Chapter 9

"What happened?" I sat beside Arthur on his ratty couch and lit a cigarette for him. His hands shook too much to even get one out of the packet. When I passed it to him, he smoked half of it before he could speak.

"My mother died today."

"Hell, Arthur, I'm sorry." I swapped hands with my own cigarette and rested my hand on his shoulder. He was trembling all over, his body seeming to vibrate.

"It was m-my fault," he choked out.

"Why do you think that? I thought she had a stroke."

"Yeah, another one." He sucked on the cigarette again. "I'm a bad person. They said she was recovering."

"She was sick," I reminded him. "Why do you think this is your fault?"

"I found out some stuff. I went to Arkham this morning."

I stiffened. "Why?"

"I'd been meaning to do it for a while. I wanted to find out about her. She told me Thomas Wayne's my father and I thought she was making it up. Delusional. Must be where I get it from." He hiccupped out another laugh and smoke the last half inch of the cigarette.

"Why did she say he's your father?"

"She would never tell me. All my life I've never known, but she kept writing to him, asking him to help us. She worked for him before I was born. When she went into the hospital, she'd left another of those stupid letters for me to post. I opened it and it kept saying "your son" and stuff like that."

"You're Thomas Wayne's son?" My eyebrows lifted.

"No! I told you she made it up!" Arthur yelled suddenly.

"You said you thought she made it up. I'm on your side, Arthur." I took my hand off his shoulder and lit another cigarette for him.

"Sorry. I'm sorry." He got up and paced around the small room, smoking and wringing his hands. "I went to Arkham to see if I could get her file. I managed to con the man on the desk into finding it. Then I stole it and ran away. It was all lies. All of it. I'm not his son. I'm not hers either. She adopted me. She's not my mother!" He screeched the last few words, then started tugging his hands through his hair, cigarette and all.

I jumped up and grabbed his wrists, then took the cigarette from him. "You're gonna hurt yourself."

"Who cares?" He wrenched free, surprisingly strong considering how frail he appeared. He took the cigarette back and drew on it, then laughed out the smoke. "I'm like this because of her. Why would you adopt a kid and then abuse him? Why?"

A chill ran through my body. "What do you mean?"

"See for yourself. Here." He grabbed a red file from the table and passed it to me. "You can read it."

"Are you sure?"

He nodded. I opened the file and flicked through some of the pages, finding an adoption certificate stating that Penny Fleck had adopted a young boy, Arthur. There were newspaper articles and medical reports, some about her and some about him. She and her then boyfriend had left Arthur chained to a radiator for hours, sometimes days, without food, and the boyfriend had beaten him to within an inch of his life, leaving him brain damaged. He was three years old. After he recovered physically, he went to a children's home, while Penny was locked up in the secure wing of Arkham, and the boyfriend went to prison.

I put the file aside as Arthur started to laugh wildly, hysterical and painful. I tugged him into my arms, and the laughter turned to sobs. He clung to me, his agony pouring out of him. Then suddenly he pulled away and rushed into the bathroom. I heard him throwing up and when I got there, he was crouching on the tile floor, shivering.

I didn't say anything. What was there to say? Suddenly it made my problems seem insignificant. I found a washcloth hanging on the side of the sink, soaked it in warm water, and wiped Arthur's face. Then I helped him to his feet and led him to his bedroom. It had to be behind the one closed door—I could see all the other rooms. Then I remembered. He didn't have a bedroom—he slept on the couch. I hesitated, but he shuffled through the door and lay down on the bed, curled up on his side, and closed his eyes. I grabbed a folded blanket from the foot of the bed and spread it over him. Then I lay down with him and took one of his cold hands in mine.

"I read the file," he said softly. "Then I went to see her. I thought about—" He scrunched up his face. "Don't hate me. I thought about killing her. I imagined all these ways of doing it—smothering her with the pillow; injecting air into her drip; stabbing her with a scalpel. Maybe that makes me as crazy as she was. I didn't do any of that. I asked her why she would do that to a baby? Why she stood by and let her boyfriend almost kill me. Her heart monitor started bleeping faster and faster. She was clutching at her chest like she couldn't breathe. I watched her die."

"I'm so sorry, Arthur." I touched his face.

"You don't think badly of me?" His long wet lashes fluttered, and slowly lifted.

"No. I don't think badly of you. I feel sick that Penny and her man did all that to you. You were a helpless child. That card you showed me once said the laughing may be the result of a brain injury. Was it?"

