Fifteen-year-old Will has lost his older brother, Shawn, to a shooting. Grief quickly gives way to anger, and Will believes he knows exactly what he must do next. He has a gun, he knows who he thinks is responsible, and he has grown up knowing the unspoken rules of the streets: keep your tears to yourself, never betray anyone and settle the score.

With Shawn’s gun hidden at the back of his jeans, Will leaves his apartment and enters the lift on the seventh floor. His plan seems certain. But the journey to the ground floor takes an unexpected turn.

At every stop, the doors open and another person enters, each with a connection to the violence that has shaped Will’s world. Their stories force him to confront memories, choices and truths he never considered. With every passing floor, his certainty begins to unravel, and the revenge he thought was so simple becomes far more complicated.

Told through sharp, spare verses in Kaaps that capture the immediacy of Will’s thoughts, Lang Pad Onnetoe is a powerful exploration of grief, revenge, gun violence and the cycle that keeps it going. Jason Reynolds turns a single elevator ride into a tense reckoning with the consequences of violence. This Afrikaans edition, translated by acclaimed South African writer and poet Nathan Trantraal, brings the story even closer to home for local readers.