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  I hung out in my room for a while and tried to get to know Noah. He was still lying on his bed, reading a science-fiction novel that must have had five hundred pages. “You like to read, huh?” I said, trying to strike up a conversation.

  “Takes my mind off things,” he said and then added, “Sorry about your mom.”

  “Yeah,” I said.

  “My mom left when I was little. She got tired of being beat up by my dad.”

  “Ouch.”

  “So he took it out on me.”

  “What was he so angry about?”

  “I never figured it out.”

  “How’d you end up here?” I asked.

  “He nearly killed me.”

  “My father left a long time ago. I hardly remember him.”

  “Man, are you lucky,” Noah said. “I wish my father had left.”

  “How do you like living here?”

  “It’s okay, really. No one hits me. Connor is a pain in the ass, but Darren keeps a lid on things. Brian’s the only genuine criminal in the house, but he’s really okay once you get to know him.”

  “What did he do?”

  “Tried to burn down his school. Aside from that, he seems pretty normal.”

  Despite the fact that Noah seemed like he was hurting, I thought he might not be so bad as a roommate. I sized him up and realized he was about the same height and weight as me. “Noah,” I asked, “do you have any nice clothes I could borrow? Just for tomorrow.”

  “What do you mean, nice?”

  “I don’t know. Like formal.”

  He got off his bed and opened the closet. He held out a white shirt, a tie and dress pants. “I’ve got some shiny shoes in here somewhere,” he said, rooting around the bottom of the closet. “You’re welcome to them, if you want. I never have a reason to wear them.”

  “Thanks, man,” I said. “I really appreciate it.”

  “No problem,” he said. He never asked me what I wanted them for.

  Dinner was that Connor special Darren had mentioned. It wasn’t great, but I hadn’t eaten much since my mom had died, so I ate like a pig. “The new boy has an appetite,” Connor said in a smart-ass way. “He shovels more in his face than Kyle does.”

  Kyle gave him the finger and snarled. Noah looked at me and smiled. I couldn’t quite figure out Brian. He just looked at his food and ate slowly.

  “I’m going to work on you guys,” Darren said. “Turn you all into vegetarians. Wait and see.”

  “Frig off,” Connor said, but he said it in such a way that we all laughed, even Brian.

  “Healthy body, healthy mind,” Darren said.

  “Sick body, sick mind, is more like it,” Connor chimed in. “How come I’m not getting a bit more appreciation for my cuisine?”

  Truth was, the hot dogs and macaroni slathered with ketchup tasted good.

  “Sorry, Connor,” Darren said. “I can tell that you made this meal with love.”

  “Hey, at least I didn’t spit in it.”

  “We all thank you for that,” Darren said and laughed.

  It was clear that Darren got along with the guys. He had a light touch.

  After dinner I sat down outside on the steps as the sun was setting. Darren came out and sat down beside me. “So far?”

  “So far, okay.”

  “We need to come up with a plan for you.”

  “What kind of plan?”

  “I don’t know how long you’ll be here. Could be a while. But then, in the not-too-distant future, you’re gonna be out there. And your fate will be your decision.”

  “So far, nothing in my life seems to have been my decision.”

  “Feel like a victim?”

  “You bet I do.”

  “What if I said there are no victims?”

  “Then I’d say bullshit.”

  “I mean, if you feel like a victim, you stay that way. If you take charge, no matter how hard it is, then you control your future.”

  “Sounds good on paper,” I said. “Not sure it will work for me.”

  “Just think about it. Anyway, I’m glad you’re here with us. Be brave. Trust me, there will be some rocky moments.”

  “Like dinner?”

  “Dinner was nothing. That was easy.”

  “Will Brian try to burn the place down?” I asked.

  “I don’t think so. He likes us. And besides, we hide the matches.”

