Free After Tupac & D Foster by Jacqueline Woodson

bony shoulder and we stared out the window, watching the farms move by us. Someone had put on some music—oldies songs. Behind me, Albert was still sitting next to Emmett and both of them were reading Emmett’s comic books. The girls had fallen asleep on each other. Behind them, Jayjones and Miss Irene were sitting together. Miss Irene was doing a crossword puzzle and Jayjones was listening to his Walkman and staring out the window.
    “It’s all quiet now,” I said to Neeka. “You can start working on planning your Big Purpose.”
    Neeka stared out the window. And nodded.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN
    The loudest sound in the world is the soft click of prison gates locking behind you.
    Maybe it’s how final it is—the loud slam of the gate, then the quick, gentle click. Then the scary feeling of it all being forever.
    So many gates slamming shut. So many locks clicking. One after the other until you’re all the way inside.
    And the only way out is at the hands of a prison guard, who has to press a button. And turn a key. Then press another button and turn another key. All the while staring at each of you. And you know what he’s thinking:
    Remember this place good, y’all. We got a spot waiting for you.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN
    “Shoes and belts off,” the guards yelled.
    We moved down the line slowly, waiting while the guards went through Miss Irene’s bag, searched inside the girls’ shoes, glared at Emmett and Albert and Jayjones. Albert wore wire-frame glasses and the guards made him take them off and put them through the metal detector. Albert looked tiny and a little afraid without his glasses on. He looked around the room real quick, then rubbed his eyes. His glasses were kinda thick, so I knew without them he couldn’t see much. When the guard handed them back, Albert whispered, Thank you , wiped them off on his shirt and put them back on.
    Then when we were all signed in, the final gate slammed behind us and we joined a bunch of other families in a big room as we waited for Tash to be brought down.
    All around us, people were hugging and kissing each other. I watched one old-looking woman hold a young guy like she’d never let him go, her eyes closed tight but the tears pushing through anyway. I heard him say, Ma, don’t cry. Ma, please don’t cry . But the tears kept falling like they never planned to stop.
    A young couple across from us pressed their foreheads together, a boy about three years old dancing circles around them.
    The room was crowded and hot and loud. I stared at the door where Tash would come through.
    The first thing I noticed about him this time was how skinny he’d gotten. Tash wasn’t a big guy to begin with, but in the months since I’d last seen him, the tiny bit of meat beneath his cheekbones had disappeared and his beige uniform hung all big on him. But when he saw us, he let go of that big Tash smile and inside that skinny face I could see the Tash I’d known forever.
    “Girl, you are not stepping up in here looking like Miss Thang now, is you?” Tash grinned and gave Neeka a big hug. “All tall and almost-grown. Come here and let Tash spin you around.”
    Then he was hugging everyone and everyone was hugging him back and I felt the same old stupid huge stone rise up in my throat and the same stupid tears coming down. Neeka was crying too. So was Miss Irene. I saw Jayjones pull his hands across his eyes.
    “Don’t even,” Tash said, waving his skinny finger at us. “You know this girl is getting out of here soon. Don’t come up in here crying now. I ain’t having it.”
    We found a place at a long table in the back and Miss Irene started pulling food from the shopping bags. There was roasted chicken, mac and cheese, corn bread, potato salad, salad and corn. She’d brought paper plates and plastic spoons because they wouldn’t allow plastic forks for some dumb reason. After we’d all filled up our plates, Tash started telling us, between tiny girlie bites, how he was getting