"Yes. The doctors said so. I was normal before. Afterwards, I had no memory of it. I lived in children's homes—lots of different ones because they couldn't cope with me. Penny was released when I was in my twenties. I still thought she was my mother. She was frail and sick and needed me to look after her, so I did. She wasn't even my mother. I cared for her for over ten years, and she was nobody." He pulled his hand free of mine and clutched at my shirt. "Don't leave me, Travis. Please."

"I'm not gonna leave," I said. "You didn't do anything wrong. Not when you were a kid, and not now. She was a sick woman and she got everything she deserved. She can't hurt you anymore."

He heaved a sigh of relief. "I thought you'd hate me. I thought you'd think I'm a freak and never want to speak to me again."

"You're not a freak, Arthur." I gently pried his hand off my shirt and lifted it to my lips so I could kiss his knuckles. "You'll be okay now. We'll both be okay."

I didn't remember closing my eyes, but when I opened them, the room was dark, several hours having passed. I still lay on my side facing Arthur, his hand in mine, and he continued to sleep peacefully. I'd slept without my pills and I hadn't been disturbed by dreams.

I thought about everything Arthur had told me, and impotent anger filled me as I imagined a scared little boy chained up, starved and beaten by a woman who had chosen to have him in her life. If she hadn't been dead already, I'd have wanted to kill her myself.

Carefully, I slid away from Arthur to go to the bathroom. Then I made some coffee and lit a cigarette. I should have been at work by now—it was past seven—but a night off wouldn't hurt. I made another coffee for Arthur and went back to the bedroom. He stirred and opened his eyes.

"You're still here."

"I said I wouldn't leave."

"I'm sorry about before." He pushed the blanket off and sat up before accepting the mug of coffee.

"You have nothing to be sorry for."

"You don't need my shit adding to your own."

"You were there for me when I needed somebody. I'm here for you, too. Maybe we can help each other. Dr Kane doesn't give a shit about either of us, but I do. I care, Arthur. You can talk to me whenever you want to."

"Did it help you at all, talking to me about Gerry?"

"Yeah. I didn't think so at the time, but when I thought about it later, it didn't hurt so much. I still have nightmares when I let myself sleep, but it's not so bad."

"That's good." Arthur sipped his coffee. "Don't you have to go to work?"

"Not tonight. I'm having a day off."

"Is that because of me?"

"Not entirely. I need a day off. I work seven days a week. But I wouldn't leave you tonight, anyway." My stomach grumbled, and I grinned. "I need to get something to eat, though."

"There are some frozen dinners," Arthur said. "Bread and eggs and oatmeal. You can help yourself."

"Okay. I'll find something." I lit a cigarette for him, then went to look around the kitchen. I wasn't a great cook—I lived on sandwiches, cereal, burgers from a diner, and other shit. I should probably do something about that. I'd let myself go after I was discharged from the marines; lost all my fitness and muscle. Not that I could have done much to keep healthy in Arkham anyway. The food was shit, and the only option for exercise was walking around the damn place.

I boiled some eggs and toasted some bread—I couldn't go far wrong with that. Arthur appeared just as I was picking bits of shell off the eggs and trying not to burn my fingers.

"I'm shit at cooking. This was as much as I could manage." I laughed and handed him a plate with two slices of toast and two halved eggs on it.

"Oh, I'm not really hungry."

"Try a bit of it. We can eat together." I remembered him saying he had issues with food, and I expected it had something to do with being starved as a child, but I had no intention of asking him about it. He was upset enough. But I wanted to see him eat a few bites.

"All right." He took the plate into the living room. I made more coffee and joined him. He picked at the food, but he did eat it eventually. I wolfed mine down and wished I'd made more. When I took Arthur's plate from him, there remained only a crust off the toast on it.

Arthur switched on the TV while I was in the kitchen. There wasn't much of interest showing, but we watched together for a couple of hours. Arthur took his medication and I noticed the anti-depressant was the same one I took. I hadn't taken my own, and I had one of his rather than go back to my apartment.

"You know, you don't have to stay with me. I'm okay now," Arthur said eventually.

"You asked me not to leave. I'm not leaving."

He smiled. "You're going to stay all night?"

"Do you want me to?" I had visions of lying in that bed with him, snuggling together, perhaps getting a few more hours' sleep and waking up with him in the morning. My face warmed.

"That'd be nice."

"Then I'll stay."