Kindness for Weakness Read online

  I nod and climb in next to a chubby black kid wearing plastic tortoiseshell glasses and a white button-down shirt with food stains on it. There are no other kids in the van. The driver, a small pinched-face guy with short reddish hair and a beard, hands Horvath two McDonald’s take-out bags and then steers the van out into traffic; Horvath digs into the first bag and shows a smile that’s as big and true as any child’s. He tunes the radio to a country-and-western station, moving his massive rounded shoulders to the slow, twangy beat, singing in a surprisingly clear voice: “I’m not big on social graces; Think I’ll slip on down to the oasis; Oh, I’ve got friends in low places.”

  The red-haired driver laughs and taps the slow rhythm on the steering wheel. He turns off Central Avenue and heads toward the thruway tollbooth. I’m going to pay close attention to the directions so I can tell Louis. Maybe he can come visit and help the time go faster.

  “What are you in for?” the other kid says.

  I don’t want to have a conversation with him or anyone else. I mean, I am in a van being taken to some kind of kids’ prison. And I feel like I might puke or pass out. What will happen if I pass out? Will they still take me to lockup, or will I get to go to a hospital? It’s an interesting idea. How sick or crazy do you have to be to go to the hospital? And do they send you home after, or back to lockup? I could think about it more if this kid would just shut up and leave me alone. “It’s complicated,” I mutter.

  “Always is, white brother.” He holds a shackled fist up for a bump. I oblige, even though my heart is pounding out its own rhythm of fear inside my chest, urging me to find a way out of this van and the mess of my life. But it’s no use. For me I don’t think there is a way out.

  “I was delivering packages for someone.”

  “Oh. You mean you was dealing.” He says it matter-of-factly, like you’d talk about washing dishes or taking out the trash.

  “Yeah, I was dealing. What about you?”

  He points at his shirt. “Busted for good taste. Ain’t that some shit?”

  I have no idea what this means, but at least he’s cheerful and friendly. How can a person be cheerful on the way to lockup? Maybe if you get locked up enough times, you get used to it.

  We’re heading east on I-90. Orderly rows of Fredonia grapes are giving way to the hardwood forests of Silver Creek, and the slow, muddy rivers that run through the Seneca Indian reservation. Huge billboards advertise the cheapest cigarettes in New York, by the carton! No taxes. Louis and my mother would definitely stop, but only if they carried their brands: Camel and Marlboro. Off to the left, past the westbound lanes, I see a giant wooden Indian chief with his arm outstretched. He’s got to stand thirty feet tall; I point, but the kid ignores me and keeps talking. He talks all the way through Buffalo and Batavia, hardly stopping to breathe.

  “You know how much good designer clothes cost?” he says.

  “No.” But I’m sure he will tell me about it whether I want him to or not. I lean back in the vinyl bench seat and breathe, letting the air out in a slow steady stream. And with each exhale, I lie to myself and say that everything will be okay.

  “Well, I’ll tell you. A Dolce and Gabbana classic suit in charcoal costs a grand and four hunnert. John Varvatos shoes, two-fitty.”

  Except for the stains, his clothes are nicer than mine—but not a thousand dollars nicer.

  “Bullshit,” I say.

  “Not these. These is Old Navy. Cheap shits. But the ones I stole, they was nice.”

  “You got locked up for stealing clothes?”

  “Designer clothes. Tasteless stuff like hoodies and jeans get you probation. But Dolce and Gabbana’s grand larceny, baby!”

  16

  I look out the window at the passing trees and farms. A little while after Rochester, we pass a sign that says FINGER LAKES EXITS; I’ve never been to any of the lakes, but I remember studying about them in earth science—six deep finger-shaped lakes carved out by glaciers. I don’t see any water, just kids on dirt bikes and four-wheelers riding through rows of stubbed cornfields. Other kids bounce up and down on trampolines outside broken-down trailers.

  A red barn stands with its roof torn off, showing bones of rotted wood. I wonder if the barn will still be standing in twelve months, when I get out, or if it will collapse into the weeds and disappear. I wonder if I will disappear, too, or if I will go back home at the end of my placement. But home to what? To no friends and a brother who doesn’t care about me? To Ron and my mother in their shitty apartment with no food and a smelly couch?

