Hendrix
“Let me make sure I have this correct.” Cynthia leans forward, places her elbows on the table and has this starry-eyed take-me-to-bed expression that’s going to get me into trouble. So far, my brother isn’t nibbling the bait, but I don’t have much luck left. Axle hooking up with someone involved in my future won’t do me any favors.
“You’ve taken on custody of not only Hendrix, but your younger sister, as well?”
Axle is in the folding chair next to me, and he draws his long legs in as she edges farther in his direction. Cynthia introduced herself as my “handler” when we arrived ten minutes ago for the press conference. She’s in a pink dress top, black pants and suit coat, and she’s good-looking. Not as beautiful as Elle, though. Not as charismatic either.
My lips slightly edge up at remembering the fire in her eyes when she described her idea of taking out those guys with a baseball. I almost stepped back because I wanted to see her do it.
Have to admit, the girl put the fear of God into me. She had the most intimidating blue eyes. Eyes that made my heart pound, eyes that made me feel like she saw past my skin and into every crack, crevice and shadow. Eyes that made me feel alive. Eyes that also made me want to hide.
Girls like that are one in a billion. Shots with girls like that are even rarer. Another tally mark in the column of things I lost.
Cynthia laughs too loudly, and my brother and I share a side-eye-what-the-hell because Axle’s comment about feeling too young to be a dad wasn’t funny.
For the fifth time since I put on the white button-down shirt, black dress pants and tie, I pull at the collar. Between the humidity and the pressure at my neck, I feel like I’m choking. The convention center is air-conditioned, but there’s also a thousand people worth of body heat.
We’re sitting at a table near center stage. When Axle and I first got here, a group of kids were tap-dancing. They’ve left, so have their parents, and now reporters with cameras are preparing for the press conference. Time feels like it’s speeding up while my thoughts are slowing down.
“Yes,” Axle says to bring the conversation back around. “To taking on Holiday and Drix.”
“You’re so giving.” Cynthia twirls her black hair around her finger. She’s about Axle’s age, and I don’t know if it should bother me how inexperienced she acts for her job. Flirting with the older brother of the person you’re in charge of should be at the top of the Don’t Do playbook. “Not many people would give up so much of their life for their family.”
I can’t argue with that, but I’d still like her to leave us alone.
“How does your girlfriend feel about all this?”
Axle’s chair squeaks when he scoots back. “I’m single.”
“I didn’t know. Sorry.” Cynthia appears anything but sorry as she scribbles a few notes. “I know you said your father is out of the picture. How about Hendrix’s mother?”
“They both gave custody to me,” Axle says.
“I’m aware, but are they both out of the picture?”
“Legally,” Axle answers, and I glance at him from the corner of my eye. He and I haven’t talked about my mom or our dad yet. I haven’t heard from Mom since my first month in juvie. Odds are she’s drinking away her problems. That’s where she was before I moved in with her, and where she was while I lived with her. Can’t imagine that’s changed. For Dad—Axle, Holiday and I have never been more than playmates for when he was alone and bored.
“Legally?” Raised eyebrow on her part.
“They won’t be problems.”
Satisfied with the answer, she moves on. “Do you want to run through what you’re going to say again, Hendrix?”
I didn’t want to go through it the first time. “No.”
Cynthia’s cell vibrates. She checks the message then lands her narrowed gaze on me. “You say exactly what’s on that sheet. Feel free to read from it onstage. No one expects you to have it memorized. We will open it up to the press, and I have two reporters who have agreed to ask my questions. I have a few prepared answers typed up for you. Memorize those so you can rattle them off. Those I don’t want you to read from the paper.”
Axle frowns. “That happens? People are okay with you prepping the media?”
She waves his question away. “It’s not something we do often, but we do want to seem transparent with this program. With Hendrix only being seventeen, we have two reporters who agreed to take it easy on him and ask simple questions. Oh, and, Axle, make sure you give me Hendrix’s cell number.”
“I don’t have a cell,” I say.
“I know.” A bat of her eyelashes at Axle. “The moment you get it, Axle, I need that number. I have to be able to reach Hendrix to give him plans. But, of course, I’ll use your cell in the meantime. And, Hendrix?”
Axle’s phone pings, and a dark shadow crosses his face.
“What’s wrong?” I ask in a low tone. Cynthia’s close enough to hear, but she’s not included in this conversation.
Axle slides his cell to me. The text is from Dominic: Holiday’s boyfriend showed.
Fantastic. Last I checked, the ass wasn’t invited. “Go.”
“Drix,” Axle starts, but I shake my head.
“Go. I’m good.” My sister is more important than being grilled by my handler.
There’s a pout to Cynthia’s mouth, and she gives sad eyes when she tells my brother goodbye. Cynthia watches him leave, and when she turns back to me, she giggles over some joke no one told. It all seems forced, and it places me on edge. I drum my fingers on the table.
