Rodman had Kelson drive to a cold white concrete building on the Southwest Side. The building housed the juvenile court and a temporary detention center. Blue wooden barricades blocked the street by the front doors.
‘No matter where they sent Bicho, they processed him through here,’ Rodman said.
When they went inside, the guard, a thin black man with a starched white shirt, came around from the metal detector and bumped fists with Rodman. ‘You come for Tyrice?’ the guard asked.
‘Nah, judge sent him out to Adams County.’
‘Sorry to hear that. You’ll check on DeShaun?’
‘Not today. This is my friend Sam Kelson. We’re here to see the big man.’
Kelson held a fist to bump the man’s too, but the man just narrowed his eyes as if Kelson was trying too hard. ‘Say hi to DeShaun if you got time,’ the man said to Rodman. ‘He could use it. And we got a couple new kids from that thing last night in Woodlawn.’
Then the man let them in, and Kelson said, ‘Who’re DeShaun and the “new kids”?’
‘I come to see the boys sometimes,’ Rodman said. ‘Talk to them. Scare them and give them hope.’
‘Huh. It do any good?’
‘I’ll tell you in about ten years.’
They went down a gray hall to the detention center director’s office. Charlie Jenkins, the man who worked in it, stood about five eight with glasses perched on top of his bald head. He bumped fists with Rodman too.
Rodman explained Kelson’s situation and said, ‘He needs a favor.’
Instead of pulling up Bicho’s record on his computer, the director looked Kelson in the eyes and said, ‘The boys here are animals, most of them. They’ve got all the problems of grown men, plus a kind of kid insanity. We put them here to keep them safe from adults, though, and, except for the worst of them, we let them out at eighteen or twenty-one because maybe they’ve grown out of it. A lot of them are every bit as vicious as the worst of the men. But like all animals, they do what they do because it’s what they are – you can’t really blame them for ripping up their prey. So I protect my boys. Maybe that makes no sense to you?’
‘Makes plenty,’ Kelson said. ‘I do what I do because I am what I am too.’
Rodman said, ‘Charlie and I disagree on the animal part.’
‘Yeah,’ the director said, ‘wild cats are gentler than some of these boys.’ Then to Kelson, ‘This Alejandro Rodriguez is dead? That doesn’t change my legal obligation to him. I want you to understand what you’re asking me to do.’ He looked from Kelson to Rodman and back. Then he went to his computer and sat. He said, ‘When DeMarcus first came and wanted to visit the boys, I told him the same thing, isn’t that right?’
‘Word for word,’ Rodman said.
‘How many times you come before I let you in?’
‘Four?’ Rodman said.
‘Something like.’ And then to Kelson, ‘So you understand, DeMarcus has saved more than a couple of boys from themselves. I’m doing this for them and for him – because he asked for it. You understand? Because if this comes back on me and hurts me, that hurts the boys, and, vicious as they are, that would be as bad as hurting an innocent animal.’
‘I can’t make any promises,’ Kelson said.
The man took his fingers off the keyboard.
Rodman laughed. ‘Just the way he talks.’
The man said to Kelson, ‘Are you fucking around?’
‘No, sir,’ Kelson said.
‘Because I’m not fucking around,’ the man said.
Five minutes later, the printer kicked out sixteen pages. It was a small portion of what Venus Johnson could give Kelson, but when the assistant director handed it to him, he felt as if the man might be saving his life – and he told him so.
‘Just don’t let it come back on me or my boys,’ the man said.
Kelson and Rodman sat in the car and read the file. Mostly it gave dates and numbers – the January day when a judge remanded Bicho to temporary detention, the August day when Bicho left for the Kewanee Youth Center, the schedule and quantities of Zoloft the nurse dispensed to him, and a meal schedule for a period of time when he was isolated from the other boys. A page of infractions listed three incidents over a period of two months – all for fights in the cafeteria, the third of which led to the isolation. A visitor list mentioned an ‘uncle’ – nameless – who came once a week. Toselli’s words returned to Kelson – Someone loved the kid a lot – the kind of love that makes a person violent. ‘Got to find the uncle,’ Kelson said.
‘Uh-huh,’ Rodman said.
A separate page gave an intake evaluation completed by a social worker three days after Bicho entered the facility.
Physical Health – good
Intelligence – high
Sociability/Social Characteristics – manipulative
Emotional/Psychological Status – paranoia? Depression (refer for further evaluation)
Suicide Risk – moderate
Family – uncle, grandmother. Mother and father deceased. 0 siblings
Support Range – low
Education – completed 9th
Acquaintances Currently at Detention Center – 0
Another page listed the charges that landed Bicho in detention. There were four, all involving drugs – one for marijuana possession, one for possession of Ecstasy, and two for selling cocaine. Kelson recognized none of the arresting cops’ names.
The final page contained contact information for Bicho’s lawyer, a man named Rob Chalmers, surprising only because he came from a private firm instead of the Public Defender’s Office.
‘See anything?’ Kelson asked Rodman.
‘Just the uncle and the jump the boy made from kid-stuff dealing to serious business by the time he shot you.’
Kelson said, ‘Want to go talk to his lawyer?’
‘You do that. I’m going to go back in and see DeShaun and the new kids.’
‘I’m fighting a clock,’ Kelson said.
‘What did you say about me doing this my way and you doing it yours?’
‘I’m scared.’
‘Yeah,’ Rodman said. ‘You should be.’
‘Thanks for the boost.’
‘You do it your way, and I do it mine.’