After

“You’re ready to work with me?”

  Devon hesitates, afraid of what this “work” may require. But she has no choice, really. She nods again.

  “Good.” Dom smoothes her skirt and sits back down on her stool. “I’m going to try to meet with you at least once more before the hearing. It’s scheduled for April eighth—that’s exactly a week from today. In the meantime, I want you to work on three things for me, okay?”

  Devon doesn’t say anything.

  “O-kay?” Dom says again, louder.

  “Okay,” Devon says quickly. She meets Dom’s eyes so Dom will know that she’s sincere.

  “First, I want you to participate in all scheduled activities here. That means attending school, eating with the other residents, doing chores. Anything that is required and anything that is offered, is mandatory for you. Second, get on the highest behavior status you can manage. You may not understand how it all works right now, but a staff member should explain the point system—”

  “I read the booklet,” Devon says, eager to demonstrate her ability to comply. “Last night.”

  “Okay, good. Staying on Regular status would be good. But working up to Privilege or especially Honor status before the hearing would be even better. The judge looks favorably upon ‘model’ residents. Third, I want you to work on a list of names, some people we can potentially call as witnesses to speak positively to your rehabilitative potential. Basically to say nice things about you, sort of like character witnesses: teachers, coaches, friends, employers.”

  A list of names? Of people to talk about her? Devon feels the panic rise. Impossible. She can’t do that.

  Dom is defining some legal concept, now, the Kent factors, which she’s saying are eight specific criteria that judges must consider before sending a juvenile offender to the adult criminal court system. “Most of the factors are completely legal and fact based,” she explains, “such as your age when you committed the offense, the nature of the offense—meaning, how serious it is—your previous criminal record, et cetera. We can’t make much of an argument against those objective criteria; they are either true or they are false. But the area where we potentially can sway the judge is with the more subjective factors. So, that’s where we’ll need help from your character witnesses.”

  Devon watches as Dom flips to a page of her legal pad. “Here are some ideas. You’re a soccer player. You play varsity for Stadium High School in the fall and a premier club pretty much throughout the year, correct? I think I’ve read that in your file. So, that makes potentially two different sets of coaches. And then you got selected for the Olympic Development Program last year. Could you explain to me what that—”

  “No!” Devon is up, backing toward the door.

  Dom looks at Devon, one carefully manicured eyebrow arching above her glasses. “No?”

  Devon starts pacing. She’d rather stay here forever than hand a list of names over to Dom and then know that the people on that list would know everything about her, about IT. What would remain of her then? Not the person they thought she was.

  She thinks about the charge sheet that Dom had tucked back into the DAVENPORT file. Murder. Abandonment. Mistreatment. Assault.

  She thinks about her coach. The way he’d smile with undisguised admiration after a game where she’d made an amazing save. “You’re crazy, Dev. You scare even me.”

  She thinks about her teachers. She thinks about her teammates, the kids at school. She thinks about Kait.

  Once they hear what happened, even if untrue, there’d be no admiration left. Devon would become someone to hate. To fear even.

  “I’ll do everything else, Dom. I promise! I’ll be a perfect model inmate. Just . . . not that. Don’t make me do a list. Please. I don’t want anybody to know. . . .”

  Dom puts the paper down, watches Devon for a long moment. “But, Devon,” she says softly, “everybody already knows.”

  Devon stops pacing, looks back at her.

  “Your story’s been in all the papers. On the radio and TV. On YouTube, even. There’s this reporter from the News Tribune who’s very aggressively wanting to follow this thing from start to finish. She’s contacted me several times already—she’s e-mailed, left voice mails. She’s stopped by my office, left messages—”

  Everybody already knows? Devon feels her body go cold. The walls seem to close in on her, the painted white cinder block walls.

  “That’s definitely one thing that we’re going to challenge, the use of your name in the media. I know it’s not illegal, but that should not have been allowed. . . . ”

  Her name? In the media? Devon stumbles toward the table.

  Dom’s voice trails off.

