Wrong
10.
I hadn't been allowed to go to the pool house. I hadn't known that sleeping can be such a big event. Okay I hadn't known that Ryan wasn't much of a sleeper then. But I did what my parents said. I had been a little afraid to piss Ryan off. I already had brought him to jail. He didn't need more. I just waited. My parents had been out to their jobs. I again had been alone. Well not really alone, Ryan had been there. He just hadn't been in the house. I just sat in front of the TV and plaid some videogames. The door to the patio opened and Ryan stepped finally in. The end of a deadly boring day.
"Hey dude." I said when he came in. He nodded telling me he had heard me.
"Do want some coffee and something to eat?" He had nodded and we went into the kitchen.
"I just wanted to tell you I'm really sorry for the mess you ended up in." I tried to apologize again.
Not your fault
"That's what you say. But I feel responsible for that. I mean if it hadn't been me, all this wouldn't have happened." I felt so guilty and yes I've been afraid Ryan might hate me for what had happened. He had all reason to do so.
The guy is an asshole. When it's someone's fault then his parents'
"Okay, for him being an asshole you might be right. But I should have reacted in a different way."
Shut up
"Okay, I stop talking about that. But I'll never will forget you that. I owe you something." I told him and with that the story just had been finished. Ryan never talked about it again. I don't know whether he forgot about it of if he hadn't cared.
"So what do you wanna do today?" I asked him. I had wanted to make up to him for what he had done. I had to otherwise I never would have been able to lose the feeling of guiltiness.
No sailing please
"Alright, then just have breakfast and then we'll see what we can do." I said and then we ended up in front of the TV playing play station. Yes it's much more fun playing together with someone than playing alone. It felt like we spend the whole day playing. Unfortunately we couldn't use the pool as Ryan's back still hadn't been healed enough for that.
"Do you have a girlfriend?" I asked him. I had expected a nod, but it had been something in between nodding and shaking.
"Could get a little more precise?" I asked.
Used to have one. But last year or so I hadn't enough time for her
"How do I have to understand this? You had a girlfriend, but had no time for her? Dude, you're really screwed. If I had a girlfriend I would spend every free second with her and more." I answered. I didn't know then what the reason was for why he hadn't enough time for her.
Had no choice
"Man, you're a little too cryptically for my taste. I mean despite school there is nothing to spend our time with. We have to use the chance we have as teenagers." I only said.
Family problems
I know after reading this I should have become more alerted. But I had no clue of what he considered as family problems. For me it's something: your grandma dies or your parents get divorced. That had been the reason why I hadn't asked on. If something of that had been the reason for the problems it would have been a little clumsy if I had asked him after that. Things like that should be told voluntarily – not because someone drags you to answer some stupid question.
"Know what? What about going to the movies? The I MAX is great and I swear we won't meet Luke there. The movies they show are too intelligent as if he could understand them." I told him. I wanted to show Newport and what I used to do in my spare time. I wanted to make him relax - not thinking about was coming up to him. I mean the thought ending up either in Juvies or in a foster home is not really comforting. I wanted to make him feel free at least for the few days he stayed with us. It had been hard for him, as the I MAX is usually very crowded. But he seemed to have understood that most of the people just ignore you and don't hurt you or something. If I had known what had been making him so frightened about crowds, I had been able to help him better. Okay, people say I already have helped him a lot. But I don't think so. If I had, why had this happened? If I had helped him, this wouldn't have happened. I know that. In somehow it had been my fault too. I should have realized that something was wrong – that he didn't feel comfortable. But I was too much concerned about myself to realize that. I only was concerned to lose a friend and to be alone again. I hadn't even wasted a thought what must have been gone on in his head after the whole procedure.
We watched a bloody movie about sharks. I can't understand how Ryan had been able to watch the whole movie motionless. He hadn't been the slightest way of frightened. Honestly? For me it had been too much and I had been thinking about how to sleep after this movie.
We went home and my parents had been already back. I had asked myself since when they were home earlier than seven but they were. It also hadn't looked as if something was wrong. They just had been home. Maybe my Mum had listened to what I said and now tried to improve. For me it could be more than only okay.
"Hey boys, hungry?" My Dad asked when we entered the kitchen.
"Oh yes." I answered. Ryan made his way back to the pool house. I know that this day had been a rough fight for him, but he was at our house. There it was safe and he should know that – I guess he knew that. That's why I sometimes didn't understand why he behaved the way he did.
"Hey aren't you hungry?" I asked him. We had spent the whole day busy. He couldn't tell me that he wasn't hungry, but he shook his head.
"Oh no, this is not happening here. You sit down and eat with us." My Mum replied stern. Ryan came back again. He seemed to be afraid of my parents or something. They really can be dominant if they want to, but they don't intend to hurt anyone. You have to get used to it and just overhear them. We all sat down and ate dinner.
"So where have you two been?" My Dad asked.
"In the I MAX." I answered. My father had looked astonished, when I told him.
"And what movie did you watch?" He asked on. That's what I consider as parental control. Awful, as if a movie could hurt you. Okay a few hours of sleep had been missing the next morning, but hell this is nothing.
"Something about sharks. A lot of blood." I answered. I felt my Mum's glances. She didn't like it when I go out and watch such movies. But I have to make my own experiences and now I know I'll never watch a shark movie again. Despite these movies have really an educational aspect – and that's in the summer vacations.
"Well okay, I hope you liked it." My Dad said and then went back to his plate. The rest of the dinner went as usual. My Dad had been talking about his job or I had told something about the movie. In somehow I had the feeling that my parents didn't really like that. After we've been finished my Mum and Ryan cleaned the table and then Ryan disappeared in the pool house.
