She stuck her legs out and leaned back, not changing position when the swing rushed back.
Jimmy’s right. Swings are for boys.
Stupid girls.
Jason kept pushing and Dot kept leaning backward with her legs straight out. He pushed her for a long time.
Chapter Six
A week after Jimmy’s funeral, Mr. Kirby came over to pick Jason and his mom up at Grandma’s house. He started the car and looked back, making sure Jason had buckled his seatbelt. “Don’t do anything funny back there. These are leather seats.” He pulled away from the curb, turned downhill to Alvarado, got onto the freeway toward downtown. A minute later, he got off at Temple.
Jason liked reading the signs. He rubbed the side of his head, still itching like crazy. Rubbing worked okay. Mom had convinced him not to scratch. The stitches had been removed a couple of days earlier but sometimes it still itched like crazy.
Mr. Kirby turned into an alley, rolled down his window and stopped to take a slip of paper from a machine. He rolled up his window, a yellow gate went up and he drove under a big building into an underground parking garage. He drove past a lot of other cars, looking for a place to park.
Mom said, “Look, there’s a space.”
Mr. Kirby drove into the space and parked.
Mom turned to look at Jason but he couldn’t see her face. It was too dark. She said, “Okay, honey, we’re here.”
Jason unbuckled his seat belt and everybody got out.
Mom tried to take his hand but Jason pulled away. He was too old for that stuff. He was nine already. They walked down a wide aisle between cars and joined several other grownups, waiting for an elevator.
The elevator door opened, nobody in there, and the grownups rushed to see who could get inside first. Mr. Kirby held the door open.
Jason and his mom pushed their way into the large elevator, squeezing between people toward the back where there was plenty of room. Everybody else wanted to be in front.
Mr. Kirby stepped in last, pressed one of the buttons and the door closed. The elevator started moving up.
Mr. Kirby pushed through the people to be closer to Mom and looked at Jason. “You ever been in an elevator before?” He didn’t really care. His eyes were too dead to care.
“Of course. They’ve got one at the school administration building and one at the hospital. We’re going up to the fifth floor. I watched you push the button. I’m not stupid, you know.”
Mom rubbed his shoulder and smiled, asking him to calm down.
Some of the other grownups smiled at Jason and shook their heads, grinning. They knew Mr. Kirby was a poop head.
It’s okay. He’s not my dad.
The elevator stopped on the third floor and chimed. The door opened and three of the grownups got out.
A lady with a stack of brown folders stepped in and looked at the lighted numbers. She didn’t push anything. The door closed and the elevator moved up again. It stopped at the fifth floor, it chimed, the door opened, and Mr. Kirby said, “Excuse please.”
Jason pushed out first and waited in a wide corridor.
Mr. Kirby held Mom’s waist, pushing her in front.
Jason followed them down the wide corridor to a white haired man in a light gray suit. He'd been waiting.
Jason wore a dark blue suit.
Mr. Kirby shook the man’s hand. “Thanks for coming, Walt. This is Carolyn Potter, one of our authors.”
The man didn’t smile at Mr. Kirby but he did smile at Mom and shook her hand. “I’m Walter Emerick, Emerick, Bessel and Waters. We specialize in corporate law but I know the judge. We sponsored her into law school at U.S.C.” He held her hand, leaned closer, smiled a private kind of smile and winked. “Don’t let on I told you that.” He let go of Mom’s hand and looked at Jason, more serious now. “You must be Jason. I’ve heard quite a lot about you.”
“Like what?”
“Oh, that you’re a good student, that you don’t get into fights, that you’re really good at math and art, stuff like that.” He turned to Mr. Kirby, very serious. “We need to talk about that other thing.”
“Yeah, I know.” Mr. Kirby suddenly looked mad about something. “I’ll get with you guys right after the first of the month.”
Mr. Emerick stepped around Mr. Kirby's shoulder, getting face-to-face. “We’re climbing into some serious numbers, here. If not for your father . . .”
“Okay, Walt, right after the first.” They stood close, looking into each other like they wanted to start a fight.
Mr. Emerick finally shook his head and opened a glass door. The sign read, JUVENILE JUSTICE.
Mr. Emerick led them down another corridor to an office. The raised brass letters on the dark wood door read, JUANITA SANCHEZ.
Inside, they all stood in front of a desk where a woman wrote some notes into a long book. After she finished a line, she looked up and smiled. “Hi, Mr. Emerick. How nice to see you again. The judge is expecting you.” She stood and led them through another door and into a bigger office with windows.
Dressed in a black suit with pants but no tie, another woman stood from behind a large desk and smiled. She took and shook Mr. Emerick’s hand. “Hi, Walter. I’m so glad to see you. It’s been a long time.”
“You’ve come a long way, your honor.” Anybody could see they were friends.
“We’ll be video recording this session. That okay?”
After glancing at Mr. Kirby and Mom, Mr. Emerick nodded. Okay.
By now, the other woman had gone and closed the door. The lady in black motioned to a chair by her desk. “You must be Jason. I’m Juvenile Justice Juanita Sanchez. Do you know what that means?”
Her suit fascinated Jason. All three buttons had been fastened and looked like they might tear. Her boobs and belly pushed out so hard they formed folds in the fabric