  Devon can’t think or breathe. She collapses onto her stool, lays her head down on the table.

  “I thought you knew, Devon, how huge this is.” Dom quickly sifts through her DAVENPORT file, pulls papers out. “Here are copies of the newspaper articles, of what’s been published so far. And copies of some of the police photos. I was going to wait to show these to you later, but . . .” She pushes the papers toward Devon. “Take these with you and read them, look them over. You really need to know what we’re up against.”

  Devon doesn’t lift her head.

  The News Tribune. A reporter from the News Tribune had interviewed Devon once. She’d won the Golden Glove MVP award at State Cup last May, and the News Tribune wanted to tell the story. A photographer had spent forty-five minutes one day after school, posing Devon in the goal down at Stadium’s field and snapping off pictures. They were set-up action shots, but they still looked cool. Her mom had cut out the article and slapped it into a frame from Wal-Mart. She’d hung her handiwork near the door to their apartment so no one with eyes would miss it.

  Devon feels numb. Dead.

  Everybody knows. Everybody. Everybody.

  “Devon? Are you okay?” For the first time, Dom’s voice sounds unsure.

  Devon says nothing, not one word. She pushes herself up. She slides the papers toward herself. She slowly folds them into quarters. She closes her hand around them.

  Devon lifts her face to Dom’s.

  Is she “okay”?

  Will she ever, ever be okay?

  chapter eight

  Devon waits until she’s back in her cell, back on her rubberized mattress and alone, to unfold what Dom had given her. Her hands are trembling. The paper rattles.

  She takes a breath and looks down at the creased photocopies, black on white. Clean, perfect font forming words arranged in rows and columns with block margins.

  So innocuous. It could be about anything. She quickly shuffles through them.

  Then she sees the pictures.

  A sharp pain slams into her chest, seizes her breath.

  One of the couch—the blood-soaked cushions, the crumpled blanket. And another of the bathroom—the blood smeared across the linoleum, a pile of soiled towels in the corner. And still another—a torn open trash bag, revealing the garbage contained within.

  “Oh, God!” Devon pushes them away. The papers hit the cement floor and fan out.

  Devon can’t breathe; she can’t get enough air. She gasps like the salmon, just pulled from the Sound, as they flounder and flop beside the weekend fishermen along Ruston Way.

  Devon shoves her fist into her mouth, bites down hard. Snot runs over her knuckles.

  She wants to die. She truly wants to die. Because it’s all there, right there on the floor. Right there in black and white.

  Devon stares down, at the mess of paper there, for a long time. Her heart pumps fast.

  Read them, look them over. You really need to know what we’re up against. Dom’s words. I Am Your Future, she’d said. You’re ready to work with me?

  Dom wants her to stand up and meet this straight on. Now. Not later. And Devon knows that Dom’s right, she’s absolutely right.

  Devon struggles to get a grip. This is so unlike her, this melt-down. This is not how she operates. She’s a pro at bei
ng calm when the entire world turns to complete chaos around her. In the goal or at home, she is the opposite of her mom, who lives in constant freak mode.

  Devon is not like her mom. Right?

  She is NOT like her mom!

  Devon stares at the papers again, concentrates on them, the black on white. They are the ball sitting harmlessly on the grass before her. In milliseconds the striker’s foot will send it hurtling toward her. But for now, it is nothing, harmless. It is just a ball. A round object with air inside.

  She pulls her hand out of her mouth. She hugs herself, rocking forward and back on the edge of the bed.

  Devon must take this. She must pick up the papers and look at them. Like facing a penalty kick, it’s her job to deal with it. Even when she wasn’t the player who caused the foul in the box.

  Devon wipes her hands on the stiff polyester of her orange jumpsuit. She takes a deep breath, then pushes herself off the bed, reaches for the papers. She kneels on the floor and makes herself look at them.

  The one with the trash bag is on top, and the bag is the first thing she sees—the black plastic torn and frayed—sort of framing the entire photograph. Her eyes move on to the other objects in the picture. The striped Tim’s potato chip bag. The stripped toilet paper roll. The frozen juice container. The crumpled newspaper pages.

