House Arrest Read online

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  WINTER

  WEEK 1

  WEEK 2

  WEEK 3

  WEEK 4

  WEEK 5

  WEEK 6

  WEEK 7

  WEEK 8

  WEEK 9

  WEEK 10

  WEEK 11

  WEEK 12

  WEEK 13

  SPRING

  WEEK 14

  WEEK 15

  WEEK 16

  WEEK 17

  WEEK 18

  WEEK 19

  WEEK 20

  WEEK 21

  WEEK 22

  WEEK 23

  WEEK 24

  WEEK 25

  WEEK 26

  SUMMER

  WEEK 27

  WEEK 28

  WEEK 29

  WEEK 30

  WEEK 31

  WEEK 32

  WEEK 33

  WEEK 34

  WEEK 35

  WEEK 36

  WEEK 37

  WEEK 38

  WEEK 39

  FALL

  WEEK 40

  WEEK 41

  WEEK 42

  WEEK 43

  WEEK 44

  WEEK 45

  WEEK 46

  WEEK 47

  WEEK 48

  WEEK 49

  WEEK 50

  WEEK 51

  WEEK 52

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Author

  Chronicle Ebooks

  Copyright © 2015 by K.A. Holt.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:

  Holt, K. A., author.

  House arrest / by K.A. Holt.

  pages cm

  Summary: Young Timothy is sentenced to house arrest after impulsively stealing a wallet, and he is forced to keep a journal

  into which he pours all his thoughts, fears, and frustrations.

  ISBN 978-1-4521-3477-2 (Hardcover)

  ISBN 978-1-4521-4084-1 (ebook)

  1. Diaries—Juvenile fiction. 2. Juvenile delinquents—Juvenile

  fiction. 3. Detention of persons—Juvenile fiction. [1. Novels

  in verse. 2. Diaries—Fiction. 3. Juvenile delinquency—Fiction.

  4. Detention of persons--Fiction.] I. Title.

  PZ7.5.H65Ho 2015

  813.6--dc23

  2014022151

  Design by Jennifer Tolo Pierce.

  Typeset in Bodoni Six ITC and Vine Street.

  Chronicle Books LLC

  680 Second Street

  San Francisco, CA 94107

  Chronicle Books—we see things differently. Become part of our

  community at www.chroniclekids.com.

  To my sweet Ike-a-saurus

  WEEK 1

  Boys don’t write in journals,

  unless it’s court-ordered.

  At least, this is what I’ve figured.

  I

  I have

  I have nothing

  to say.

  I am not allowed to have nothing to say.

  Except on Tuesdays

  when I go see Mrs. Bainbridge

  who calls me Tim instead of Timothy.

  I sit on her squishy couch

  my mouth sealed shut

  my eyes burning holes

  in the leaves of all her plants.

  She says I can call her Maureen.

  But who would want to be called Maureen?

  Adjudicated delinquent.

  I had to look up how to spell that.

  Three times.

  I don’t feel like a delinquent

  and I don’t know what adjudicated means

  (even after looking it up).

  Sounds like a kung fu move.

  I adjudicated you in your face!

  HI-YA

  A whole year of this journal?

  Maybe I will write about the other people I see.

  Like José . . . just being José.

  I will pretend his life is mine,

  like I can still go hang out in our street

  whenever I want.

  Magnolia Circle. Where I’ve always lived.

  With the manhole cover

  that makes a perfect third base.

  WEEK 2

  How do you let yourself

  become a probation officer?

  Is there a school for that?

  A diploma?

  Congrats, James, you have graduated

  and are now

  a complete

  tool.

  James recommends

  not writing any more things

  like that last thing.

  Otherwise

  the judge will get mad.

  Who knew my probation officer

  could read my journal?

  I would like it on record that that isn’t fair.

  Do you hear me, James?

  Do you hear me, Mrs. Bainbridge?

  Do you hear me, Judge?

  A personal journal is very crowded

  with so many eyes.

  James on Monday.

  Mrs. Bainbridge on Tuesday.

  School every day.

  Home every day.

  Nowhere else unless Mom is with me.

  That’s the schedule, Journal.

  Got it?

  It’s pretty simple.

  Like a court-ordered cage,

  with a Mom-shaped lock.

  You better take this journal seriously,

  James told me Monday.

