Growing Like a Tree

CH-8

I was a bookish kid. I was always described by other kids as “the quiet one” because I didn’t talk much. I spent my time with my nose in a book when I wasn’t quietly people-watching. I wanted to be a lawyer when I got older. I read case files sometimes for fun. Being the one in the role of the criminal was something I never imagined I would ever experience, but it happened. The time I spent at the police station became a blur in my memory with a few vivid bits standing out.

Chase acted his worst. He swore and kicked at the officers that took us in, and he kept swearing at them at the top of his voice. He shouted profanities at other officers that looked in on us when we were at the station. I remember begging him in whispers to stop. At that time, I was closer to tears than my pride would let me admit afterwards. He stopped when we were alone but started up again whenever an officer came into the room.

“What is wrong with you?! Just don’t say anything else! You’ll only get us in more trouble!” I hissed after his last outburst.

He sat down on the floor as though he had collapsed into himself.

“I can’t go home Max.” He didn’t look at me while he said that. He hung his head between his knees.

I swallowed the tears that had lumped up in my throat and closed my eyes.

“Stick to the plan,” he whispered hoarsely. “You don’t know anything. I’ll take all the blame.”

He didn’t say anything to me after that. My parents got to the station first, so the police took me to a separate room to question me. He cussed out the officer that came to get me.

I did like Chase told me. I told them I had no idea he had those things in his bag when they asked if I knew how he got possession of the gun. It wasn’t hard for me to seem like a kid terrified that I would be sent to jail for something a twelve-year-old shouldn’t be involved in. They let me go with my parents after they accepted my lie. I spent the rest of the day in bed, miserable because I was in huge trouble, and terrified for Chase. All I could think about was the way he had caved in on himself before he told me he would take all the blame. The image of him sitting on the floor his head between his knees in a jail cell haunted me.

I didn’t know his mother well enough to imagine how she would react, but I knew the kind of reaction Chase was expecting from his father. My father yelled at me. I was grounded and got so many chores assigned to me I thought my parents intended to work me until I dropped. I had to listen to lecture after lecture about how one small decision could ruin my life. I was wondering if I got off easy by comparison. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Chase, sitting on the floor, his head between his knees, and I heard his voice telling me he couldn’t go home. What would happen to him when he got picked up from the police station?