Short chapter set just before 'Remember the first time' - making it the earliest chronologically thus far.
Rusty came back from the Care Home with a nicotine habit, an unshakeable reputation as a liar and a need to be able to make people like him and then forget about him the moment he left their sight.
After talking to his class teacher, the principal, the school councillor Mr. Atwood, two doctors, five social workers and three police officers – Danny, silent at his shoulder all the way – they'd taken him to a Group Home on the edge of town. It was a tall, grey building, with a couple of dozen brightly painted rooms and a large, tree-filled garden.
On the first night, Miss Stevens smiled at him when he arrived, made him a sandwich and gave him several sets of nearly-new clothes that were almost in his size. While he ate she took a look at the cuts on the back of his head, and reapplied the antiseptic that the doctor had given him. Then she took him upstairs to a large room where three other boys – all a little older than him – were sleeping. Or, from when the door opened, pretending to sleep.
One of them sat up as soon as Miss Stevens had wished him goodnight in a whisper and closed the door behind her. "Hey, kid." he hissed. "What are you in for?"
He climbed into bed and tried to think of an answer.
"Jesus, Greg," the oldest of the boys cut in. "Don't ask him that. He just got here."
"Just wanted to know." Greg muttered apologetically. "Sorry."
The oldest boy turned to face him. "What's your name, kid? I'm Jerry, that's Randy over there, and the idiot in the corner is Greg."
"Rusty." he said, smiling. He leaned forwards and looked at each of them in turn. "So, what's it like here?"
The other boys exchanged glances. "It's okay, I guess." Greg said finally. "Three meals a day, and Stevens is a real soft touch."
That, he'd already figured. "What is there to do for fun?"
He lay back and listened to them, as they launched into a rambling explanation of ballgames, movie nights, and daytrips to the beach, or the arcade. Eventually he fell asleep.
The first day he spent going over the house and grounds, making certain he knew every inch. He made sure he went exploring with some of the others; apart from the local knowledge, he needed to appear to fit in. In between checking out the doors and windows, the unused rooms and the wall around the garden (Too high to get over without injury, he'd only risk it if he absolutely had to.) he listened to the other kids and watched them. Greg liked anyone who laughed at his jokes, Marie could tolerate most things as long as you didn't look at her too hard, Jerry mostly wanted to talk about basketball, and Randy would probably follow you into hell if you showed a bit of interest in his opinions.
By the time they were choosing up teams for soccer that afternoon, Rusty was first to be picked.
On the second night he found it more difficult to sleep, so after the other boys' breathing evened out he decided to go for a walk.
The door was locked.
Suddenly he really needed to get out of that room.
Kneeling down, he was able to see that the key was in the lock on the other side, so he fetched a pencil and a piece of paper, carefully pushed the paper under the door, knocked the key down with the pencil and drew the paper – with the key on it – back through to his side.
He unlocked the door and sneaked out into the hallway where it was a little easier to breathe. With no real idea where he was going, he headed downstairs.
Just as his hand was on the front door, one of the care-workers – Bruno – stepped up behind him.
"And where are we going?" he asked, genially.
Rusty turned round slowly. "Just needed some air." he said, watching Bruno carefully.
"Well, you should be in bed." Bruno said briskly. "Come on, I'll take you back upstairs." He reached out a hand and Rusty automatically dodged sideways and put himself out of reach. Just the sort of stupid, instinctive reaction that Danny would cover for him.
Bruno took a step backwards and put his hands up. "Come on." he repeated, sadly. "I'll take you back to bed."
Rusty nodded and obediently followed him back upstairs. It would be useless to do anything else.
At the door, Bruno paused. "This should have been locked." he muttered and looked around. "And there's no sign of the key. Someone's in trouble."
The key in Rusty's pocket was heavy, but he said nothing.
Bruno pulled a key out of the door opposite. "Old house." he explained, catching sight of Rusty's puzzled expression. "Most of the locks are the same. Now come on, off to bed with you."
The room felt smaller to him than it had before, but without any real choice, he did as he was told.
On the second day, he planned to go and meet Danny in town. It was, after all, the last weekend before the end of Spring Break, and the streets would be filled with careless shoppers. And more than that, he had to know what Danny thought about everything.
It never occurred to him that he wouldn't be allowed to go, but when he asked the other kids they looked at him like he was crazy, and when he went to see Miss Stevens she sighed, and pushed her glasses further up her nose.
"I can't let you go wandering around the city on your own, Rusty. I know you've not been used to all this, but you're only ten years old. It isn't safe. You need to be looked after."
"I'm nearly eleven." he said, flatly.
She sighed again, then seemed to brighten up. "There is a bit of good news. I've been on the telephone all morning, and from Monday you'll be starting your new school."
"New school?" He blinked.
She nodded. "Yes, of course. You'll be going to school with the other children. Won't that be nice?"
He looked down for a long moment, and when he looked back up, he appeared to be on the brink of tears. "Can't . . . can't I just carry on going to my old school?"
"Oh, Rusty." She smiled softly. "You'll be fine. You'll make lots of new friends. Just look at how well you've settled in here."
He nodded as though she'd helped and left her office.
The rest of the day he spent eyeing the walls and trying to figure out if a broken arm or leg would really be that bad, and when Joe offered him a cigarette and said it would help he accepted without hesitation.
The third night he spent staring out of the window and working his way through the pack of cigarettes he'd lifted off Bruno.
On the third day it was raining, so they were all kept inside. He played snap with Greg, Jerry and Randy for a while, but he had to walk away when the urge to cheat got too strong.
So he was on his own, curled up in an armchair, reading his way through a pile of old comics, when Miss Stevens came into the room, followed by a man and a woman he'd never seen before.