  These objects are strangely familiar. Like artifacts from a place and time she’s lived, but too long ago to clearly recall their specific connection to her. As her brain recognizes each object, one by one, she slowly starts to remember. And then, in a rush, she knows—she used those things. Those things were hers; she’d touched them all.

  She’d touched them all That Night.

  Before she can squelch them, her mind supplies the memories:

  The Tim’s chip bag: she’d finished off the chips with a microwaved hot dog and a stale bun for dinner, sitting on the couch, The Simpsons reruns playing across the screen, her chemistry homework open beside her.

  The toilet paper roll: she’d had to rush to the bathroom, sharp diarrhea cramps rolling through her gut. She’d reached into the cabinet under the sink with her butt still over the seat, one hand fumbling for the new roll, the other clutching her stomach.

  The frozen concentrate orange juice container: she’d made the juice before starting her chemistry homework—she was craving something sweet and cold and wet. She placed the frozen container in the sink and stood mesmerized as it thawed, the hot water a cascade pouring from the faucet.

  The pages from the newspaper: she’d picked up the pile tossed on the floor outside her mom’s bedroom door, the section with the personal ads lying on top, two prospects circled in black permanent marker.

  That was her trash. She’d dropped it all into the Glad trash bag with the Quick-Tie, one by one.

  And . . . the towels? The blood? The used tampons? The . . .

  The images snap off. Stopped. Blank.

  Her skin is pricked and cold. Each hair is erect, every nerve alive. She’s panting as if she’d just done pressure training at goalie practice.

  She grabs the papers, mashes them into a tight ball, hurls it to the floor. But a caption from one of the newspaper articles catches her eye:MIRACLE BABY ANASTASIA RESURRECTED FROM CERTAIN DEATH WHEN PLUCKED FROM A TRASH CAN EARLY YESTERDAY.

  Certain death. Certain death. Her mind pounds out the rhythm the syllables create. Certain death. Plucked from a trash can. Plucked from her trash can—her toilet paper roll, her potato chip bag, her orange juice container. Stuffed into her Glad Quick-Tie trash bag. Her hands. Her.

  That’s why she’s here. That’s why she’s sitting in this walled-in cage. Her black trash bag and what was inside of it. That’s what all the charges are about.

  She squeezes her head between her hands.

  And heaves her breakfast into her lap.

  chapter nine

  The lock snaps open.

  Devon jerks upright in her bed. Will she ever get used to that sound? That sound, which announces each new day?

  She stands, shuffles to the toilet in the corner of her cell, relieves herself. The pad lining her underwear displays only a thin brownish streak this morning. Like the blood at the end of a period.

  When she’s finished, she goes to check outside her door. Like yesterday, the girls are moving around the room, preparing for the day.

  This is the day Devon must join them. She must go out there, get a tray from off the food cart. Retrieve her bag of toiletries with the other girls and wash her face, brush her teeth. Go to school. Start working toward that Honor status so the judge will be impressed.

  And that thought, her status and impressing the judge, reminds her that she has a job. Or at least, she thinks she might. Henrietta had assigned it to her yesterday afternoon.

  “Since I had to clean up your mess today,” she’d said, “you get to clean up after everyone else. Starting tomorrow. Okay?” Henrietta had said this after hosing the puke down the drain in Devon’s cell. “What comes around, goes around.” Then she’d handed Devon the unit rules test as promised and made Devon sit on the stainless steel toilet in the corner to take it while she herself proceeded to wipe down Devon’s mattress and mop the cement floor with a strong disinfectant.

  Devon feels some relief. She has a mission; she always does best with a task to perform. She now has a place to go and something specific to do when she steps outside her cell. She’ll walk right up to the desk and the staff woman behind it and inquire about her job.

