You were wrong, Uncle Ben.
It's maybe the millionth time he's thought it since he came here, but he can't seem to stop. Like he has mental Tourette's, the thought just bursts out of his brain, five, ten, fifty times a day. While he's scrubbing dishes. While he's bouncing the half-deflated basketball off the back wall with Felipe. While he's clicking aimlessly through homeschool courses in the musty attic, where Ms. Charlise keeps the computer.
He thinks it now, staring at the snapped cross-support on the bunk above his and half-hoping the whole thing will just collapse on top of him.
It probably wouldn't kill him, though.
Springs creak. The support groans, but holds. Felipe's face looms out of the darkness over the side of the top bunk.
"Hey, ese," he whispers, "you awake?"
Peter props himself up on his elbows.
"I'm always awake, man. What's up?"
Felipe jerks his head at the other bed. Across the minuscule space of the bedroom, a second set of bunk beds holds just one occupant. Peter gropes for his glasses and sees that said occupant is curled on his side, facing the wall and shaking with silent tears.
He sighs, looks at Felipe. Felipe shrugs.
"You got the golden touch, my man," he says, "I'll just make things worse."
"Yeah, I got it."
Peter gets out of bed. Crouches next to the other one and whispers, "Hey. Hey, new kid. You okay?"
The new kid rolls over, tears shining in the moonlight filtering through the window, which has no curtain. He startles when he sees Peter and tries to press himself against the wall. Peter holds his hands up.
"Woah," he says, "hey, it's okay. I'm not gonna hurt you. I just wanna make sure you're alright. Are you alright, kid?"
Felipe drops to the floor behind Peter. The new kid's wide eyes flicker toward him, reflecting fear, but Peter holds his own gaze steady until the kid meets it and shakes his head.
"I don't know," he whispers.
The new kid arrived after dinner, dropped off by his CPS worker and a cop right as the other boys, Peter included, were getting ready for bed.
Just like Peter was six weeks ago.
"Yeah, that's how most people feel on their first night. You got a name?"
"Arnold."
Felipe whistles dubiously, but silences himself at Peter's glare.
"Hey Arnold, I'm Peter." Peter offers a hand and Arnold takes it nervously. "This is Felipe. He's not as much of a dick as he seems."
"Hey, I take offense at that, Pedro. I'm hung."
"He is disgusting, though." Peter rolls his eyes and turns back to Arnold. "How old are you?"
"Eleven," Arnold says, voice so small it's almost inaudible.
"Yikes." Felipe crouches next to Peter on the floor. "Eleven years old and practically in the big house? What'd you do to get here, Arnoldo?"
"It's um, it's Arnold."
"Nah, I'm pretty sure it's Arnoldo."
"That's just Felipe, Arnold, ignore him."
Felipe holds his hands out, innocent.
"Hey," he says, "if I gotta spend the rest of my life getting called Phillip by gringos, some of your gringos are gonna go by your Spanish names, comprende?"
"Believe it or not, that means he likes you."
Felipe grins at Peter, then looks back at Arnold.
"So, Arnoldo, what'd you do? Knife a guy?"
Arnold shrugs and looks at his hands.
"No need to be modest, my man. You wanna hear how we got slapped with this sentence? See, I'm a victim of an unjust system" —Peter snorts— "but Pedro here? He's a mad dog. Real crazy. He should probably be in supermax, but he turned those big brown eyes of his on the officer that arrested him and instead they sent him here to put the rest of us in the line of fire, can you believe that?"
Arnold looks at Peter, shrinking back again but at the same time looking doubtfully at Peter's narrow shoulders, his mussy, too-long hair, and his pallid skin. Peter rolls his eyes again.
"He's lying, Arnold."
"I sure as hell ain't," says Felipe. "Mad Dog Pedro pushed an old lady down some stairs, Arnoldo. Just 'cuz he fuckin' felt like it."
"There were no stairs."
"That's what the police report said, though. I keep tellin' you, my man, you gotta own it. Mark your territory. Older kids aren't gonna fuck with you if they think you kill old ladies for fun."
"And yet somehow I don't want that to be my reputation," says Peter. "If marking territory is so important, why have you never told us what you did, Felipe?"
Felipe whistles again, lowly.
"Like I said," he says. "Victim of the system."
"Um," says Arnold.
They both turn to look at him.
"Is the food good here?" he asks. "I'm… they didn't give me dinner. At the station, I mean. And when I got here…"
Peter glances at Felipe just as his bunkmate's expression goes dark.