After a while he came back. I didn't know that we had such an influence on him.
After dinner Ryan had gone into the pool house but came back later. It had been unusual as he used to disappear and not come back until the next morning. He had something in his hands. It looked like books. I've looked up to him. I didn't know what he had planned. He just came to me and handed me those books. It was three of them.
"What's that?" I asked him.
What you want from me
I didn't understand what he was saying. I didn't tell him what I …yes, I told him that I had wanted a testimony against his parents – or those he had been forced to live with.
"I don't understand." I said.
Just read and then see what you need
"Read? What? Ryan you need to tell me what that is." I begged him for an answer.
I can't tell you. Just read. I can't
And with these words he disappeared again. My wife and my son had been staring at me. Nobody of us has had a clue of what had been happened a few seconds ago. Nobody of us understood what the boy had wanted to tell me. Then I just opened one of the books. It had been some kind of diary. I started reading. After I have read the first lines I closed the book again. The boy was right. It had been what I wanted. It had been a testimony – a testimony about all the years he was forced to live with those people.
"Sandy, what's wrong?" My wife asked me. In this second it occurred to me that the boy must have trusted me a lot when he gave these books to me; allowed me to have a look into his life, into what had shaped him, into what had made him react and behave the way he did. It had been his whole privacy. His whole privacy is written down in these three books and he just handed them to me. But who had I been for him? I just had been someone. Why did he give these books to me? I asked this question, because I hadn't wanted to read it. I hadn't wanted to see what he already went through. But I promised my Mum I would help this boy, thus I just did.
"It's…his life." I only answered and then went into my study. I didn't want my wife or my son seeing any of this. Some of the sheets are bloody. On other ones I fund the traces of tears. These books contain all kinds of abuse one could imagine – physically and psychologically. It had been the worse I've ever read. But I had to. This was the only prove and I had to show the judge that the boy hadn't been guilty – that he has had no other choice. The books started when he was about six or seven. There isn't an entry for every day. But there are enough entries to tell me that the boy had been suffering through a long period of time and nobody had come to help him. Nobody had been there to protect him. He had to protect himself. That was the reason why he didn't speak or looked at you or let you touch him. This behaviour was his only protection.
"Sandy, what's wrong?" My wife stood in the door frame and watched me. Of course she knew that there was something wrong.
"I hate my job." I told her. Reading these books felt wrong. That the boy trusted me had been wrong. I was nothing but a stranger. He shouldn't trust me. What would come next? I would get him out of this mess that had been for sure, but then? He was sent into a foster home. A lot of other kids, nobody who cared whether he was broke. There would be nobody who tried to fix him. There would be nobody who told him things were going to be okay again, because they won't. Sometimes it's questionable whether a foster home was better than living with the parents.
"Why?" She asked and then came to me, massaging my neck. She uses to do so when she recognized I was overtaxed with something.
"This…I can't do this." I answered her.
"You can't do what?" She asked on. She would ask so on until I gave her the answer she wanted from me.
"I…the boy trusts me and what am I doing? I misuse this trust." I answered her.
"No, you don't. You help him to stay out of Juvies. That's your job." She told me. Now she stood in front of me, looking into my eyes.
"Yeah, instead I'll send him into a foster home, where nobody cares about how vulnerable and hurt he is."
"You think it's wrong, right?" She asked. She had read me. She usually reads me. She knew what I felt.
"In somehow. I mean, I can't abandon him after knowing this and…just I can't." I admitted.
"I know." She only replied. I hadn't known that this was what she had felt too.
I understood my husband's motives only too good. It was strange to get a broken boy like Ryan to trust you and then send him away as if nothing had happened. It was a lie. There had happened a lot – too much to just forget about it. It had been the feeling of hurting him only more gnawing on my soul. We would abandon him – not knowing whether he would cope, whether he would survive, whether there was someone caring as we did. We would have to live with the feeling of having sent a boy that started to mean something to us to some place where he probably would get lost. It was utterly wrong.
"You know what I mean?" My husband asked.
"The feeling as if we're doing something wrong to him." I said to him. He looked at me astonished. Of course he hadn't counted on this. For him I still had been the ice queen from Newport. Honestly: I've never been. Yes I have my job here and I was tough there, because I had to satisfy my father. But this is all. I'm no whole ice queen, only part time and never around my family.
"I should have said no as my Mum asked." He told me.
"And then he probably would already be in Juvies."
"Yes…but…I mean look even at Seth. I don't know if he can cope with losing his first and real friend. I don't want him to be sad and depressed again." He told me.
"Neither do I. Do you know that he feels also alone, because we're working too much?" I asked him. He had nodded.
"I have thought of something like that as a reason. But even if we start to work less, we never can replace a friend in his age. We always will be the parents. I have the feeling as if he will miss something if he only had us around." He was right. We were hurting two teenagers. One of them had been our own son. The thought had been awful and the feeling of being wrong increased more and more.
"I'm sure we'll find a solution for that. Maybe your Mum can help. Maybe there's a foster home in our closer near. Thus both of the can meet and we can be there for Ryan if he needs us." I suggested. It felt like we had a responsibility towards this boy. Not an annoying one. It just felt as if we had to care – to take care of him. He had grown into our family that fast, without even knowing or wanting it. We only gave him the peace that he needed. We gave him the feeling of being safe and taking that from him again had been a painful thought. My heart clenched every time I thought about this.
"Maybe. And if not, we're failing two teenagers." My husband said. I never should have agreed to this. I should have told him to stay in New York, not to bring the boy here. I should have said no when he had said he had to head for New York. I should have…I don't know. All these thoughts and feelings are just too painful.