I'd like to thank Blackangle2011, kunoichiXwitch, tigerwhisper and Sweet-Romantic for the reviews on Chapter one.
Disclaimer: Don't own Four Brothers.
Enjoy!
Chapter two: You Can Sleep Soundly
It had been three days since Amity had come to live with the Mercers' and in those three days, Evelyn had taken her out shopping for more clothes and some books as well as school things since she had transfered schools. It was also helpful that they were currently on Thanksgiving break and she could have time to get used to life in the Mercer home. Of course it was awkward for Amity to be sharing a meal with people that actually wanted her to be there with them. It was even weirder having a meal that was hot and fresh. Another perk I could get used to. She thought. Amity had relaxed a bit in her few days at the Mercers', but she was still what normal people would consider paranoid. She felt herself in constant fear that they would all just snap and everything would end up as it had been with just about all her other homes. She sighed miserably as the memories of her past slowly filled her mind. She quickly blocked them, having no desire to have a night filled with screaming which hadn't happened so far. To help her concentrate, Amity tried to keep reading her book, but found that it was impossible. She suddenly felt the need to be alone and since Jack was sitting on his bed listening to a tape player, she didn't feel alone. Amity slammed her book closed and bolted for the bathroom, not even caring that Jack had noticed her and was yelling after her. She blocked out his yells and the sounds of feet hitting the stairs as a reaction of Jack's yells. Amity slammed the bathroom door and locked it just as she heard Bobby and Jack yelling for Evelyn. Her eyes closed and tears spilled down her cheeks. Amity fell against the door and slid to the floor, she knew that she was in trouble now. She could feel the anger in the air.
- - -
Pounding fists, making loud bangs as they contacted with the wooden door. Amity had hidden in the tub as soon as she felt the door vibrate with the contact. She closed her eyes tightly as more tears made small, salty streams down her cheeks. Suddenly the banging was silenced and she could hear Evelyn talking to an angered Bobby. Evelyn's voice was muffled, but Bobby's wasn't. "Bobby..."
That was all she heard as Evelyn's voice went down once she had Bobby's attention. "Ma! She's been in there for the whole fucking day! It is my problem now."
More distorted talking from Evelyn. Bobby growled slightly. "I thought you said that she was better than Jackie! You said that she didn't go through all the same shit that he went through!"
There was more muffled talking and suddenly a scream was heard. Amity stopped breathing at the sound of the scream. Seconds later came the slam of a door. "Oh for fuck sake! Not Jackie too!"
Amity instantly found herself picturing Molly. "Molly!" Evelyn said sternly.
Molly gasped slightly and more than likely apologized. Bobby's fist contacted with the door again and Amity felt herself jump. "Ma! I don't care if it's hurting her at all! This is nothing compared to what I'll do when I get my hands on her!"
Amity's blood went ice cold and her breath was caught in her throat. Panic mode took over and she felt herself get out of the tub and bolt to the window, in her fear she fumbled with the latch trying in pure desperation to open the window. She didn't even hear Evelyn screaming at Bobby, she also didn't hear the door open as Jerry had successfully picked the lock. Amity got the latch and pushed the window open, she was just about to pull herself up and through when a pair of arms wrapped around her waist, she instantly screamed and tried to get away. The next thing she knew, her arms and legs were pinned to the tile floor and she heard herself whimper in fear, she kept her eyes tightly shut the whole time, just waiting for the pain to begin. Nothing happened, instead she felt herself being picked up and carried straight to her room, from what she could tell Jack hadn't locked the door, they were both left alone to calm down.
The room was dark, Amity laid in her bed as silence took over. Her eyes opened and she blinked a few times and wiped tears away. Jack's voice cut through the silence. "Bobby wasn't really going to hurt you ya know."
His voice mirrored the fact that he didn't believe what he had just said himself. "Then why did you freak out?" She asked.
"Memories." Jack bluntly stated. "How 'bout you? What made you lock yourself up?"
Amity felt a small smirk tug at her lips. "Memories." She said in the same exact tone as Jack had just moments before.
"What kind of memories?" Jack said, obviously ignoring her mimicking of him.
"The kind that you could never understand." Amity quickly snapped.
Jack felt a small smile form on his face. "Try me."
