nothing happened and I went back to my cell. The next morning came and I was told to get back in my own clothes and they drove me to a group home where I was to live with six other kids.
The place was in a suburban neighborhood. The house was white and two stories high. I went inside and was introduced to an old man named Skip. He had a gut that was so big it hung over his pants, nearly reaching his crotch. The driver handed him my file and left. Skip took me to a room that had two sets of bunk beds in it and I was shown a bottom bunk and was told it was mine. He showed me a dresser that was assigned to that bed and he gave me a toothbrush, toothpaste, and a towel. He took me to the basement where they had boxes of clothes. He found me a pair of jeans, a few shirts, and five pairs of underwear and socks. Then I was led outside where three other kids were mowing the lawn and weeding and I was told to help them.
For dinner we all sat at a long table with Skip and his wife Charlene who was overweight as well. She had long gray hair pulled back in a bun, and wore an old-lady sort of dress and made us hold hands while she said grace. After that we got to eat. There were six kids in all. A couple were younger but most seemed around my age. We ate macaroni and cheese mixed with hot dogs and there was a big bowl of mixed vegetables that Charlene told us we had to eat. There was a pitcher of red Kool-Aid and a loaf of white bread and I ate until I couldn’t eat any more. Afterwards I helped clear the table and do the dishes. There was a big living room with four separate couches and we all sat around and watched TV until it was nine, then we were told to go to bed.
As I lay there that night I could hear the other kids talking. Some of it was about their various jobs or about girls and then they started talking about a kid named Weston who had my bunk before me. He was released and sent back to his foster parents. It seemed like everyone there hated him and they went on and on about it. They didn’t talk to me so I didn’t say anything and I felt alright. I didn’t care. I just wasn’t hungry and the bed was soft and the sheets smelled good. I lay there and listened until Skip came by and banged on the door and told them to cut it out.
That night I dreamt about Pete. He and I were walking by a swimming pool and we stopped and he drank from the water but the water was so full of chlorine and chemicals that it was smoking. I tried to make him stop. I yelled at him.
“Pete, don’t,” I screamed. “For Christ’s sake, Pete, please.”
I pulled on the lead rope and when I did he spooked and reared and fell into the pool. But the pool had no bottom and he couldn’t get out and he couldn’t stand or rest. He just trod water and tried to hang on. I ran around looking for a way to get him out, but every time I tried to think my mind would freeze. It seemed like it all went on for hours and days, through sunlight and darkness. He was sinking into the water. He was getting tired. I tried my best to hold him up but I wasn’t strong enough and then he just disappeared. He was gone.
At seven o’clock Skip came in and told us to get up and by seven thirty we all went down to breakfast where we ate cornflakes and orange juice and toast. Skip told four of the kids to hurry or they’d be late for work and he told me and one other kid to be back by five o’clock or he’d call the police. Charlene gave us each a sack lunch and we left.
Me and the other kid walked down the street together. His name was Kevin Sheraton and he was younger than me. His face was covered in acne and he was the skinniest kid I’d ever seen. He had black hair and it was shaved down like he was in the army and one of his ears was smaller and deformed, like it never grew from when he was small. He told me his mom married a born-again Christian and they kicked him out of the house for smoking cigarettes. After two months they let him move back in, but then they said he’d tried to finger his little sister.
“But it ain’t true, man. I’d never do that. My sister’s seven. My mom’s husband hates me, that’s all. He’s the fucking pervert. He’s the one.”
We walked around downtown and both ate our lunches and then we went into a hardware store and looked around. When we came out we went down near this canal where there were shops and restaurants and people walking by. I followed him until he sat down right near the water. He took a tube of glue out of his pants pocket.
“You didn’t even see me do it, did you?”
“You mean the glue?”
“Yeah,” he said.
“You took it when we were in the hardware store?”
He nodded. He opened the glue and put it up his nose and inhaled as hard as he could. He did that a few times, then he handed it to me, but I told him I didn’t want to do it so he put the tube back in his pocket. We sat there for a long time, then we got up and I showed him where I slept by the river.
“That’s rough, man,” he said. My blanket was still there along with the shirts I had. He pulled out the glue and stuck it up his nose again. “At least the house is better than this. Skip’s alright but it’s Charlene who’s the real bitch. I’ve lived there two months now. You’ll see. She’s the worst. She’s got a real temper and she’s mad at me right now. But it wasn’t my fault. Skip, all he gives a fuck about is watching TV. That guy can sit in front of the TV all day. The problem is he always picks what we watch and all he likes are hunting and fishing shows.”
“How come they just let us out all day?”
“What else are they gonna do? We ain’t fucked-up enough for juvie. We can’t get jobs ’cause we’re too young, and they don’t want us wasting their lives back at the house. You just can’t be late, man. If you are they get seriously pissed and then you’re fucked.”
We sat down in the bushes and talked for a while, but it was hot out so we both stripped down to our underwear and went swimming in the river and the day passed. When it got near five we got dressed and made our way back to the house.
Skip was washing his car when we got there so Kevin and I helped him. We dried it and waxed it and then we helped him rearrange the garage and sweep the driveway. That night for dinner we had Hamburger Helper and a bowl of mixed vegetables and a loaf of white bread. There were two pitchers of red Kool-Aid and we all held hands and said grace again, then we sat in silence and ate. Since Kevin and I were the only ones without jobs, Charlene had us clear the table and do the dishes. A couple of the other guys went upstairs and the rest followed Skip into the living room to watch TV.
The next morning it was the same thing, toast and cornflakes and juice. We left with the same sort of sack lunch we had the day before and Kevin and I went downtown and walked in and out of stores. Then we went to the river and ate our lunches and went swimming.
When we got back that evening at five Skip had Kevin and I vacuum the carpets and mop the kitchen and bathroom floors and then Charlene came home. She put two pounds of ground meat in a pan and had me stir it around, then she threw in a bunch of onions and added a gallon can of spaghetti sauce. She boiled two big pots of water and threw in the spaghetti. The whole time she didn’t talk or say much of anything.
We all ate together and afterwards Kevin and I did the dishes again. When we’d finished, Charlene told me to stay behind. S
he took me into a back room that had a desk and a couple chairs and a computer. We went inside and she shut the door and told me to sit down.
“I’ve done this for over ten years,” she said. She was sweating and you could see it leaking through her dress. She moved her big body behind the desk and sat. On the walls in the small room were two religious posters. One had a picture of a bird flying through the sky. It said “Jesus loves you” and the other was a picture of a green meadow and it read “With His gift you will be set free. With His gift you will finally be.”
“I have certain rules and if those rules are broken, then you’re gone. It’s the way I’ve run my home since the beginning, and it works. There’s no discussions or second chances here and I told you that when you arrived. Del, you’ll be leaving us.”
“Me?”
“We found a tube of glue, a baggy with what looks like marijuana, and four cigarettes in the back of your dresser.”
“In my dresser?”
She nodded.
“I don’t even have anything to put in the dresser but the things you’ve given me.”
She just sat there sweating, looking at me.
“I don’t smoke anything and I don’t stick glue up my nose,” I told her.
“We’ve never found anything like this before with any of the other residents. That’s the truth. You arrive and suddenly there’s marijuana, a tube of glue, and cigarettes in your dresser. I called your assigned juvenile magistrate and she remembered you. She looked in your file and made a call and tomorrow you’re being sent to the Idaho Youth Ranch in south-west Idaho. It’s a year-long residency.”
“A year?”
“A year,” she said. “It’s on a five hundred and fifty-acre ranch and is a more intensively structured living situation than this.”
“But none of that stuff is mine.”
Lean on Pete Page 18