  Or they’ll throw you in juvie

  so fast

  your head will spin.

  As if my head isn’t already spinning.

  On that day, weeks ago, I’d lost my head.

  Everything foggy and frosty,

  everything a dwarf name

  from a fairy tale

  that doesn’t exist.

  I remember I was so tired.

  So

  so

  so

  tired.

  Levi had been sick the night before.

  One of those nights with no nurse at home to help.

  Mom had her hands full.

  And I did, too.

  Levi was bad sick.

  So I helped.

  Running for towels,

  for meds,

  for the heavy oxygen tanks,

  for the suction machine,

  for the spare trach tubes,

  for the ties to keep the tube in his neck

  so he could breathe

  which he wasn’t doing very well

  that night

  before the morning

  when my head was full of fairy-tale dwarves

  named Foggy and Frosty and Sleepy and Crazy.

  I will never know what I was thinking when I stole that wallet,

  because I wasn’t thinking.

  I wish everyone would stop asking.

  There is no what

  when there is no thinking.

  There is just is-ing.

  Things happen.

  Things happened.

  Just like that.

  Snap.

  It is what it is.

  It was what it was.

  So stop asking.

  I was trying to help,

  that’s all.

  But it was the opposite of help,

  and I know that now.

  I’m not sorry, though.r />
  If you’re wondering.

  I’m just sorry I got caught.

  Because it would have helped.

  It would have.

  WEEK 3

  James says I should take that last part out.

  You better be sorry, he says

  when he throws this journal into my chest

  looking mad and disappointed.

  A look they must give tests on

  at Probation Officer University.

  This is not a joke, Timothy.

  They’ll throw you in juvie so fast

  your head will spin.

  I mouth the words when he says them.

  He doesn’t like that.

  But he needs new words.

  He won’t like it that I wrote that, either.

  Oh, well.

  Hey, James?

  Suck it.

  When Levi was born my dad was still here.

  Nine months ago.

  Feels like nine years.

  Dad’s heart was beating in the same room as mine.

  His lungs filled with the same air as mine.

  His stomach filled with the same pizza as mine.

  We had pepperoni that night

  when Levi was born.

  We high-fived our root beers.

  Dad told the waitress,

  I have two boys now. How about that?

  And she gave us ice cream

  for free.

  And it was the best night.

  Until it wasn’t anymore.

  Then the phone rang in the pitch-dark night

  and José’s mom answered because I was at their house.

  Dad was at the hospital with Mom and Levi.

  José’s mom came to wake me up

  but I was already awake.

  And she drove me to the hospital

  and she told me Levi was sick

  and the doctors didn’t know what it was

  and it was bad

  real bad

  and they wanted me there

  in case he died

  so I could say good-bye

  and none of it made sense

  because Levi was a brand-new baby

  and nothing happens to brand-new babies

  because they are new and haven’t hurt anyone yet.

  And Dad still had pizza in his stomach

  and so did I

  from earlier that night

  when everything was OK.

  P.S. Levi did not die.

  Not any time they told us he would.

  And there were a lot of times.

  James.

  Mrs. B.

  I know you’re reading, so listen up.

  I’m thinking you guys don’t know anything

  about anything.

  No offense.

  But if you’re going to understand what I’m

  talking about

  in this dumb journal

  I’m going to need to explain some things

  to your dumb faces.

  No offense.

  There are just so many things you have to understand

  before you can really understand.

  Understand?

  So I can tell you about that day

  that stealing day

  but you’re never going to know

  what was going on in my head

  because I don’t know what was going on in my head

  all I do know is what was going on in my life.

  Lesson One: trach.

  You say it like trake

  in case you didn’t know.

  It’s a plastic tube

  in Levi’s neck.

  Well, in a hole in Levi’s neck,

  a hole the doctor put there

  so Levi can breathe.

  The tube protects the hole

  but it lets in a lot of germs

  like a superhighway to his lungs,

  so that’s no good.

  But breathing is good.

  Kind of a lame trade-off, if you ask me.

  I guess the trach is like a plastic nostril

  in Levi’s neck.

  It has all the gross stuff that nostrils have:

  slippery boogers

  and slime

  and gunk

  and when he sneezes, these snot bullets shoot out.