  Chapter Nine

  That night I dreamed I was back living with my mom and everything was okay. Or, at least, as okay as it ever was while she was alive. It seemed like everything that had happened in the last week was a dream and not real at all. Then things kind of got jumbled up as to what was real and what wasn’t—until Noah started shouting in his sleep. That woke me up. And at first I was more confused than ever.

  “No! Don’t! I didn’t do it!” Noah yelled.

  I shook myself awake and sat up, realizing where I was and being suddenly reminded of my mom’s death. The room was dark, but there was light coming in from the hallway.

  “No! Please!” Noah pleaded, still in some kind of nightmare. My guess was that he was reliving scenes with his father. I didn’t know if I should wake him or not. What was the right thing to do?

  Darren appeared in the doorway with a flashlight. He saw me sitting up in my bed.

  “Sorry about this, Josh. I warned you that Noah does this sometimes.”

  “What do you do?”

  Darren sighed. “Sometimes I do nothing and wait for the dream to go away. If it’s really bad, I sit beside him and try to gently wake him up.”

  Darren sat down in a chair by Noah, and we sat in silence for a minute. Noah seemed to settle back down, and soon he was snoring. Darren looked at me and laughed quietly. “Dreams are a way of processing some of the bad stuff in your life. Noah had it pretty rough. He’s still working through it. What about you? Having any bad dreams?”

  For some reason I didn’t want to get into it. “Nah,” I said. “I’m okay.”

  “Good,” he said. “Just remember, you’ve had a major loss. You have to let it out somewhere. Otherwise, you explode. You’re gonna feel bad and feel sorry for yourself for a long time, but you also have to face the world.”

  I was beginning to see that this was Darren’s way. He played his role like an older brother, one with lots of advice to dole out. But I didn’t mind. Noah continued to snore. Darren said, “Good night,” and left.

  I tried to get back to sleep, but I couldn’t help thinking about where I was and what came next. How was I going to make it through the summer? What would it be like to go back to school? How long might I have to stay here in this group home? Even worse, where would I would go after that? I felt like I simply wasn’t ready to deal with anything.

  So I tried to stop thinking about it all. And then an image of Lindsey floated into my head. The old me would have been scared of a girl like that. A bad girl. A tease. A liar and a scammer. Who knew what else? But I had to admit I looked forward to seeing her the next day. Saturday. And she’d asked me to dress up. What was that about? Was this some kind of real date?

  Noah slept quietly for the rest of the night. In the morning, Darren walked the halls and announced, “Rise and shine, campers. You don’t want to miss this one. This is the first day of the rest of your life.” I could see that Mr. Sunshine could get on your nerves after a while. But as I stumbled into the kitchen and saw him scrambling eggs and frying bacon, I decided I could forgive him for his annoying cheerfulness, and apparently the others did too. We all ate like we hadn’t seen any food in a month. Even Noah, who seemed to have survived his nightmares.

  Darren had a little garden in the backyard, but he was the only one who worked on it that morning. I wasn’t in the mood for any more of his advice, so I stayed clear of him. When the afternoon rolled around, I tried on Noah’s pants and shirt and shoes. The shoes were a bit tight, but the rest seemed to fit. I looked in the mirror and Noah watched as I tried to tie the
tie but failed miserably. I didn’t think I had ever worn a tie. Finally, Noah helped me out. “Where are you going, anyway?”

  “I don’t really know.”

  “But there’s a girl involved, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Lucky you,” he said, offering me some kind of gel to put in my hair.

  “Yeah, lucky me.”

  I met up with Lindsey as planned, in the coffee shop of the new downtown library. She saw me walking toward her and stood up. She had on a dress and makeup and carried a large, expensive-looking handbag. She looked beautiful. I suddenly felt nervous and not at all like myself in my new look.

  “You clean up real nice,” she said in a fake Southern accent.

  “So do you,” I said. As we stood there sizing each other up, I noticed that some adults were looking at us and smiling. The perfect young couple. Ha.

  “Now what?” I asked.

