It was always referred to as a boys’ home. You would never hear an adult call Hellenweiler a prison. There was almost two hundred yards of open ground before you got to the trees. I guessed it was plowed to bare dirt to give the guards a clear view of anyone trying to escape. Beyond the ten-foot wire fence was a field where nothing was planted. Hellenweiler sat in the middle of a five-acre yard of mostly bare dirt and a few small oak trees. When we got to the front gate I heard a buzz and then a click as the electronic lock released and the gate slid open. It would be a while before I’d sense any of these things again. I listened to the robins calling and rustling in the hedge beside me. Then I took a deep breath and savored the smell of the pines and honeysuckle in the spring air. I blinked my eyes and swallowed against the awful feeling. This time the dread was so strong it made me dizzy. All I could think about were the days ahead as dread puddled in the pit of my stomach. Sundays were supposed to be the beginning of the week, but they’d always felt like the end of it to me. I shuffled toward the guardhouse ahead of Officer Pete, the leg shackles restricting my steps and bruising my ankles. Except this time I was no longer the biggest, oldest boy at the home. Now he was gone and I had to face a whole new set of friends and enemies. And the only reason they caught me was because I turned myself in to help out a friend. The only reason I was three months late was because it took them that long to catch me after my escape. I was both and I’d known for a long time that Live Oak wasn’t in my future. It was for the repeat offenders and trouble kids. Everybody talked about Live Oak like it was a vacation. There were two places a ward of the state could go after Pinson: Live Oak and Hellenweiler. Besides, I didn’t plan on sticking around long. I’d already done two years in the Pinson Boys’ Home. This place would be hard time, especially since I was considered a problem case and an escape risk. I was officially property of the state and sentenced to live there until I was eighteen. Late Sunday morning Officer Pete delivered me in chains to the Hellenweiler Boys’ Home in Tuscaloosa, Alabama.
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