HELLO! MIGGY NOT FAX HERE! WHO MISSED ME!
Chapter 1
Fourteen year old Frank walked into the Hardy's home with clenched fist as the social worker in charge of him got Mrs. Hardy's signature, took a brief look around the house, and left. He was automatically suspicious and nervous about the family. Their house was nice which, from Frank's experience, either meant they were stuck up snobs who were going to use him as a slave or they had some kind of illegal business going to keep the cash coming in.
"Mrs. Hardy." Frank said, he would never call her 'mom'. "Where do I need to put my bag?" Frank had just a single duffel bag which was stuffed with his pairs of jeans, a spare hoodie, and several t-shirts.
"Oh, your bedroom will be right down this way," Laura said leading the way down the hallway. "And please, call me Laura." Frank nodded and set his stuff on the ground by the dresser before looking at the bed.
"There's a bunk bed in here. How many kids am I sharing with?" he asked. It wasn't ever likely for him to get his own room.
"Just Joe," Laura said. Frank's eyes narrowed. Joe was probably some older, larger, brutish teenager who would make his life miserable.
"Who's Joe?" Frank asked.
Laura rummaged in her purse for a moment before pulling out a picture. "He's my son," she said and handed Frank the picture. He glanced at the picture of the angel faced blonde boy laughing as food went up in smoke as his frustrated father attempted to cook. "That was last week. He's turning thirteen in a month."
"What grade?" Frank asked. He was trying to get a feel of what kind of person the blue eyes boy was and what kind of trouble he was in.
"Eighth," Laura answered without hesitation. Frank cocked an eyebrow.
"A little young isn't he?" he was nervous about getting into trouble on his first day with a new foster family, but he needed to know about 'Joe'.
"Yeah, the elementary school was across the street when Joe was little and he would run over there and play with the kindergartener and first graders. Finally we just enrolled him in school about a year or so early."
"So he's a genius or something?" Frank asked.
Laura shook her head. "He's smart for his age and for someone as impulsive as him, but his grades are average." Suddenly a cell phone went off and Laura fumbled through her purse and pulled out her cell phone and answered it.
She spoke into the phone for several minutes and was starting to sound kind of panicked. When she finally stopped her eyes were worried as she turned to Frank.
"Well had imagined you meeting Joe under better conditions, but we need to go pick him up from the hospital. An older boy at school stabbed him," she said. Frank obediently followed her into the car and climbed in the passenger seat. They were at the hospital within minutes and Laura got Joe's room number from the woman at the front desk.
Joe, a small boy with tousled blonde hair and daring blue eyes was sitting on the hospital bed looked nervous. "Um… Hi Mom," he said, anxiously picking at the edge of the sheet.
"My baby," Laura mumbled, rushing forward and wrapping Joe in a hug. He winced as he arms tightened around several bruises, but Laura didn't notice. Frank did. Lucky for him, Joe had been able to convince the nurse that he got the bruises from playing football.
"Get off me, Mom," Joe said wiggling. "I can't breathe." Embarrassed, Laura stood.
"Are you alright? Why did Jacob stab you? What did the doctor say? Do you have to stay the night or can you come home now? Does your father know what happened?" Laura demanded. Joe held up his hands in the 'whoa nelly' gesture.
"I'm fine, Mom, it was just a flesh wound. Jacob had a mental breakdown, threatened the teacher, and stabbed me in the stomach. The doctor said to keep it clean and bandaged, I can do regular stuff by the day after tomorrow, and I can go home as soon as you sign me out. And dad knows what happened, he was there giving a lecture," Joe said.
Laura stepped out and Joe glanced at Frank. "I'm Joe," he said briefly while he climbed out of the hospital bed, yanked the hospital shirt off, and pulled on his t-shirt that had a slit that was about three inches long where the blade had entered. He tried to keep Frank from seeing the numerous cuts, bruises, scratches, scrapes, and scars that littered his body.
"I'm Frank," Frank said.
-Line-
Dinner was almost silent. Fenton and Laura made idle chatter with both boys, but it was almost silent. Fenton briefly asked Joe about his trip to the hospital that was just as brief as his father with an explanation. Fenton told him not to play football until he could go without the bandage and Joe nodded.
"Oh and Frank," Fenton said and Frank looked up for the pork chop he had been cutting. "You have school tomorrow. Joe will show you around and we already got you some school supplies."
Frank nodded silently, but inside he was fuming. He wasn't going to be staying here long at all, what was the point of enrolling in high school?
The next day Frank and Joe walked to school from their house. It wasn't very far and neither Fenton nor Laura could drive the boys.
"Oh crap," Joe mutter once he saw the older boys coming towards him and Frank. 'Oh crap, oh crap, oh crap, oh shit." Joe looked like he was ready to die, but quickly shifted into escape mode.
"Follow me and run like hell," Joe said while shifted his backpack so that it was on better. As soon as the words were out of his mouth he took off running, with Frank following behind him. Frank had to admit, Joe was fast. He was lean and lightweight, a perfect runner. Not to mention he would get beat up if he got caught.
