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    Up North
    Up North
    Up North
    Ebook83 pages1 hour

    Up North

    By Jeff Ross

    ()

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    About this ebook

    This is the second story featuring Rob and Adam Maclean after Coming Clean

    Rob Maclean and his mom have moved to a small community in northern Ontario in order to be closer to Rob's imprisoned brother, Adam. One night after a rowdy party, Rob and some friends end up in a van speeding through a First Nations reserve. The driver of the van has a deep hatred for Indigenous people, and he lobs rotten fruit at a group of young men gathered in front of a community center. The young men chase them down, and Rob's friend Alan is injured and ends up in a coma. Now the police are pressuring Rob to identify their prime suspect.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherOrca Book Publishers
    Release dateSep 19, 2017
    ISBN9781459814585
    Up North
    Author

    Jeff Ross

    Jeff Ross is the author of several novels for young adults including several titles in the Orca Soundings and Orca Sports series. He teaches scriptwriting and English at Algonquin College in Ottawa.

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      Book preview

      Up North - Jeff Ross

      Thirteen

      Chapter One

      I don’t think I’ll ever understand why that boy had to die. But I’ve spent enough time trying to figure it out, and I’m tired of it. I don’t think saying that is disrespectful. It’s just a fact. I’m tired, so I’m writing it all down and then I’m going to put it somewhere, and maybe years from now I’ll read it and it’ll make sense. I’ll be able to go through these pages and understand everything like it was written on a crystal-clear northern night sky.

      Though I doubt it.

      I can’t help but wonder how different things could have been if Chantale Hart’s party hadn’t sucked. I feel like there was a moment when everything might have shifted slightly, and then I wouldn’t even be writing this. The road not taken. Chantale just doesn’t know how to throw a party.

      That sucked, Keith said. He was our driver, behind the wheel of his mother’s van, cigarette between his lips, a glassy look to his eyes.

      Washit, Joel replied. Joel had primed before going to the party and, once there, had inhaled a six-pack. He was no longer useful as a human being.

      The van smelled like stale farts and lacrosse gear.

      And something else.

      Why does she even bother? Alan asked.

      Alan was the reason I was in the stinking van. We’d met at guitar lessons. I decided to learn to play guitar after all the garbage happened back home that ended up sending my brother, Adam, to jail and a girl to her grave. I didn’t blame my time DJing for what happened to Mary Jane and my brother, but I just couldn’t listen to that music anymore. I even sold all my records before we moved up here. Up North, as they say.

      I’d bought a second-hand guitar and started playing Americana stuff. Josh Ritter, Ryan Adams, Bright Eyes. If any of my old DJ friends saw me now, they wouldn’t recognize me at all.

      Which, maybe, was the point.

      Mom and I had moved here when my brother got transferred to a different youth penitentiary. I felt lucky to have met Alan on one of the first days at school, and luckier still that Alan was a good guy. The kind of guy who would seek out the new kid and try to make him feel at home.

      Alan and Keith had been friends since they were little kids, which was why the two of them were together that night. Otherwise I doubt they would ever have met. Alan was kind and quiet and always a little lost-looking. Keith was what you might call the school bully. That kid who’s always punching down, beating on anyone weaker than him. No doubt I would have had my head jammed under his arm on a regular basis had I not been Alan’s friend. Instead I was in a van with him, cruising the wintry streets trying to find something to do after Chantale failed so horribly at throwing a party.

      Now what are we going to do? Alan asked. He was behind me in the middle row. Joel was laid out on the back row, making horrible guttural sounds. Somehow I had managed to snag shotgun.

      No puking in the van, Keith yelled, looking in the rearview.

      Home, Joel said. Keith shook his head.

      Hey, Keith? Alan said.

      Yeah?

      Why do you have a bunch of rotten fruit back here?

      "Christ, that’s the stink. That was from the lacrosse tournament. My mom was making sandwiches and shit for us. You’d think it’d be all frozen in these temperatures."

      Some of it is. The rest is squishy, Alan said. We were at a stop light, one of only three in town. The buildings outside looked as though someone had painted them entirely white.

      "Take me home, country roadssss," Joel wailed.

      Yeah, yeah, Keith said. "By the way, you were supposed to be the DD, idiot."

      So sorry, sir. It won’t happen again, sir.

      I looked over at Keith. Something changed in his eyes as the light flicked to green. I didn’t know him that well. In fact, I only hung out with him when I didn’t have any other options. But at that moment he looked like a cartoon character who’d just had an idea. I was surprised there wasn’t a lightbulb flashing above his head.

      I know what we can do, he said.

      I didn’t dare ask what. We drove in silence to the end of Joel’s long lane and stopped.

      You’re home, Keith said.

      Drive me in, Joel said.

      Joel lived on a farm. I didn’t know what happened there in the winter. Maybe they had cows or something. But anytime we’d ever picked him up, his parents and sister all seemed to be asleep. Even if it was only eight or nine o’clock.

      You sure you want that, Joeley?

      C’mon, don’t make me walk.

      Keith turned into the lane. Okay, remember you asked for it.

      As we neared the house, Keith shut the headlights off.

      Don’t make noise, okay?

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