"You stick with us, Arnold," says Peter, "and you're gonna be just fine. You should get some sleep, okay?"
Peter gets to his feet. Felipe looks like he'd like to say something else, but Peter shakes his head and Felipe closes his mouth and climbs back into the upper bunk, scowling.
Peter gets back into his own bed. Takes his glasses off. Stares at the broken support.
"You are allowed to defend yourself," says Uncle Ben, his voice as loud as it is silent.
"You were wrong, Uncle Ben," Peter whispers.
Uncle Ben doesn't reply.
Now that Arnold is here, there are five boys at the halfway house, including Peter. Justin is tall and black and almost eighteen, and as such he doesn't talk much—staying out of trouble until his birthday, according to Felipe. Ryan is nearly as silent, though white, and as broad as Justin is tall. But where Justin's silence is brooding and solitary, Ryan's seems to be a result of extreme stupidity, and is punctuated only by an occasional random fist, if one is unlucky enough to catch him alone in the hallway, or the living room. The first thing Felipe did when Peter arrived at the house was warn him to stay out of Ryan's way, so that's the first thing Peter does for Arnold as they walk down to breakfast the next day.
Sure enough, Ryan scowls as the three of them troupe into the kitchen, and Arnold hurries to take the seat furthest from his at the table. Justin is nowhere to be seen, but Mr. Leonard is there, and Karen is leaning over the stove, and she smiles as the younger boys take their seats.
"Good morning, boys," says Karen, while Ryan remains silent.
Karen and Mr. Leonard are the Monday-Wednesday-Friday day shifters. Mr. Leonard mostly stands in the corners, staring at his phone, but Peter likes Karen. At nineteen she is almost as short as Peter, black, and a little chubby. Karen wears a constant smile and is the only provider who doesn't talk to the boys like they're sewer scum. She's the one not-horrible part of living in the halfway house, which has been Peter's home since the Arlingtons surrendered custody.
Even though they decided not to press charges—after the officer in charge of Peter's case cited the average court fees for a case like Peter's, interestingly enough—just the accusation of felony assault (which, according to the Arlingtons, was what Peter committed) can't be expunged from his record until he's eighteen. The lack of a conviction makes no difference.
There are very few foster families who want to take fourteen-year-olds as it is, but there are even fewer willing to take fourteen-year-olds who have been accused of shoving women down flights of stairs.
So they sent Peter here.
If someone had told him just two months ago that he would miss living with the Arlingtons, Peter would have laughed in their face. But that was before he'd been introduced to halfway-house living.
There are no more excursions to see Ned. There are no more excursions period, because the boys aren't allowed to leave the premises, except for chaperoned "field trips" every other weekend, which usually means that the boys who have outgrown their clothes go to Goodwill with one of the providers. Peter doesn't even know if Ned knows where he's gone, because besides the homeschool website, which they visit in turns, the internet is fully blocked on the ancient computer in the attic. And even though they get two supervised phone calls on the house phone each week, Peter never memorized Ned's number like he did Ben's. And May's.
(He called her again, once, his first week here, only to discover that her number had been reassigned. Peter hung up before the old man who acquired it could finish telling him he had the wrong one, then spent the next two weeks biting his knuckles against the shame of having made the same mistake again.)
Somehow, the isolation and the boredom and the confinement aren't the worst parts. The worst part is—
"Is this it?" Ryan grunts as Karen places a plate on the table in front of him.
Loathe though Peter is to agree with Ryan, today's breakfast is especially pitiful: it consists of a single hard-boiled egg and a half piece of wheat toast, unbuttered.
Karen grimaces.
"Sorry, guys," she says, sounding genuinely apologetic. "They haven't adjusted for the new guy yet, it might be slim pickings for a couple of days."
Peter glances at Arnold, who is clearly trying not to cry as he looks down at his own egg, and then at Felipe, who has an expression to match Peter's thoughts: this has nothing to do with Arnold.
Peter lowers his head. Pokes at his egg.
He's done defending himself. What good does it do?
What good has it ever done?
("Ese," Felipe said Peter's first night, while both of them lay awake with growling stomachs, Peter biting back regret at ever having complained about the meals at the duplex, "that's just the way things are.")
The jangle of keys makes everyone look up: a Pavlovian response. Except instead of food the boys—and Karen, who is sitting at the coffee table, playing go-fish with Peter and Felipe and Arnold while Justin skulks in the ratty armchair in the corner—are greeted by the sight of Ms. Charlise, emerging from her office for the first time today.
