Leaving Paradise by Simone Elkeles

you have to learn the hard way.
    Accidents happen at the DOC, and some of them are intentional. Gangs are rampant, even in the juvenile jail. When there’s an altercation between two rivals, you better get the hell out of the way.
    Warden Miller has this thing about greeting a new inmate on their first day at the DOC. He thinks it eases the new kid’s mind knowing his expectations, but all it does is scare the crap out of them. Unless, of course, they’re repeaters. Miller is on a first-name basis with a lot of repeaters. They get a very different version of the welcome speech.
    His first-timer speech goes something like this: “My name is Scott Miller. Welcome to my house. You’ll get up at five forty-five every morning and go to the showers. You get five minutes, no more, to wash up. You’ll get three squares a day and you’ll attend classes for eight hours. We’ll get along just fine as long as you respect the rules in my house. If you don’t . . . well, then you and I will have ourselves a problem. Ask anyone around, they’ll tell you that you don’t want a problem with me. My problems get twenty-three hours straight cell time. Any questions?”
    Warden Miller doesn’t explain the absence of toilet paper in the cells; that’s one of those things you have to find out the hard way. It’s when you’re sitting on the can and need to wipe. The call button to borrow a roll is on the other side of the cell, nowhere near the seat you’re crapping in.
    I head over to Brian and the guys, ready to distract them from talk about jail. “Wha’s up, guys? Where are all the girls?” I ask.
    Drew is sitting across from me and rolls his eyes. “Practicing for cheerleader tryouts. Don’t get me wrong, I love when the chicks jump up and down for me. I just don’t know how it could be all that difficult that they’d need to practice for three weeks straight.”
    “Brianne and Danielle are going out for cheerleading instead of tennis?” I ask. Brianne and Danielle were die-hard tennis fanatics.
    “It’s because of Sabrina,” Tristan says. “She doesn’t have enough hand-eye coordination to be a tennis player, so she’s convinced Brianne and Danielle to try out for the Pantherettes.”
    Maybe I’ve been gone too long. Or maybe I didn’t hear correctly. “What’s a Pantherette?”
    “Caleb, you got to get up to speed, man.” Brian is trying to control his amusement as he says, “Pantherettes are the cheerleaders for the wrestling team. Get it . . . Paradise Panthers . . . Panther ettes. ”
    Huh? “Wrestling cheerleaders?”
    Drew nods. “Pantherettes, dude. Gotta love ’em. Lots of schools have wrestling cheerleaders, so last year we got ’em, too.”
    “You wrestling this year, Becker?” Tristan chimes in. “It might be Wenner’s last year coachin’. He’s got a kid due in the summer, and I think he wants to keep his Saturdays open to stay home with the brat.”
    “I can’t,” I say. “I’ve got to work after school.” I intentionally leave out the part that work is actually community service and if I ditch it, I may have to go back to jail.
    Brian takes a bite of his sandwich and says with a full mouth, “We need you, or we’ll suck like last year.”
    Tristan and Drew nod their heads, agreeing with Brian. Nothing like peer pressure to make one give in. But the truth is I missed these guys. “Okay, listen,” I say. “If there’s a match I can make, I’ll compete.”
    Brian holds up a hand for me to give him a high-five. “That’s what I’m talkin’ ’bout.”
    I slap his hand. “You’re seriously pathetic if you think I can single-handedly make a difference.”
    Drew shakes his curly-haired head. “You pinned Vic Medonia , Caleb. The guy is huge and a legend. Remember when you kicked his ass, getting that five point throw-down ten seconds before the round ended?”
    “Drew, please,” Tristan says. “Don’t disrespect CB here. It was four minutes when he did the