Live and Let Shop Read Free Page A

naming names. I won’t sell out my friends just because you think you can boss me around.” There, that ought to teach her.
    “Rachel, perhaps—” Marvin started to speak. But I gave him my best glare and he shut up.
    “Let me get this straight,” the judge said. “Your so-called friends,”—and she made that little “air quote” marks motion when she said it; I hate it when people do that—“the ones who actually stole the car, drove the car onto a lawn, and then left you facing arrest…these are the people you’re protecting?”
    “That’s right. I guess you’ll just have to send me to Juvie. But friends are friends, and I’m not pointing the finger at them to save myself. You probably wouldn’t understand that, since I doubt someone as mean as you has any friends. I don’t think it’ll do any good to send me to Juvie, but if you have to, I guess you have to send me.”
    I hoped the outfits in Juvie wouldn’t clash too horribly with my complexion.
    Marvin took a huge breath and threw his head in his hands, muttering, “Oh my God” under his breath.
    For a moment I thought the judge almost smiled, but from what I’d seen of her personality so far, that seemed unlikely. And then she got an almost evil glint in her eye and I wondered if I’d pushed it too far with that crack about her not having any friends. She didn’t say anything else for a really long time. She just sat there staring at me like she knew something about me butcouldn’t quite place it. Then she finally spoke.
    “All right, Ms. Buchanan. Frankly, I think you’re being stupid. I do admire loyalty, even misguided loyalty. However, you’ve committed a crime and I have an obligation to the people to protect their lives and property. And I won’t even mention your deplorable behavior in my courtroom. So I can’t simply let you off the hook, but there is an alternative option.” She kept staring at me. It was giving me the creeps.
    “Anything. I’ll agree to anything.” The plain truth of it is, I felt like I was inches away from being sent to the slammer, and the very thought terrified me. I don’t like admitting to myself that I’m scared of anything, but right then I was more scared than I’d ever been.
    The judge steepled her fingers.
    Somehow I sensed a smart remark wouldn’t be so smart.
    “Your Honor,” I remembered to add at the last minute.
    “I’ll be frank with you, Rachel,” she said. First time she called me Rachel. I felt us growing closer. “I don’t want to send you to Juvenile Detention. I think you’d survive it fine, but I don’t think it would do any good.” Me? SurviveJuvie? Who was she kidding? I’d be dead in an hour.
    “So this is the alternative.” Oh boy, here it comes, I thought. I saw myself in one of those really tacky orange jumpsuits, picking up trash along the Santa Monica Freeway, part of a rebellious, yet quietly heroic, teenage chain gang.
    “I’m listening,” I said. She cocked her head and looked like she was about to come down on me again, so I hastily added “Your Honor.” Dang, I kept forgetting that.
    “I’m on the board of directors of a boarding school in eastern Pennsylvania, near Washington, D.C. It is a school for students of all ages and from a variety of backgrounds. Many come there for the excellent education. But many of them are like you, Ms. Buchanan: troubled, on the wrong side of the law. Some are orphans, some are unwanted by their parents, others are there for a variety of other reasons. The school helps turn them around.
    “So this is my deal,” she went on. “You will attend this school for a minimum of one year. Complete the year and you’ll have all the charges dropped from your record. You’ll be free to come home or stay at the school. It will be totally up to you. But leave the school before theyear is up, get kicked out or in trouble in any way, and it’s right back to California and the William G. Wilson Hall for Juvenile