They call Ms. Charlise the headmistress, but Peter has yet to work out the logic behind the title. For one, this stuffy brick oven of a house is about as far from a school as it's possible to be. For another—and more importantly—Ms. Charlise doesn't do anything, as far as he can tell, except stay in that so-called office, which doubles as her bedroom, shouting muffled curses into her telephone and emerging three times a day to check the locks on the doors, the windows, and, of course, the refrigerator. The only reason he can come up with is that Ms. Charlise is the only staff member who stays on the premise at all times, and that she might possibly own the house—but this last is just a guess, because Ms. Charlise does her best never to speak to them unless she absolutely has to.
She's in full form this morning as she locks the office door behind her. She doesn't even glance at them as she shuffles past them on her way to the kitchen, keys clanging against her hip, where she keeps them looped through her belt. She also doesn't comment on the fact that Mr. Leonard is nowhere to be seen, even though technically there are supposed to be two providers with the boys at all times (he's outside, taking his fourth long smoke break of the morning).
Arnold looks at Peter with a question in his eyes, but Peter just shakes his head. With Ms. Charlise, it's better to accept the silence.
But apparently, Karen does not agree. Just as Ms. Charlise sidles past Justin—who doesn't even glance up from his book—she gets to her feet.
"Ma'am!" she says, and Ms. Charlise turns around slowly, her pouchy, red-rimmed eyes raking Karen's youthful face with unmistakable dislike. "Good morning." It's almost afternoon. "I was wondering if I could speak with you for a moment."
"I have a very busy day coming up."
Ms. Charlise turns toward the door.
"We have a new resident this morning, Ms. Charlise," says Karen.
Peter admires her gall. Ms. Charlise's glare reminds him of Mrs. Arlington, makes his chest contract with phantom tightness every time she is in the room. But Karen holds her ground and doesn't falter, even when Ms. Charlise barely glances at Arnold and then turns her obvious irritation on her employee.
"If there's nothing else."
Once again she turns away.
"Actually" —Karen steps forward— "I'd really like to talk to you about our meals budget. Maybe we could go into your office and—"
"The budget is fixed," says Ms. Charlise, not even bothering to turn around this time. "If you have a problem, take it up with the state."
She takes another step toward the door. Peter's respect for Karen ratchets up another notch when the younger woman, undeterred, sidles around the coffee table to stand between the headmistress and the doorway, forcing Ms. Charlise to look her in the eye.
"Except, ma'am," she says, "except, I've looked at the budget, and I see what we have on-site, and I just can't imagine—"
"That's outside your duties, Ms. Anders."
"Well, yes, but it's public record and—"
Ms. Charlise's eyes jolt away from Karen's face to look at Ryan, who has just appeared in the doorway, a hulking shadow.
Her scowl deepens.
"And where have you been, Mr. Overton?" she snaps. "I thought your case worker agreed that social time is to be a firm aspect of your rehabilitation."
Ryan snarls in reply, making the three younger boys sitting around the coffee table recoil. Ms. Overton doesn't even blink, just pushes Karen out of the way and goes to stand toe-to-toe with her largest, most intimidating resident, even though her head only rises to his chest.
"Do I need to write you up again, Mr. Overton?" she says. "Because if I recall, one more citation could indicate that your parole was granted prematurely. Should I inform your case worker that you enjoy incarceration more than you enjoy following a simple rule?"
"Ms. Charlise, please, it was Ryan's turn on the computer. I told him he could—"
Ms. Charlise sticks a hand into Karen's face to silence her, still glaring up at Ryan.
"Well?" she says.
Ryan's sneer deepens, and there is a collective holding of breath. For a second Peter is certain there is going to be a fight. He scoots closer to Arnold, blocking him from view. Then—
"Sorry, ma'am," Ryan grunts, and he takes a lumbering step to the side, out of Ms. Charlise's way.
Her keys clink as she shoulders past him.
They all listen until she disappears down the hallway, and don't exhale until they hear the front door open and close, then the clunk of the key turning in the lock.
Ryan stands in the hallway, gazing after her with an inscrutable expression until Karen steps forward and puts a hand on his arm.
"Come on, Ryan, we can—"
Ryan jerks her hand off.
Peter starts to rise, then scolds himself. Keep your head down, Parker.
"Back off, bitch," Ryan says, and before Karen can say anything to stop him, he disappears up the narrow stairs that lead to the bedrooms on the upper level.