  Lindsey checked her watch. “At two o’clock we’re going to go somewhere.”

  “Where?”

  “To a wedding,” she said, giving me a mysterious smile. “Well, we’ll go to the wedding at the church, and then we won’t look out of place when we get to the wedding party.”

  “Friends of yours?”

  “Not really.”

  “What’s this all about?”

  “What, you don’t like weddings?”

  “I’ve never been to one.”

  “You have a long list of things you’ve never done?” she asked and gave me a funny look.

  That was just like Lindsey, to put it that way. It made me feel even more embarrassed.

  So for the second time in less than a week, the second time in my life, I found myself sitting in a church. With a pretty girl. The service was like something out of a movie. People smiling, crying, a young couple walking down an aisle strewn with rose petals. The whole thing had nothing to do with the world I had come from. It was like I had landed on another planet.

  When it was over, we followed the other people outside. “And now for the good part,” Lindsey said. As the couple was being photographed, we walked with the others to a nearby church hall. Inside, people milled around and chatted with each other. Lindsey held my arm and walked me into the center of the room. Three separate bars were set up, and people were getting drinks. Lindsey walked over to the closest one and asked for two glasses of wine. The man behind the bar didn’t question her, but he did give me a wink as he handed her the glasses.

  “Isn’t this great?” she said, giving me one of the glasses and taking a sip.

  “Another first,” I said as I sipped the wine. I’d had beer before and even sneaked some whiskey once, but I’d never had wine. Lindsey drained her glass quickly, and, like a fool, I did the same. She went back for seconds.

  Lindsey led me on a tour around the hall and stopped in front of a table piled with gifts and envelopes for the newlyweds. “Must be nice,” she said, pointing at the wedding booty.

  Suddenly it struck me as very odd that we were part of this scene. “What are we doing here anyway?” I asked.

  She didn’t answer my question. “Aren’t you having fun?”

  I could feel the wine doing funny things to my head. “I guess so.”

  “Just relax and enjoy the party.”

  We wandered around the room some more. I followed Lindsey’s lead, nodding and smiling at the people we encountered. No one asked us who we were or why we were here.

  And then the bride and groom entered the hall. All eyes were on them. That’s when Lindsey grabbed me by my sleeve and led me back toward that table with the gifts. As everyone oohed and aahed at the wedding couple, Lindsey began picking up envelopes from the gift table and stashing them in her oversized purse.

  I couldn’t believe it. “What are you doing?” I whispered.

  “Be quiet,” she hissed as she grabbed another handful of envelopes and started walking casually to the door. Everyone was still making a fuss over the newly married couple, who looked like they had just stepped out of a magazine.

  As I followed Lindsey out into the sunlight, I was both shocked and angry. “That was a truly rotten thing to do.”

  “Just shut up and keep walking.”

  I thought about getting the hell away from her. I felt like I had been tricked into being part of this, her worst scam yet. “You’ve done this before?” I asked, the anger rising further in me.

  “No. First time,” she said nonchalantly.

  “Why?”

  She stopped in her tracks. “Get over it,” she said. “This is what I do. It’s my life, so don’t go judging me. It’s who I am. Take it or leave it.”

  We walked for ten minutes in complete silence. Lindsey stopped and sat down on a park bench by a wire trashcan. I sat down beside her. At first I just looked away. But then I turned toward her. I watched as she opened the first envelope, found a check inside and threw it and the card in the trashcan. The same thing happened with two more envelopes. Then she opened the next envelope and found two fifty-dollar bills. “Bingo,” she said. “At least some people still give cash. Here. Open a couple of these.”

  She tossed three envelopes in my lap, but I just stared at them.

  “Go on. Do it.”

  It’s hard to explain why I didn’t bail on her right then. I was really pissed off. I didn’t want any part of this. But then I remembered that this was the girl who had sat beside me through my mother’s funeral. I opened my first envelope and read the inscription inside:

  May your lives be filled with love and happiness.

