Simone Elkeles - Leaving Paradise 2 Return to Paradise

"Elkeles writes convincingly about family tensions, retreating from painful reality, and teens outgrowing their old skins."

-School Library journal

Leaving Paradise

How to Ruin a Summer Vacation

How to Ruin My Teenage Life

How to Ruin Your Boyfriend's Reputation

Woodbury, Minnesota

Return to Paradise 2010 by Simone Elkeles. All rights reserved. No part of this e-book may be used or reproduced in any matter whatsoever, including Internet usage, without written permission from Flux, except in the form of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. As the purchaser of this e-book, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. The text may not be otherwise reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, or recorded on any other storage device in any form or by any means. Any unauthorized usage of the text without express written permission of the publisher is a violation of the author's copyright and is illegal and punishable by law. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. Cover models used for illustrative purposes only and may not endorse or represent the book's subject.

First e-book edition September 2010 E-book ISBN: 978-0-7387-2729-5 Book design by Steffani Sawyer Cover design by Lisa Novak Cover image Image Source/PunchStock Flux is an imprint of Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd. Flux does not participate in, endorse, or have any authority or responsibility concerning private business arrangements between our authors and the public. Any Internet references contained in this work are current at publication time, but the publisher cannot guarantee that a specific reference will continue or be maintained. Please refer to the publisher's website for links to current author websites.

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For Erika Danou-Hasan, Ruth Kaufman, and Marilyn Brantthree women who continue to remind me that friendship is selfless and has no boundaries.

I want to thank Brian Farrey, Steven Pomije, Sandy Sullivan, Marissa Pederson, and all the Flux staff for helping me work on this book and for letting me continue Maggie and Caleb's story. You've made my fans beyond happy.

My agent Kristin Nelson has been a rock, and her support overwhelms me. Thanks for being my champion. It means the world to me!

My extreme thanks, as always, to Karen Harris for her support and friendship ... without you my books wouldn't make sense to anyone but myself. I wouldn't have been sane this year without my amazing assistant Melissa Hermann-thank you for your hard work and dedication a million times over! And to Rob Adelman, the guy who brings the word amazing to the next level.

I can't thank Samantha, Brett, Fran, and Moshe enough for letting me write my books and neglect the laundry and dishes. I'll make up for it ... one day. Or not (don't tell them my little secret ... I hate doing laundry and dishes!).

Last but not least, thank you to my passionate and incredible fans ... they are my inspiration for writing books and mean more to me than 1 can put into words.

ome people are damn lucky. Unfortunately I've never been one of those people. In fact, I think I'm one of those guys destined to always be caught in the crossfire. As I sit in the back of a squad car with handcuffs digging into my wrists, I think back to the first time I got arrested, almost two years ago.

I'd been drinking.

I was wasted.

And I was arrested for a crime I didn't commit.

Didn't matter, though. I got locked in juvie for a year anyway, mostly because I pled guilty to the hit-and-run drunk driving charges.

This time I'm getting arrested for drugs. Except I didn't smoke, inhale, ingest, snort, shoot up, or buy the shit. Okay, I admit I was living in a drug house. It was either keep a roof over my head and ignore the illegal stuff going on around me, or live on the streets.

I chose the roof. Looking back, maybe it wasn't the wisest choice. Living on the streets sounds mighty tempting right now. Nothing is worse than being locked up like a caged animal and relinquishing control of your own life. Being told when to shit, shower, shave, eat, and sleep isn't my idea of paradise. But then again, Paradise, where I grew up, wasn't paradise either. I'm wondering if paradise is just some word in the dictionary with the definition: this doesn't fucking exist.

I lean my head against the back seat of the squad car, wondering how I'm gonna get out of this. I have no money, no real friends, and my family ... well, I haven't had any contact with them since I left Paradise eight months ago.

When we arrive at the police station, the cop escorts me to a lady who has the exciting job of taking my mug shot. Then the cop orders me to his desk and introduces himself as Lieutenant Ramsey.

"Don't try anything stupid," he tells me as he unlocks the handcuff on my right wrist and secures it to a metal hook on his desk so if I wanted to flee I'd have to lug a fifty-pound desk with me. Needless to say, I'm not going anywhere.

After asking me a bunch of questions, he leaves me alone. I look around for Rio, one of my five roommates. We all got busted at the same time, when Rio and another one of our roommates were selling a crapload of meth to three guys who, if you ask me, looked like undercover cops who were just dressed up as badass gangsters. I think it was the gold tooth on one of the guys that gave it away. It looked like it'd been glued on and I could have sworn it became loose at one point and he swallowed it.

That was right before they pulled out their guns and yelled for us to kneel on the ground and put our hands on our heads. I'd been watching some reality show about a pawn shop, because the last thing I needed was to be involved in Rio's business.

Rio had asked me to help him make some runs a couple times, and I did. But I don't get off on selling drugs to guys who're so desperate to get high they'll give me their last dime to get it. The last time I was supposed to sell drugs for Rio, it was to a guy with three kids. He brought his three kids to our house, and when I saw their long, drawn faces and their ragged, torn clothes, I couldn't do it. I refused to sell him the stuff. Not that that makes me a good person or anything, especially because I know if I didn't sell it to him someone else would.

"Listen, Caleb," Ramsey says as he opens up a file folder with my name on the tab at the top. "You've got yourself in big trouble. Chicago judges aren't lenient on repeaters, especially when they're living in drug houses with over fifty thousand worth of meth and Z-tabs."

"I'm not a dealer," I tell him. "I work at Chicago Recycling."

"Just because you've got a job doesn't mean you don't deal." He picks up his phone and hands me the receiver. "You get one phone call. Tell me what number to dial."

I put the receiver down on his desk. "I waive my right to a call."