Karen stares after him, her back to the living room, and Peter can tell from the way her shoulders shake that she is gathering herself. But when she turns back, it's with a smile, which lingers on a struck-looking Arnold the longest.
"I'm really sorry about that, boys," she says.
Justin shrugs and goes back to his book. Peter can't think of anything to say, especially not when he can feel Arnold trembling slightly beside him.
"Ah, fuck them Miss K," says Felipe. "We all know you a homegirl. It isn't your fault this place is a shithole."
Arnold looks even more shocked, but Peter and Karen give identical shaky laughs.
"Language," she says, resuming her seat next to Arnold and placing a hand on his knee so subtly Peter wouldn't see it if he weren't looking for it. "I still work at this shithole, you know."
"Yeah, and we live here. Ain't none of us can really talk shit, but all I'm saying is you're allowed, Miss K. I can't speak for Pedro and Arnoldo, but I for one am no snitch."
"Uh, seconded," says Peter, picking up his cards. "On the, um, not being a snitch part. Even felons have to have some morals, right?"
They all laugh this time.
It's the one thing that the halfway house has against the Arlingtons: at least here, Peter isn't alone.
That the halfway house is like an oven is no exaggeration. There is no air conditioning. The windows are all locked shut.
Peter has been here since June. He thought the heat couldn't be worse than it was in July, when the boys all had to wear sandals anytime they were on the hardwood floors in the hallways, to avoid scalding their feet.
Then August arrived.
In August, the humidity makes the air so heavy breathing it is like having a continuous asthma attack. Their urine is "fuckin' sludge" (Felipe's words) no matter how much water they drink, because they are all sweating it out faster than they could hope to replenish it. If Peter stands up too quickly, he has to grip whatever wall or furniture is nearest to stave off the inevitable wave of lightheadedness.
None of the boys complain. Even Arnold knows, by the end of his first week, there's nothing to be done.
When Karen is on shift, she does what she can to mitigate the heat. She lets them into the yard, where the air is just slightly lighter than it is indoors, and they all take turns drenching each other with the garden hose and pilfering the little pockets of shade cast by the high, barbed-wire fence and the houses next door. It's just enough to keep them from going insane.
At night, though, there's no escape.
The Friday after Arnold arrives, Peter is lying on top of his covers, unsure if he is half asleep or just torpid from heat and hunger and dehydration. On nights when he can't sleep—which is every night—he recounts the plots of the movies he and Ben used to watch over and over until the words turn into pictures and the pictures to dreams, and in this way he can usually claim a few hours of rest before the wasp-sting of morning sun turns the sodden heat of night into something sharp.
Tonight's tale is It Came From Outer Space. After the Chitauri attack his parents had forbidden Peter from watching it, but their reticence had only encouraged Ben. "If we can't watch cinematic masterpieces like this," said Ben, "then those alien bastards have already won." It never failed to make younger Peter laugh.
Tonight, older Peter watches in his mind's eye as the malformed, cycloptic alien lands.
Just as it does, a shadow looms up over his bed.
First, Peter thinks he's entered the hazy twilight that occurs before sleep, where dreams meld with reality.
Then he realizes Ryan is standing over his bed, and he yelps.
Ryan claps a hand over Peter's mouth, but not before his roommates hear. Arnold shoots up like a geyser and knocks his head on the bunk above his; Felipe scrambles out of the top bunk with a "What the fuck, man!" and grabs Ryan's arm.
Peter fully expects Ryan to hit him. But as soon as Felipe touches him, Ryan releases Peter, hissing, "Shut the fuck up!"
The three younger boys freeze, staring up at Ryan, waiting. For a minute, he lapses back into his intimidating silence, considering each of them in turn. Then he reaches into his pocket.
Felipe and Peter both start forward, but when Ryan's hand emerges it is not holding a weapon but a silver key, which gleams in the moonlight.
"What's that?" whispers Arnold.
"It's a fucking key, dumbass."
"Yeah, but what's it go to, pendejo?" says Felipe.
His tone is irritable, but he looks just like Peter feels: curious.
Ryan narrows his eyes. "Charlise's office."
"No fucking way."
Now Felipe can't keep the admiration out of his voice. Even Peter, whose heart is still thumping uncomfortably, leans forward to inspect the key, ignoring his own discomfort as he enters the perimeter of Ryan's reach.
"How'd you get it?" he says, groping for his glasses. Ryan's scowl, apparently a permanent feature, gains clarity.