"I... you just wouldn't understand..." Amity heard Jack moving around in his bed, probably getting into a sitting position. He sighed. "Look, when I first came here I thought no one would understand what I was feeling either. So, I didn't tell Mom or my brothers' anything. A few months into my stay here, I just... snapped... and that landed me into the hospital. After that I told Mom everything and she helped me anyway she could."
He stopped. Amity heard a sniffle. He's... crying? She looked toward his bed in the darkness, but couldn't see his face to be sure. "Today, watching you reminded me of when I first came here and all those feelings and memories came back. That's why I screamed when Bobby started yelling. I knew he didn't mean anything that he was saying, but it was like I couldn't control myself and I screamed anyway."
Jack sighed. "If you tell me what made you freak out, I could try to help you or have my Mom try and help you, but only if you let us in. We can't help unless we know what's wrong."
This was her chance to get everything off her chest, it was her chance to make all the memories bearable. She opened her mouth to speak, but felt something holding her back from spilling her soul to Jack. She sighed and felt more tears. Uhg I need to control these tears. "I'm sorry Jack. I just... I want to tell you, but..."
"You need to trust me first." Said Jack, finishing her sentence for her. Amity nodded even though Jack couldn't see her do so. "Yeah, I mean I've only been here for three days. Ya know?"
"Yeah... I know..."
There was silence again. "I think I'm going to go to sleep now."
Amity smiled, she didn't know why she felt that she should tell Jack this, since she wasn't going to be sleeping anytime soon. Jack didn't say anything back. He just moved around in his bed and was silent. Some time went by and Amity laid there soaking up the sounds from downstairs. Someone had just come up the stairs and she heard a door from across the hallway close.
"I trust you though. It took a lot more than three days to trust my Mom and my brothers', but I trust you and it's only been three days."
Amity pursed her lips, blinked away tears and with a shaky sigh decided to open up to Jack. "I was born in Marquette, Michigan. On April 7, 1981. My parents' loved me and they were happy to have me. When I was three, they got into a car accident and they both died. I was then shipped south to Warren, Michigan to live with my aunt. I lived with her till I was six when the courts found out that not only was she not my aunt, but she was also addicted to crack. So, I was then put into the system and went to numerous foster homes. The average time that I spent in one home was six months. I've been all over Michigan for seven years." She stopped and laughed slightly. "I-I have a map of Michigan and there is a star next to each city I've been to so far. This is my first time here though..."
Amity heard Jack move around in his bed and she decided to sit up, her eyes had adjusted to the darkness and she could see Jack's outlined body sitting up in his bed too. "Life in the foster homes varied depending on the home and the people. Like when I was living with my 'aunt'" Amity made the finger quotations even though Jack couldn't see her do so. "she was really nice, she just acted weird around me cause of the crack, but she never hit me or yelled at me. Most of them weren't as nice though. They all seemed to have some sort of drug problem and I got hit a time or two, but mostly yelled at me and left me to fend for myself. When I turned nine all of that changed. I went to a home and the people didn't have any drug issues, they had real potential to be a good family and maybe adopt me... I trusted them and one night my foster father attacked me. H-he raped me and... and for a month after that he would repeat what he had done that night. Then my foster mother found out and I went to another home. They were no different, neither was all the homes after that, except for a few that went back to the druggie ways. I began to find myself wishing that the new family I was going to live with were druggies, at least they cared more about their drugs than how I looked in my pj's." The bitterness in her voice scared her, but she sighed and continued.
"The longest I spent in a home was a year and a half, from the age of ten to just after my twelfth birthday. That time was spent with a woman who was hopelessly addicted to Heroin, which I enjoyed almost as much as the memories of my parents'. Just days after my twelfth birthday I was placed in my last foster home before this one that is. For the first six months everything was perfect. I was treated like a child should be and I really thought life would work out for me. After my social worker stopped doing check ups, things got bad again. Oh my thirteenth birthday, my foster father tried to rape me, but I fought him. That landed me in the hospital, somehow they convinced everyone that I had gotten jumped by a gang on my way home from the store. A few more months went by and he tried it again. I of course fought back, not really wanting to be raped and the cops got called. My social worker came a got me from the hospital and drove me all the way from Grand Rapids, Michigan to here."