“You know Marcus would have been a better fit for your poster child. He was the real leader.” I don’t know why I say it other than it’s the truth. Marcus was my best friend through this past year’s entire ordeal.
Cynthia regards me with interest, as if she’s shocked I might have something intelligent to add to any conversation. “The position of spokesperson came down to you and Marcus, but the governor and his team believed you would be the better fit.”
“He was the real leader.”
“You became one, as well.”
“I only became one because he pushed me to be better.”
She flips her cell phone in her hand as she weighs our conversation. “The home life you have returned to is more stable than his. We believe that means you have a better shot of being successful in your return to society. It doesn’t mean Marcus won’t be successful, but it will be a tougher road.”
“Should you be telling me this?” I ask, if only to annoy her like she annoys me. “Doesn’t that break confidentiality?”
“I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know.”
True story. Marcus and I became tight, and the program’s aware of this, even commenting on it several times. Thinking of him causes a sense of uneasiness, as if I’m unbalanced. I haven’t heard from him yet. Yeah, it hasn’t been long, but after talking to someone day in and day out for a year, I miss him.
“So I spoke with your therapist from the program,” she says, “and he told me how you floated the idea of applying for the youth performing arts program at Henderson High School as part of your reentry strategy.”
Oddly enough, there’s a silver lining to Holiday’s boyfriend showing—I never told Axle of my plans to apply to the youth performing arts program for my senior year. I haven’t told him yet that there’s a scrap of me that’s considering applying for college. Before the arrest, my entire life was living one high to the next. No future. Just living in that minute. Going wherever my emotions dictated.
“You know this is a private high school, correct?”
I nod.
“You’re hoping for one of the scholarship spots?”
I nod again.
“I know that the program promised to help in any way they could with securing your future goals. Specifically, I know that there had been some conversation of pushing along your application to help you secure an audition, but after much discussion, the governor’s office doesn’t feel that would be the best course of action.
“The performing arts program is extremely selective, and the competition to gain one of those spots into the school is fierce, especially with a transfer student about to start their senior year. Our involvement would send the wrong message to critics of the Second Chance Program, and alienate parents and students who have worked hard to claim those spots. So, instead, we are highly encouraging you to apply on your own. If you receive a spot in the program and are awarded money to go, won’t it feel good to know you did it all on your own?”
She smiles then. Big white teeth against red lipstick. I didn’t know I had hope until my gut twists. Getting in on my own. Like that’ll happen. Will they trash my application when they see my transcript that’s C’s and below, or will they deep-six me when they read my essay of what I did on my summer vacation in juvenile detention?
“I agreed to being your poster child, and you guys agreed to get me the audition.” I can hold my own in the audition. There might not be much substance to me, but I’m good at music.
My current high school is a holding cell for teens between stints in juvie. If I want more for my life, then I’ve got to start making some major moves fast. Music was the only good thing about me before the arrest. Maybe music will keep me on track. That youth performing arts program was my best hope at building a résumé that could possibly get me into college. “I never asked for you to get me in. I only asked for the audition.”
“Well, we can’t,” Cynthia snaps, and after she briefly closes her eyes she returns to fake cheerful. “We would love to help, but you’re our model for the Second Chance Program. Hopefully, the entire state will know who you are soon and will know that the governor’s program is successful. But we can’t do anything that will bring criticism to the program. That includes the governor’s office calling in a favor. These things get leaked. How the public and media perceive this program is crucial. I’m sorry, but this is how it has to be.”
“You think they’re going to give an audition to a juvenile delinquent?”
“Your records are sealed.”
“But my transcript will speak for itself, as well as any explanation on time gaps in my education. Part of being in the program was your promise to help all of us in our future plans. Since I’m your circus monkey, that promise no longer applies to me? If so, I’m not seeing the benefit of going onstage.”
“Being the spokesperson was part of your plea deal. You’re choosing to see this in a negative light. You have no idea how this will play out until you apply for the program. Try thinking positively. Good things will happen if you remain positive.”
I stand abruptly, the seat beneath me cracking against the floor with the movement. “I’m going to let you in on a secret—hoping and wishing food would appear when I was younger didn’t work. Scamming people outside of grocery stores did. So I do know how it’s going to play out. The boy who has nothing is once again going to get screwed.”
Not how I should be talking to my handler, but it’s better than the string of four-letter words I’d rather be yelling.
My therapist told me when I couldn’t handle my emotions to remove myself from the situation. So I turn away from Cynthia and begin to walk.
“Don’t go far,” she calls out.
She shouldn’t worry. That leash she has me on is so tight it’s cutting off blood flow, and it’s so damn short, I’m surprised I haven’t fallen prone to the ground. At least now I know the score, and once again I’m on the losing end.