She asked me what had happened. She sounded worried, not mad, when I told her. She didn’t yell at me. That made me feel a little better. “I didn’t do anything,” I told the cops. “Did you hear Mrs. Franklin say that there was no real security at her house?” “Yes,” I said. “But I didn’t know until today where she lived.” I couldn’t tell if the cops believed that. “Do you belong to a gang, Colin?” “No, he does not,” my mom said. She was angry—at the cops. “Have you ever been a member of a gang, Colin?” “No,” I said. They asked me a million more questions. I told them how I had got the job. I gave them Dave Marsh’s name and Ray’s and Stike’s. I let them look at my work sheet so that they could see that I had been near that woman’s house this morning because I was supposed to be there. They made my mom and me wait while they left the room. When they finally came back, they said, “You can go for now, Colin.” For now? “He didn’t do anything,”
