Chapter 2 : Move from place to place
Daniel lay on his bed, his back arched over the edge, his head inches from the ground as he lay upside down. He had just finished packing his two suitcases and now waited for his social worker in his bedroom. Well, former bedroom. Daniel looked at his watch. In seventeen minutes he would be out of this hell hole.
Daniel's foster brothers, well former foster brothers, always teased him because of his habit of sitting like this. Truth was it relaxed Daniel. The world looked different this way and he liked it. It felt right. His life had been turned upside down when he was eight, so maybe if he turned himself upside down he'd be back where he started. Back to normalcy. It was a twisted philosophy that the boy genius knew was unrealistic and completely absurd. But every once in a while Daniel let himself enjoy the naivety that he no longer possessed.
Daniel knew it was sad that at age fifteen he had little hope left. He'd been to twenty one foster homes in seven years. He had been to every corner and nook of New York; from Long Island to Albany. He had experienced the worst in people and rarely, the best also. Daniel waited for the day he would find somewhere to belong. So far for him, New York wasn't it. These people weren't it.
Despite the fact that Daniel never stayed long enough in one place to establish what normal people would call a home, he liked the traveling. Going somewhere unknown did provide that little bit of hope that maybe, just maybe, the grass might be green over there. Things had to get better. At least that what he told himself. Sure, they weren't all bad. Some of his foster homes were actually quite pleasant. Either Daniel got in trouble at school with being a "smart-ass" when correcting the teacher or some other small problem that ripped Daniel away from the good homes, squashing his hope of maybe finding the home for him. And after being molested and beaten by dozens of foster parents, Daniel only had the hope that things would get better.
This time Daniel finally gained the courage to tell his social worker that he needed to leave, rather than her finding out the hard way. This was the first time in seven years and twenty one foster homes that Daniel was able to say to her that he needed to move again.
Looking at his watch again revealed that he had 8 minutes left. Daniel lifted himself from over the edge of the bed and sat on his bed, making a mental tally of his belongings and that he packed all of them. Satisfied, he got up off the bed and looked out the window and saw his social worker pull into the driveway. Daniel tightened the laces on his red converse sneakers and tied his denim jacket around his waist. Daniel pulled down the sleeves over his forearms and wrists, hiding the bruises left by his former foster father and the scars from the razor left by his own hand. They were healing nicely from his own bout of personal abuse eight months ago, something he vowed to be strong enough to never do again. He saw his social worker make her way up to the house. His watch said she was five minutes earlier. That put a smile on Daniel's face. Maybe things were looking up. Maybe this move would be the one he could stay at until he graduated next year. Daniel could only hope.