  The kid next to me is still talking. “Hey, you been to DYS before?”

  “Where?”

  “Division of Youth Services. Man, where you think we’re going?”

  “I don’t know. Juvie, I guess.”

  “That’s what DYS is!” he blurts out. “You better get with the program.”

  I nod, wishing I could be alone to think. But he keeps talking about clothes and all the good shops and restaurants he wants to go to in Manhattan when he’s older and can move there. He sticks out his hand and says, “Name’s Freddie Peach.”

  I shake and tell him mine.

  “My man, James,” he says, smiling.

  Mr. Horvath, who has been devouring his last Big Mac, turns around to glare at us. He’s so big and fat that his neck bulges out of his shirt collar. The baby’s foot tattoo is stretched and faded, and I wonder how many more Big Macs it will take before it is unrecognizable.

  “Hands at your sides!” he says. “Why are you touching him in my van, Freddie Fruit?” A glob of special sauce flies from his mouth and hits the steel cage that separates us.

  Freddie scowls at the guard’s wide back. “I was shaking hands.”

  Horvath and his friend, the driver, exchange glances and laugh. “I’ll bet you were. Do it again, and I’ll write your revocator ass up before we even get to the facility.”

  “What’s a revocator?” I whisper to Freddie when Mr. Horvath returns to his country-and-western station.

  “Someone who gets out and then gets busted again. You only gotta do ninety to a hundred and twenty days when you come back.”

  “That’s it?”

  “If I don’t screw up, which I won’t.”

  We ride in silence for what seems like a long time. The van turns off I-90 and heads south on Route 34 through a bunch of very small towns like Auburn, Scipio, and Genoa. There are ice cream booths and vegetable stands. I see farms with horses and Amish buggies parked in muddy front yards. Finally the van turns onto a long drive and pulls up in front of a tall fence topped with coils of razor wire.

  “Is this it?” I ask Freddie, a wavy sick feeling growing in my gut.

  “Yeah. This is Morton.”

  “Where?”

  “Morton. The Thomas C. Morton Jr. Residential Center, man. Where’d you think we was headed?”

  Fuck me, I think. Neil warned me: “Don’t get sent to Morton; they beat the living shit out of you there.”

  “What’s wrong?” says Freddie. “You don’t look so good.”

  “I’m not supposed to be here.”

  “Damn straight,” he says. “Me neither.”

  Mr. Horvath packs up all his fast food garbage and climbs out of the van. The sliding door bangs open, and Horvath shows his fat head, tilted, leering. “Come on out, ladies.”

  I try to get up, but my legs feel weak. Breakfast sloshes dangerously in my stomach. I brace myself on the edge of the vinyl bench and vomit everywhere.

  17

  “Motherfuck!” Horvath says. “Clean that shit up.” He grabs a handful of napkins from the glove box and throws them at me.

  I do my best to wipe up the mess, and then an electrified gate buzzes open. Freddie and I are herded through it and beyond to a series of sliding metal and glass doors. We shuffle and rattle in our leg chains, trying to keep up. Inside the building there’s a big, empty waiting room surrounded by tempered glass windows.

  I can see into a hallw
ay where a line of boys stand single file dressed in khaki pants and bright red polo shirts. Some have glasses with thick black frames, and a couple of them are growing beards, half-formed patchy things that make them look sick or crazy. I don’t belong here with these kids. I can’t be here. They stare through the glass at Freddie and me, smirking and grinning until a guard walks by. Then they turn forward and look down at their feet, casting sideways glances.

  Horvath takes off our shackles, careful not to touch my vomit-soaked pants. “Sit down and keep your mouths shut,” he says, pointing at a plastic couch along the wall.

  We do as he says while he bullshits with some other guards, all big men with close haircuts and either mustaches or goatees. They talk so loud that everyone within a hundred feet can hear them go on about trucks and football teams and the size of the deer they shot during gun season. They hitch up heavy leather belts and jingle giant rings of keys. They crack jokes about each other’s allegedly small dicks.

