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“You heard me.”
The kid glanced over a shoulder. At his friends before turning to face me again. “We were here.”
“All morning?”
Nobody answered. Which confirmed what I already knew. What Alvin knew before I knew. I hadn’t been watching these little fuckers and they’d gotten bored. And violent. I didn’t know what I’d expected from a bunch of teenage criminals. And I guess that had been the problem in the first place. I hadn’t been expecting anything because I’d been too stuck in my own shit to care. To do what I was trusted to do.
“Come here.” I snapped my fingers in the kid’s direction and pointed to the open space in front of me.
The fucker didn’t move.
“Now.”
His friends glanced at him. And he stood, slowly, trying to make it look like he wasn’t nervous.
“What did you do at the dock?”
“Nothing.”
“Try again.”
“We didn’t do anything, Mr. D. What the fuck crawled up your ass and died today?”
I stepped closer. His face changed, just slightly. A twitch near his mouth. A flash of calculation. The kid was big for his age. But standing toe-to-toe, I was bigger. And little shits like him were always afraid of fuckers who were bigger than them.
“And if someone says they saw you?” I pressed him.
“Who?”
“Does it matter?”
“Yeah.” He smirked. “It kinda does.”
“You think this is funny?”
He shrugged. “A little.”
My hands curled at my sides. I will not hit a fucking kid. I will not go the fuck to jail.
“Trev’s too sensitive. We were all just fucking around. Right, guys?” The fucker peered over his shoulder again. Unfortunately for him, his friends weren’t feeling nearly as brave and seemed too seconds away from throwing Billy-Bobby under the metaphorical bus.
“Who put their hands on him?” All of ʼem looked away instead of answering me. I took another step closer. “Who?”
“Why do you care?” one of the fuckers in the back asked. “You weren’t even here this morning.”
“That’s right!” Billy-Bobby grinned at his friend before turning his glare on me. “So where were you, Mr. D?”
I stared at him, trying to talk myself out of shoving a sixteen-year-old through a wall before landing on something only slightly less painful. For everyone involved. “All four of you are going to spend the rest of your time here glued to my side like a couple of leeches. You don’t talk without me saying so. You don’t eat without me saying so. Hell, you don’t even piss without me giving you the thumbs-up first.”
“What?” the kid in the back whined.
“You heard me.”
“We didn’t do anything,” Billy-Bobby chimed in.
“Good. Then you can keep doing nothing right next to me.” I shrugged.
By lunch, every counselor and camper alike knew something had happened, though none of them knew what. The camp director had called me. Twice. And I’d told her there’d been an incident and that it was all being handled. Twice.