Joe wormed his way through the crowded hallways and tried to make sure Frank was behind him. He ducked into a janitorial closet and yanked Frank in after him.
"Won't we get in trouble for being in here?" Frank whispered. Joe shook his head.
"This is Mr. Harvey's closet. He knows about them and lets me hide in here when I need to," Joe said. He cracked the door open and watched the four older boys barrel by and slipped out, unnoticed by everyone else in the hallway.
Joe led Frank to their lockers and showed him what books he would need for his first class. Because Joe was in eighth grade, not seventh, he and Frank had almost identical schedules.
For the rest of the day, Frank did his best to avoid the younger boy who always wondered around by himself. After each class that they weren't together in Frank could here sounds coming from inside of the janitor's closet. He made no attempt to help him whenever the boy would stumble out with a black eye or blood soaking through his shirt, he just watched as Joe would expertly use the ice pack out of his lunch box to keep down the swelling or cut a strip off of his gym shirt and tie it in place as a makeshift bandage. He felt kind of sorry for Joe, but he wasn't about to make him think that he could just come whining to Frank whenever there was a problem.
He and Joe walked home at different times, Mr. Harvey, the janitor, had asked to talk to Joe for a minute, so Frank got home relatively easily. He was at the Hardy's house for nearly an hour before Joe came limping in.
His face was covered in bruises and blood that was seeping from his head. There was a huge tear in his jeans that was soaked with blood. His shirt was shredded, showing the numerous cuts, bruises, and scrapes. Joe hurried into the bedroom, grabbed some fresh clothes and rushed into the bathroom, ignoring the looks he got from Frank.
When Joe came out of the bathroom nearly ten minutes later he was carefully hiding the limp, the bruises on his face still looked rough, but the blood was gone and he had carefully draped his hair over the cut on his head. He moved stiffly, trying not to bother anything into hurting more than it already was. Frank could hear him curse as he sat down on the couch.
"What happened to you?" Frank asked.
"Nothing, I just got jumped," Joe said, pulling out homework and beginning it slowly.
"Does this happen a lot?" Frank asked. Joe shrugged.
"It usually just happens two or three times a week," he said causally, while doing his math. He seemed to hesitate before he added, "My parents don't know about it. They think I get hurt playing football."
"Well what are you going to tell them now? Your dad said that you can't play football until the stab wound heals.
Joe shrugged again. "Nothing, they hardly ever notice anything like this. If they ask, I'll make something up."
-Line-
Joe was right about his parents. It was like they couldn't even see the black eye and purple face or the limp he carefully hid. Frank had to admire Joe for keeping from yelling in pain when Fenton accidently smacked him on the face with a brief case.
When Joe pulled his pajamas on Frank saw how bad the damage was. Joe was a medical expert when it came to bandages, but even he couldn't hide the blood that soaked through the bandages, but luckily it hadn't soaked through his t-shirt. Joe quickly changed the bandages and pulled a shirt on.
As Frank pulled on his PJ Joe saw that he had several scars covering his back. He didn't pressure Frank to talk about it; Frank was too much like some of the kids who would occasionally beat Joe up for that.
After a while Frank saw a blonde head swing down and look at him. "What do you want?" Frank asked.
"Nothing, I was just seeing if you were asleep," with that Joe carefully climbed off of the top bunk and left the room. Curious, Frank followed.
Joe sat at the kitchen table and clutched something tightly in his hand. IT wasn't until Frank saw his shoulders shaking that he realized Joe was crying. Frank shuffled forward and awkwardly sat next to Joe who immediately tried, and failed, to stop crying.
"What's the matter with you?" Frank asked. Instead of speaking, Joe shoved the pictures he had been clutching in his hand at Frank.
Frank looked through the pictures. There was one of Joe and a blonde girl, and then another of the charred remains of a tree house, the final picture was of a tombstone that read, Iola Morton 1/17/2000-5/5/2010. Frank's mouth made a small 'O'. Today was the one year anniversary of the death of one of Joe's friends.
"She was… in my tree house… waiting for me… and someone that… my dad had arrested… had just gotten out… of prison. He… He thought I was in… there and blew it up… I was a yard away… when it went off. I… was in the hospital for… almost a month,… but Iola… died," Joe sobbed out. "It's my… fault she's dead."
Frank awkwardly rubbed the boys back and made shushing noises. "It's not your fault Joe. It's the man who blew up the tree house's fault. You didn't kill her. He did."
Finally, Joe stopped sobbing, blew his nose, apologized for breaking down to Frank and, without waiting for his reply, soundlessly went back to bed. Frank sat in the kitchen for a moment, thinking. It was possible that Joe's life was just as bad as if not worse than his. Joe had a good family, sort of. He had a father who was too busy to do much with him and neither of his parents noticed that he was getting beat up and jumped all the time. He lived everyday with the guilt, believing that it was his fault his best friend was dead. He sounded miserable.