"Grabbed it when the bitch hip-checked me in the hall."
"And she hasn't noticed it's gone?"
"She keeps doubles of all of them. This is just the spare."
In spite of himself, Peter starts to feel impressed too. Ryan's fingers must be far more nimble than their thickness would suggest. He wonders if that's why Ryan is in here.
Felipe sits on the bed next to Peter, who has known his bunk-mate long enough now to know when he is affecting casualness. Felipe's shoulders might be slumped, but his fingertips drum on the bedspread, sending vibrations up and down Peter's spine.
"So what?" says Felipe. "You come here to shank us with it? Because I gotta say, my man, when they say size doesn't count they're actually referring to—"
"Justin," says Ryan, "is a fucking pussy."
"What, he didn't follow through when you dared him to kiss you?"
Ryan does punch Felipe now, gives him a charlie horse on the upper arm that's not enough to leave a bruise but is enough to make Felipe yelp.
Peter gets to his feet, stands between Felipe and Ryan.
"Get to the point then, sea-monster," he says. "Not all of us are goons who don't need sleep."
Peter is immediately surprised by his own audacity. In the swarm of adrenaline, the mouthiness he thought he'd lost the night Ben died rises up before he can stop it.
He braces himself for a charlie horse of his own, but Ryan doesn't hit him.
"I need your help," he says.
"What?"
"Help, dickless. Help." He shakes the key in Peter's face. "Justin said no, so I need one of you twerps. And I've heard Karen talk about you. She says you're smart."
Peter glances sidelong at Felipe just in time to see him look at his lap. Peter knows Felipe has a crush on Karen, but Peter doesn't mention it; just swallows and looks back at Ryan.
"What kind of help?"
"Charlise lies about the food."
Peter's boldness transmutes to queasiness in an instant.
"I mean, probably, but—"
"Not probably. She's got a second fridge in her office. I was in there two weeks ago getting written up and I saw it. She left it open and everything. It's full-sized, and it's fucking loaded. She says we got no money in the budget, but she has enough food in that goddamn room of hers to feed the Upper East Side, and she's fucking hoarding it."
There is a moment of sharp silence. Even Arnold scoots closer now, his eyes shining with something Peter hasn't seen in them since he arrived: hope.
"Are you fuckin' serious?" says Felipe.
Ryan nods.
"I'm gonna get in," he says. "On Monday, when she does her errands. But I can't do it by myself. I need someone to distract the providers, and keep lookout." He nods at Peter, pocketing the key. "So. You in?"
For a second, all of Peter's mind is occupied by the thought of a full fridge. Soda, cookies, sandwiches—hell, at this point he would probably sell his own clothes for a fresh salad. He's grown so accustomed to the constant, gnawing hunger he almost can't remember what it's like to feel fully sated. And if Ms. Charlise really is dipping into their budget to buy food for herself—
You're allowed to defend yourself Peter.
The image sloughs away.
"No," says Peter.
Felipe and Arnold's faces go slack, while Ryan's immediately assumes an expression of fury.
"Pedro, what the hell?" says Felipe. "You can't be serious, man."
But Peter sets his jaw, widens his stance, and meets Ryan's eye.
"If we get caught, we all get stuck here even longer," he says. "Ms. Charlise even said it, if Ryan gets written up again he gets a longer sentence. Maybe they even send us to actual jail."
"Peter," says Felipe, gaping. It's the first time he's used Peter's real name. "It's food, ese, it's not like we're robbing the goddamn Queen of England. How can you not want food ? You're the skinniest fuckin' kid here!"
Meeting Felipe's eye is harder than meeting Ryan's, but Peter forces himself to nonetheless.
"Trust me," he says, "it's only going to make things worse. It always does. You stand up for yourself" —
(Peter, lunging toward the gun right as Ben steps in front of him, pushes him back)
(Peter, hands thrown out to stop a descending blow, his lungs empty)
(Peter, handcuffed and alone, head hanging as his social worker appears to tell him he's no longer wanted)
— "and things get worse. They always get worse."
He looks at Ryan.
"I'm out."
Ryan opens his mouth and Peter forces himself not to flinch, certain he's about to get his ass kicked. But before Ryan can respond, Felipe cuts in.
"I'll do it."
Peter's stomach sinks, but when he turns to Felipe, his bunk-mate's eyes are hard and unyielding, and looking not at Peter but at Ryan.
"Fuck the haters," Felipe says, "just tell me what to do."