  I remember again what Neil said about this place, and wonder when they will beat me. I want to be tough and unafraid, but I can’t help it. I’m scared shitless of these men and what they might do to me. I watch the guards carefully, the jagged edge of panic sparking across my nerves like an electric current.

  “Those two are the worst,” Freddie whispers.

  I ignore him and look straight ahead at the far wall.

  “Horvath, he’s a motherfucker. Pike, with the red beard, he’s a motherfucker, too.”

  Horvath’s eyes narrow, and he shouts across the room, “I thought I told you two to shut up!”

  “Yes, sir,” Freddie says. But under his breath he mutters, “Pig.”

  Horvath doesn’t hear it, but he senses something.

  “Get up!” he says.

  I’m not sure if he means both of us or just Freddie. I wait for more instructions.

  “I said now, puke!” I stand. He gets in my face so I can smell the Big Macs on his breath, a rotten sweet smell that brings my nausea back in sick lurching waves; I fight hard to hold it in.

  One of the other guards says, “You have a problem listening to directions?”

  “No. I just …” What do they want from me? I’m not a troublemaker. I’ll follow the rules, if they’ll just tell me what they are. But it’s already too late. Horvath nods to the other guard, who grabs me roughly by the front of my shirt. Someone else grabs me from behind and pins my arms. I try to pull away, but they’re squeezing really hard and it feels like my arms might pop out of their sockets.

  I let out a scream as I’m lifted off my feet and slammed onto my face. My right cheek hits the carpet and explodes in pain. I want to touch it to feel if it’s bleeding or if the skin has been rubbed off, but my arms are still pinned, and the weight of someone heavy is crushing me. I can’t breathe.

  “Shut up when one of us talks to you,” says a voice close to my ear. “You follow orders here or you hit the floor. Understand?”

  “You’re hurting me,” I wheeze.

  The guards laugh, but I can’t figure out what’s funny.

  “You ain’t too bright, are you?” one of them says.

  “Just keep your mouth shut. The more you bitch, the longer you stay down,” another says.

  I don’t know why they are doing this to me. I kick and thrash my legs, but they push my chest and face even harder into the floor. Someone grabs my ankles, and then I can’t move at all. I lie still, the sound of my ragged breath not enough to drown out the screaming in my head: Get off me! You’re killing me!

  Time passes slowly, the jackhammering of my heart lessening. The screaming in my head stops, and my muscles go slack; I feel drained, exhausted. The guards take some of the weight off me, and for a long time no one says anything. Then, as if a timer has sounded, they start to talk with each other.

  “You get mandated yet?” one guard says.

  “Yep. Henderson banged out sick this morning.”

  “He ain’t sick.”

  “Don’t care. I need the overtime. You going out tonight, Roy, or you got your kid?”

  “No. The ex’s lawyer says no more visitations until I go to anger management. You believe that?” It’s Horvath’s voice, but I can’t see; he’s standing outside my field of vision.

  “Hah! You can go to Eboue and Samson’s group. Won’t cost you nothing, but you’ll have to read their damn books.”

  “You know Roy can’t read.”

  They all laugh. Abruptly the one on my back says, “Hey, this kid smells like puke!”

  “Maybe you squeezed him too hard, Croop.”

  “Ah, shit,” says Croop. “That’s why you let me have him. You suck, Horvath!”

  Horvath laughs. The weight on my back and legs is lifted, and Croop pulls me over onto my side. He says, “You stink, kid. Get up!” I rise stiffly and touch my cheek. It throbs and burns, but there’s no blood.

  “You’re fine,” he says, cuffing me on the back of my head. “But it’s time to man up.”

  What’s he mean, “man up”? I want to sit in the chair and cover my face with the palms of my hands. I want to lie down and curl into a tight, impenetrable ball. I want my life to be over. I’ve had enough.

  Horvath points at Freddie, who is stone-faced, sitting with his back against the wall.

  “Come on,” Horvath says. “We’re waiting for you, Peach!”