  Devon turns to her bed, folds her one sheet and one blanket, first in half, then in half again, and once more in half before stacking them neatly at the foot of her bed as prescribed in the unit pamphlet. Devon places her pillow on top of the pile, then peers out her little cell window one last time. The path to the desk is clear, no girl in her way to step around. She takes a breath to center herself and pushes open the door.

  “Good morning,” the woman says when Devon gets there. She’s unfamiliar, this woman. She’s very tall and lanky with short dishwater blonde hair.

  Devon nods back.

  The woman waits for Devon to say something, to ask a question or register a complaint.

  Devon clears her throat. “I’m new here. And I was told yesterday—I mean, Henrietta told me—that I have a job cleaning up? I’m just wondering what exactly it is that I have to do. Because I’d like to get started on it right away. If that’s okay.”

  The woman says nothing for a moment, just looks at Devon with an amused expression on her face. “Well!” she finally says. “This is new and refreshing. Someone asking me for a job? I seriously think this is a first.”

  Devon smiles to herself. One step closer to Honor.

  The woman turns toward a white board on the wall behind her. A simple chart is there, chores listed in one vertical column—Laundry, Mop, Windows, Sink/Counter, Wipe Down, Trays/Trash—and first names in a second column beside it. The woman rubs off a name beside “Trays/Trash,” picks up a dry-erase marker and writes “Devon” in its place.

  This surprises Devon, that the woman knows her name already. Why does everyone here always have to know everything? Devon can feel her momentary burst of “take charge” confidence seeping away. What else does this woman know? Devon thinks of the crumpled papers stashed in the cubby under her bed. Has she seen the articles, too? Read them?

  “Here you go,” the woman says. “The girl who had Trays and Trash was released last night, so it’s all yours. That means from now on, I expect it to get done by you. If it doesn’t, you’ll lose points, which will affect your status.” She tells Devon the requirements for the job. After every meal, once all the girls have returned their trays to the food cart, Devon will stack the trays neatly. She’ll then get a trash bag from the staff on duty and pick up any napkins, milk cartons, sporks, et cetera that were left around the room by accident. After that, she’ll empty the trash in the bathroom and shower rooms. Finally, she will attach the trash bag to the hook on the food cart and w
heel the cart to the door to the unit so that it can be taken away later.

  “Pretty simple. Any questions?”

  “No,” Devon says, absently running one hand along the top of the desk. “I don’t think so.” She sees a piece of paper taped there:TOUCH THE CONSOLE

  GET A 0!!!!

  Devon snatches her hand back, looks at the woman guiltily. That rule wasn’t in the pamphlet. She feels a jolt of panic—she doesn’t know all the rules here. But she must. She must learn all the rules and perform them to perfection. It’s her best shot of returning back to the real world, her real life.

  “Don’t be sorry for the things you didn’t know anything about.” The woman turns away to mark something on a clipboard. “But now you do know it, so don’t let it happen again. Pretty simple.” She points toward the floor beside the desk. “Now grab your toiletry bag out of that box. Your name’s on one of them. Find it, use it, and bring it back when you’re done.”

  Someone else is waiting to talk with the staff. In her peripheral vision, Devon can see a small, dark-haired girl bouncing up and down on her toes impatiently.

  The woman shifts her eyes to the other girl then. Dismissing Devon.

  After breakfast is over, the girls start to make their way to the classroom, one of the rooms off the entryway. Devon had managed to sit alone, in a corner, to eat a few bites of the toasted frozen waffle and mushy fruit cocktail. Beside her was a cart jammed with paperbacks, worn with use. Scanning the titles had given her something to do while the other girls moved around the room or did their chores or ate at the round tables. Only after most of them had cleared out did she move to collect the stray napkin, the stray spork.

  Devon veers the cart with the trays and trash around the few girls loitering in the entryway outside the classroom. She stops the cart at the door to the unit, as she’d been instructed. The moment she’d entered through that door replays in her mind, and all the accompanying feelings—how she had felt clutching her bedding to hide her chest, stress churning in her stomach. That moment was not even two days ago. Her stomach still feels the same; that anxious feeling has never left her, not even in her sleep.