Jack was quiet, some of the things that she had been through, he could say that he too had been through them. But, as Bobby's words echoed in his mind, he realized that he was a lot worse than she was. "There, so I guess I trust you after all."
"Do you wanna hear my story?"
The quickness of Jack's question caught Amity off guard, but she nodded anyway. "Yeah."
Jack nodded and took in a breath. "Okay, well I was born in Lansing, Michigan. On March 31, 1981. So we are really close in age." He laughed slightly and Amity found herself laughing too. "Uhh, my mother was a single parent when I was born and she'd had two kids before me, my biological brother and sister. We all had the same shitfaced father who ran off with a pretty little blond, as I remember my mother calling her. When I was five my dad decided to come home and meet the son that he ran away from five years before. At first he didn't seem too bad, until he was supposed to pick me and my siblings up from school and he never showed up. We later found out that he had once again decided that fatherhood was not for him and ran off. My Mom was furious and vowed that he would never be welcomed into our lives again. When I was seven, he came home again and demanded that he see us, well my Mom was true to her word and kept us hidden from him. He was drunk and got angry, he ended up murdering my mother that night. My brother, being the oldest, called the police, who in turn took my dad away and locked him up for good. After that, my siblings and I were all split up. And for three years I went from foster home to foster home, getting every type of abuse that landed me in the hospital numerous times. I quickly learned that the only way I could stay alive was to obey my foster families and steal things when I needed to. When I was ten, I got caught stealing food and shit. The police quickly found out why I was stealing things, so they told my social worker who in turn brought me to live here with Mom and my brothers'. I was officially calling her Mom at the age of twelve."
"Was your birth mother a good person?"
Amity found the question leave her lips before she could do anything to stop it. "No." Jack said quietly. "She was never home and was always saying shit about my father, but he deserved that. It just got her really angry and she would end up leaving and would come home drunk." Jack shrugged. "She worked a lot to keep our house and give us a better life. My father fucked it all up though."
Jack was quiet, she watched as he laid back down and turned so he was facing the wall. Amity decided to do the same. Even though they had just poured their hearts out to each other, Amity still felt that Jack might have just made up a story to get her trust. That made Amity lay in bed wide awake the whole night.
- - -
The next morning, Amity quietly got out of bed when she heard signs that people were awake. Jack wasn't, which she was thankful for. She quietly made her way down the stairs to find the three mercer brothers' and Alex all lounged on the couch. Somehow they all knew she was there and looked over, she froze as they watched her, they then turned their attention back to the tv and Amity quickly went to the kitchen. She found Evelyn at the stove and Molly sitting at the table, drinking some coffee. "Oh, good morning Amity."
Amity was expecting to get drilled with questions about the night before, but they were all acting as if it didn't happen, this behavior puzzled her. "Amity? Have you been sleeping a lot sweetie?"
The sound of four boys' running up the stairs could be heard as Amity debated on whether she should tell the truth or not. She looked at Evelyn for a moment and decided that Evelyn wouldn't hurt her for it. "No. I haven't slept since I got here." She quietly confessed.
"Oh my... sweetie why not?" Evelyn had worry laced in her voice, it was sort of shocking to Amity to have someone, whom she had only known for four days now, being worried about her. Amity's eyes went to the ground. "I-I'm... afraid that Jack will...hurt me."
Evelyn squatted down in front of Amity and chuckled. "Oh Amity, you can sleep soundly dear. If anything Jack is afraid that you will hurt him."
Evelyn's words hit Amity like a ton of bricks. I really can trust Jack. She decided. She sighed in relief as Evelyn smiled and went back to the stove.
Jack's fingers were curled around the wooden poles that held the stair railing up. His three brothers' sat around him smiling and whispering about the conversation they had all just heard. Bobby put his hand on Jack's shoulder. "Hey, Jackie. Don't look so fuckin' shocked, man. She ain't gonna be afraid of you anymore and you don't have to be a little fairy around her."
Jack's head spun around and he glared at Bobby. "I'm not a fairy!" He said through gritted teeth. Bobby smiled and patted his back. "Sure Jackie, you keep telling yourself that."
Jack pushed past his brothers' and stomped down the stairs and into the kitchen, leaving Bobby, Angel and Jerry laughing on the stairs. Thank god school starts tomorrow. Was all Jack could think as he sat down next to Amity.