  Freddie stands, and the three of us walk down a long hallway lined with white cinder block walls and more tempered glass windows. Outside, on some kind of athletic field, a group of boys are gathered in a circle doing jumping jacks underneath a lead sky. Freddie tries to find me with his eyes to see if I’m okay, but I don’t want to look at him. I don’t want to look at anyone, because I’m not okay and I don’t think I can pretend for much longer.

  We pass heavy steel doors stenciled with the words ALPHA, DELTA, and CHARLIE. A line of boys walk in the opposite direction; they look straight ahead, like soldiers in cheap red and khaki uniforms. Horvath stops in front of the BRAVO door and taps Freddie’s shoulder with the antenna of his radio.

  “Just in case you forgot,” he says, “I run Bravo Unit.”

  “You’re senior YDC?” says Freddie.

  “Shut up. I didn’t ask you to talk. And it don’t matter who the senior is. This is my unit, and everybody knows it.” He leans toward Freddie, his bloated face inches away. “And I don’t want any bitching from you about the food, or the clothes, or the television shows. There ain’t going to be Dancing with the Stars or any other queer shit on the TV. We watch football or the History Channel.”

  Freddie scowls and moves toward the door, but the big man stays planted in his giant-sized work boots. “I’m not finished,” he says. “You can be a flaming pervert on the outside, but in here you better nut up and act like you’ve got a fucking pair.”

  Freddie breathes deep and says, “No more queer shit. Got it.”

  “Don’t curse at me, fruit. I’ll write your ass up, and you can start your time with negative points. Is that what you want?”

  “No,” Freddie says, dropping his eyes.

  “Look at me when I’m talking to you.”

  Slowly, painfully, Freddie looks up. His face is clenched in anger, and he holds the big guard’s gaze for a long, uncomfortable moment, like it’s a contest to see which of them will strike or look away first.

  No one strikes. No one looks away. Horvath grunts, says, “I’ll be watching you. Count on it.” He shakes his ring of keys and unlocks the heavy steel door to Bravo Unit, my new home.

  18

  Bravo is a big open room with plastic chairs, several shelves crammed with battered paperbacks and board games, and a Ping-Pong table. Red-shirted boys play cards and watch the History Channel on a small old-fashioned television set mounted on the wall. They turn to look at me, and I don’t see a single friendly face.

  A black guard with a silver hoop earring and a close-trimmed beard says, “Are you James?” He is tall and thin, and his uni
form looks crisp, unlike Horvath’s, which is wrinkled and darkened with patches of sweat.

  “Yes.”

  “Mr. Eboue,” he says with the slightest hint of an accent I’ve never heard before. African, maybe, or Caribbean. He sticks out his hand for a shake. “I’ll show you to your room and get you set up.” He points to my cheek. “Did that happen here?”

  I nod.

  “You’ll have to see the nurse, then. After dinner.”

  But I am only half listening, because I don’t trust him even though he seems nice. Because I can’t trust anyone. Not the guards, not the nurse, not the other kids. Freddie could be okay, but he did nothing while the guards beat me up. He watched.

  I check out my new room, number fifteen, which is walled with more white-painted cinder blocks. It’s got one narrow window looking out on the barbed-wire fence and parking lot. An empty fiberboard dresser. A cot with one pillow and a thin blue blanket.

  “You can clean up and relax,” he says, “but don’t close your door until bedtime. Any questions?”

  I turn away and lie facedown on my bed, trying not to cry. Don’t fucking cry, I tell myself, but it’s hard, because whatever it is I’m supposed to do at this place, I am pretty sure I can’t do it. I can’t “man up” or fit in with kids who are real criminals and gangbangers. What was I thinking, delivering drugs for Louis? What was he thinking when he asked me?

  I am a loser. I am scared and weak. I want to call Mr. Pfeffer and ask him what I’m supposed to do. I want to talk to him over cold root beers, and have him tell me that everything will be okay. I want him to give me new books, enough to last twelve months, so I can disappear into the pages and not have to deal with this place. I could read one book after the other, stopping only to eat, sleep, and do school or chores or whatever it is they do here. And I won’t have to talk to anyone, except for Freddie or Mr. Eboue. That would be a good plan.