  So, yeah. It’s a plastic nostril in your neck.

  But it doesn’t look like a nostril. Just a tube.

  It saved Levi’s life

  and changed everyone else’s.

  Sometimes I wonder what it’s like

  to breathe through your neck

  instead of your face.

  How does food taste

  if you can’t smell it?

  Do your sinuses still hurt

  when you’re sick?

  Does it tickle when you cough

  out of the tube?

  Does it feel weird when you swallow?

  It must.

  Because Levi chokes a lot.

  When he chokes we use the suction machine

  and it is so loud

  like a jackhammer drinking a Slurpee.

  It sucks all of the gunk out of the tube in his neck

  so Levi can breathe easy again.

  He always looks so relieved.

  I wonder how that feels?

  José came over today.

  He called me a felon

  and laughed his head off.

  He wanted me to come with him.

  Cam’s paintball party.

  My answer:

  What part of house arrest don’t you understand,

  dummy?

  I told him I was getting a tracking device on my ankle

  and if I leave the house

  it will blow my whole leg off.

  Even messier than paintball.

  He believed me

  so I laughed my head off.

  WEEK 4

  James says I need to talk more about that day.

  Your journal, he says,

  in that eye-rolly way they must teach at

  Probation Officer University,

  is to prove you are reflecting on what you did,

  to prove house arrest is working,

  to prove you don’t need juvie to set you straight.

  It is court-ordered, Timothy.

  You know what that means, right?

  And that’s when I shout,

  I’m doing it, right?

  I’m writing in it, OK?

  He nods and looks kind of bored.

  And I wonder, again, how this ever happened.

  There are a lot of things I know

  that I shouldn’t know

  about why things are the way they are.

  About Dad driving away and never coming back.

  About his job he never went back to.

  About Mom working nights for extra money.

  About food coming from the church on the corner.

  About Levi’s medicine costing as much

  as a pet space shuttle.

  I know.

  But I don’t say I know.

  But Mom knows I know.

  Because she knows everything.

  Except whether or not Dad is ever coming back.

  No one knows that.

  Well, maybe Dad does.

  A year is a long time

  to write in a journal.

  and never go to paintball parties.

  That is not a haiku.

  José came over.

  It was a quick visit.

  His mom made a casserole for him to bring

  which he thought was embarrassing.

  So did I.

  Oh, we don’t need a casserole!

  Mom said it in her fake-smile voice.

  But I put it in the fridge for later.

  It smelled so good.

  Way better smelling than José

  who punched me in the shoulder

  and called me “smooth criminal
”

  even though I’m not smooth at all.

  At all.

  That day.

  Always in my head.

  Won’t go away.

  Always in the mirror.

  Written on my face.

  That day.

  When the guy’s wallet was next to the credit card swiper thing

  at the checkout

  and the manager and the guy looked out the window

  at the car crash outside of the grocery store.

  My breath came fast.

  My vision did this weird pinpoint thing.

  My brain went white.

  So I leaned over, grabbed the wallet, kept walking.

  The sun was bright.

  The day was cold.

  The wallet was heavier than I thought it would be.

  I paid

  one thousand

  four hundred

  forty-

  five

  dollars

  and

  thirty-

  two

  cents

  on one shiny blue card.

  Levi’s medicine for one month.

  I made it one and a half days before they caught me.

  One and a half days of feeling like I could breathe.

  One and a half days of trying to figure out how to tell Mom.

  Then the police came.

  They took me away.

  But even worse?

  They took the medicine away, too.

  Man. I was really stupid then.

  White hair on his head

  coming out his ears

  creeping from his nose

  BOBBY

  his red name tag shouts it

  as if your eyes are deaf.

  When BOBBY took that credit card

  he knew it wasn’t right

  the white hair in his nose

  sucked in and out

  like seaweed in the tide.

  My uncle’s card.

  The sweat rolled down my face

  getting in my eyes.

  Quite the generous uncle.

  That’s what BOBBY said

  when he swiped the card

  handed over the medicine

  never taking his eyes off me

  even when the pharmacy door ding-dinged

  and I turned around

  looking back through the glass.

  BOBBY watched me go,

  his mouth a tight line

  his hand in his white hair

  searching for answers.

  WEEK 5

  James frowned.

  His little pig eyes narrowed.