"Oh, Rusty." Miss Stevens said, distractedly. "Have you seen Greg by any chance?"
He shook his head. "Not for a while."
"Oh, dear." She hesitated. Would you mind entertaining Mr. and Mrs. Anchorage while I go and find him? That's a good boy." She left before he had a chance to answer, and he found himself alone in a room with two complete strangers standing between him and the only exit.
They looked at him and he looked back at them. He had absolutely no idea who they were.
"So, Rusty, is it?" The man, Mr. Anchorage, smiled warmly at him. Rusty resisted the urge to look round to see if he'd maybe missed any windows. He hadn't. "We haven't seen you here before. Are you new?"
He nodded. "Yes, sir. I arrived on Thursday."
They looked slightly taken aback at his 'sir', so he deliberately changed his stance subtly, to appear more relaxed.
"How are you finding it?" Mr. Anchorage continued, after a pause. "Are you settling in fine?"
"Uh huh." His keen eyes saw how his informality relaxed them a little. "Everyone's very nice."
They smiled at him, and he smiled back. Glancing over them quickly, he noticed that Mr. Anchorage was wearing a Little League lapel pin. "And Joe said that he'd take me along to baseball practice, when it starts." he added. "I can't wait."
"You like baseball?" Mr. Anchorage asked immediately. "Who do you support?"
He hesitated for a split second, but there was a flash of a navy, red and white sock at the man's ankle, so he took a chance and said "The Red Sox."
Mr. Anchorage smiled broadly and started talking quickly about the upcoming season. Rusty was able to bluff his way through with no real difficulty.
When her husband finally paused for breath, Mrs. Anchorage – who had been smiling indulgently throughout – asked "So, what else do you like doing, Rusty?"
He smiled cheerfully at her. She seemed to like that. He'd already noticed the smudge of blue paint on her wrist earlier. She could just be redecorating or something, but it looked more like oil paint to him. "Well," he said shyly, "I quite like drawing, but I'm not real good at it."
"I'm sure that's not true." she said, warmly. "You like art, then?"
"Uh huh." He nodded. "It's my best subject at school." He was lying about that, as it happened, but it wasn't that important.
They both smiled at him again, and started talking to him about school. He managed to keep them happy, and even avoided flinching when Mr. Anchorage reached out and ruffled his hair.
All in all he felt he'd coped pretty well, so when Miss Stevens finally returned, he couldn't understand why Greg was glaring at him.
The Anchorages said hello to Greg and then took Miss Stephens aside for a long few moments. They kept glancing over at him, and he kept hearing the word 'unavailable'. Miss Stevens looked apologetic. The Anchorages looked sad. Greg looked really angry.
Eventually, Miss Stevens ushered him out of the room and told him to go play. He went to one of the empty rooms on the second floor and smoked the last of his cigarettes. After twenty minutes he saw the Anchorages drive away.
It was early evening before Greg caught up with him and knocked him to the floor. "They were my ticket out of here!" he yelled.
"I'm sorry." Rusty said, as meekly as he knew how. He didn't try and fight back. Greg was a lot bigger than him, and he didn't want to risk being seen as a threat.
"You know how often people come by looking for older kids?" Greg snarled. "I was gonna be adopted."
Rusty looked straight at him. "Maybe they'll be back."
"Yeah. Maybe. But they didn't say they would." Greg swiped the back of his hand across his eyes. "I hate you." he yelled, and ran out of the room
Rusty looked over at Jerry, who'd been standing there silently throughout the whole thing, and willed him to go after his friend. After a moments hesitation he did, and, with an apologetic glance, Randy followed.
On the third night once again, he couldn't sleep. He had no more cigarettes, the room was smaller than ever, and none of the others were talking to him. That wouldn't last long though. Greg had nodded and almost smiled when he'd handed over the comics he'd smuggled out of the reading room, the half block of chocolate he'd stolen from the kitchen and the Bumper Book of Dirty Jokes he'd won off Joe. When Greg forgave him, he knew that the others would too.
In the meantime he lay awake, his arm over his face, and considered. He had no doubt that he'd be able to get adopted or fostered, if he wanted. Once everything was settled there would be other families that he'd be able to con into believing that he was exactly what they wanted. It would be easy. And it would be months, probably, before they realised that he'd lied to them. Before they saw what he really was and looked away in disappointment. And by that time it would be too late. He bit his lip hard and tasted blood. It would be easy . . .
On the fourth day he went to Miss Stevens and told her he'd been lying. It took three police officers, five social workers, two psychologists, twelve hours and a lot of fast talking, but in the end he was driven back to his dad's flat with nothing more than the clothes he was wearing and a disgusted look and a promise of monthly home visits from a social worker he would never see again.
The worst part was going back to school the next day. Not because of the whispers and sideways glances from the other kids, who didn't know what had happened, but clearly knew something had. Not even because of the averted gazes and contemptuous expressions that all the teachers were wearing, or the way they all talked about him when they thought he couldn't hear of understand. "Highly disturbed." "Hurting himself." and what seemed to be the favourite, "Attention-seeking behaviour." It was awful. And it wasn't the worst.
The worst was the first time he came face to face with Danny. Because Danny stood there, fists tightly clenched at his sides, and with an expression on his face that Rusty would never understand, asked "Why?"
And Rusty just shook his head and looked away.
And Danny didn't ask again.
But the first time - after - that he came to school with bruises, and blood staining the collar of the nice, blue, almost-new shirt that Miss Stevens had given him, Danny ran away with him for the day, and they hid in the darkness, and they both pretended that Danny's arms weren't around him, and they both pretended he wasn't crying.
I vaguely hope that you're slightly less upset after reading that than I am after writing it. God, I'm pathetic. Anyway, let me know what you think - please.