Free December Boys by Joe Clifford

snow. I pulled the piece of paper, rereading the address for the North River Institute, trying to reconcile conflicting reports. A diversion program? Basically a rehab masquerading as detention center. That’s how Nicki had pitched it. For Brian Olisky? A band geek who had been arrested, arraigned, and sentenced in less than six hours. There’s swift justice. Then there’s cruel-and-unusual warp speed. Death Row inmates wait longer than that. What had Brian done to warrant this kind of response? I pictured that skinny, scrawny, pencil neck, imagined how scared he must be inside those prison walls. He wouldn’t last a night.
    Maybe Nicki had oversold it. Maybe North River was a residential facility designed to intervene before teens went down a dark path. Except Brian Olisky was as far from the dark side as I was from domestic bliss. I had no way of knowing what the Institute was really like without checking it out, firsthand, a mission I had no interest in undertaking. Because this wasn’t my problem.
    Did I need to call Donna Olisky and explain her son wasn’t coming home tonight? Or did she already know? I wasn’t sure which scenario bothered me more.
    I checked my phone to see how many of her calls I’d missed.After the disaster with Jenny, I’d seen my phone light up several times. I’d stopped paying attention after a while. When I scrolled the log, I saw the calls from Donna stopped early afternoon. The rest were from Charlie, texts and voice mails urging me to head over the mountain and catch him at the Dubliner if Jenny hadn’t returned.
    I was relieved I didn’t have to break the news to Donna. Someone from the courthouse must’ve already done that. Why else would she suddenly stop calling? Sucked for her. But my job was done. My stomach knotted up, I toppled a few antacids, choking down the dry chalk, trying to locate Route 302 in the dark.
    Steady precipitation returned, thick sleet and wet snow glopping the windshield like spitballs from a juvenile god. My wipers labored through the slush, little motors grinding gears until I could smell the burn. I didn’t know this area so well. Whenever I’d had to bail out Chris, I’d come during the daytime. That was ages ago. Tonight I was relying on GPS to guide the way. I still didn’t have the hang of the technology, goddamn screen rotating every time I picked up the phone to get a closer look, and the robotic vocal instructions to “turn left here” always came a beat too late. Felt like I was going in circles.
    Keeping my eyes peeled for deer, which had a bad habit of jumping out and standing in the middle of the road, I was so focused and preoccupied over Brian Olisky and Jenny and where my life was headed, I didn’t spot the cruiser on my tail. Even when the lights flashed and air horn bleated, it didn’t register they were talking to me.
    I slowed to the side. Blinding high beams shot through the back window of my truck, smacking off the rearview. I cocked the mirror to shield my eyes. Doors opened and slammed shut. I leaned over to fish my registration from the glove compartment.After the day I’d had, last thing I felt like doing was dealing with Podunk PD for rolling through a stop sign.
    I hadn’t been pulled over on a routine traffic stop in a while and couldn’t find my paperwork, too many crinkled receipts and ATM statements, napkins from the Dunkin’ Donuts that I kept for when Aiden’s nose ran, which, as a little kid living on the tundra, was invariably. I swatted aside papers in the glove compartment, growing agitated over my lack of organization. A hard knock rapped off the glass.
    “Hold on,” I said. “Jesus.” Without looking up, I reached back with my left hand to unroll the window. Waiting for the requisite “Do you know why I stopped you, sir?” I continued digging around, wading deep in the dish, until I found the registration, crumpled yellow paper like a McDonald’s cheeseburger wrapper. I sat back up, expecting a