  Love,

  Brett and Sybil

  And there was a hundred-dollar bill. Lindsey looked over, gave me a big goofy smile, took the hundred and stashed it in my shirt pocket and then threw the card into the trashcan. I handed the other envelopes back to her, tilted my head back and closed my eyes.

  Lindsey continued on like a kid on Christmas morning. When she had opened all the stolen envelopes, she announced, “Five hundred dollars. Not bad. Too bad we can’t use those checks.” “Now what?” I asked, feeling totally defeated.

  Lindsey tucked another $150 in my shirt pocket. “Even split,” she said. “Enough fun for today. This week we go on a spending spree though. I gotta go now.” She stood up, leaned over me and kissed me full on the lips. “Thanks for being such a good sidekick.” And she walked away.

  Chapter Ten

  I couldn’t sleep that night. I couldn’t believe what I had allowed Lindsey to get me into. I’d never stolen anything in my life. Even my mother, hooked on drugs, hadn’t stolen. She’d sometimes spent welfare money on street drugs and we didn’t have enough to eat, but she hadn’t stolen.

  Noah couldn’t sleep either. I could tell by his breathing. So there we were, lying on beds on either side of the room, wide awake.

  “Noah,” I asked. “Can I run something past you?”

  “Sure.” He sat up and turned on a lamp.

  So I told him about my day.

  “Man,” he said. “You didn’t strike me as the criminal type.”

  “That’s just it. I’m not. It was her idea.”

  “But you went along.”

  “I didn’t know what I was getting myself into.”

  “But if you got caught…”

  “I know. So what do you think?”

  “You want my opinion?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well,” he began slowly. “Is she cute? The girl?”

  “Yeah. She’s hot.”

  “How come she chose you?”

  I explained how we met.

  “That is one crazy chick,” Noah said. “She sounds really…interesting.”

  “Interesting but dangerous.”

  His eyes were wide now. “What was it you wanted my advice about?”

  “I’m not sure I want any more grief in my life than I already have. Should I see her again or just walk away from it?”

  Noah looked at me like I had two heads. “Josh, are you out of your
mind? If I had a girl like that, I’d rob a bank if she asked me to. What is there to think about?”

  I nodded. “Okay. Thanks. Would you mind not mentioning this to anyone else?”

  “Secret’s safe with me. But I want to hear what happens in the next chapter.”

  And that was pretty much the end of the conversation. He turned off the light. I eventually drifted off to sleep.

  The next day Darren drove us out of town to a trail in a forest. We hiked for two hours. It had been a long, long time since I’d been in the woods, and it felt good. Kyle complained a lot until Connor told him to shut up and threatened to hit him.

  “Back off, Connor,” Darren said.

  “Fat kids don’t belong on hikes,” Connor said. “Fat kids don’t belong anywhere.”

  Kyle looked humiliated, but Brian came to his defense. “Connor, you have your head so far up your ass, how do you know anything about who belongs where?”

  Strangely, Darren didn’t say anything, and that seemed to be the end of it. The trail was steep, and I was feeling it in the backs of my calves. The pain felt good. Really good. Noah was right beside me, and we were breathing hard. But not as hard as Kyle. When Connor, Brian and Darren rounded a big rock and were out of sight, we both gave Kyle a hand, helping him up the incline. We were all sweating at that point. That felt good too.

  When we stopped for a break on a high ledge overlooking a valley with a lake at the bottom, Darren handed around sandwiches. I was hungry, and they tasted great. I had a flashback to when I was little, and how my mom used to make me liverwurst sandwiches. It was weird, because in the flashback my mom was a good mom. She would wake me up, make me breakfast and help me get ready for school. It was a long time ago, though, and I couldn’t tell if it was a real memory or just something I imagined.

  When I finished my sandwich, I walked away from the others to take a pee over the ledge. I took out my cell phone and thought about calling Lindsey but discovered there was no signal.