Author's Note- Edited.

Enjoy!

Forbidden

Memory

I couldn't believe what I was seeing. Well, to be honest, I never really thought I'd ever see this outside of a movie or on television simply because the thought of being here in my future never would have crossed my mind.

But that didn't mean it was any less mind-blowing.

I was standing at the peak of a baseball field. A huge one. Suddenly the terrain made so much sense. I wasn't standing on rough carpet, but artificial grass as the substance filled the entirety of the stadium aside, of course, from the outer ring of dirt. Directly north of me was a grand collection of monitors that, when they were on and functioning, held the score board and the plethora of screens set for advertisements and sponsors of the alleged sport. Surrounding the field was a massive amount of stands where spectators would lounge to enjoy their favorite pastime and cheer for their favorite teams.

I honestly almost forgot that Derek was standing right behind me and would have continued to gawk, awestruck if his hands hadn't landed on my shoulders and his whisper hadn't brushed my ear once again.

"Too much?" He asked, amusement in his tone. He must have seen my expression.

"T-this is huge." I sputtered, sounding uneducated. Derek chuckled. "I mean, this isn't an average little baseball field. We have to be in-"

I looked down at my feet, trying to think of a baseball team because I really didn't know that much about the sport. I was greeted by an easy answer as the grass below us was painted white in the shape of a large, bold Y overlapping that of the letter N.

"Yankee stadium. We're in Yankee stadium? How are we in Yankee stadium?" I couldn't keep the incredulous questions from slipping though my lips. I was too shocked. Derek's low, rumbling laugh sounded again.

"Do you even like baseball?" I added.

"Nah." He muttered offhandedly. "I don't really care for the sport."

I glanced at him over my shoulder, giving him a questioning look and almost asking why the hell we were standing in Yankee stadium then if he wasn't a fanatic. But he wasn't looking at me. His jade eyes were passing over the entirety of the stadium, clouded as if they were lost in memories.

"A family friend works here for night security and he used to sneak us in when I was a kid."

"Your dad has a friend that just grants you access to Yankee Stadium during off hours?" I asked, tone disbelieving as I turned to face him. He shook his head, eyes taking one more sweep of the field before they cleared and he brought them back down to me.

"I don't think Jon remembers Dad. He was a friend of my mother's."

My brows furrowed, the shock of how the incredible fact of exactly where I was standing withered as a new curiously hesitant emotion took its place. Derek had never mentioned his mother before and, if he was suggesting that this friend, Jon, wasn't acquainted with his dad, then I could only assume that he was speaking of his biological mother. Of course, I only had minor theories as far as Derek's alleged intricate web of family matters. For instance, I was fairly certain that he was adopted by the Bae family considering that was the surname of his siblings that clearly held no blood relativity to him whatsoever. Then again, how could I be certain that Simon and Tori's father hadn't just married Derek's mother, simply making the Bae's his step family? I didn't know many people who addressed their step fathers as their legitimate father as Derek did, but it was possible.

I waited patiently for Derek to continue speaking. To tell me more. It was clear now why we were here and what kind of night this was for Derek. Not only did he understand that we needed to spend some time alone together, but I was starting to understand that Derek was, in his own way, opening up to me in a way I couldn't imagine him ever before. He was very much aware that I had more personal questions about him and his past, after all, I had asked him enough. This must just be his way of showing that he was ready to share that part of him with me now that we've been getting to know each other the past few months.

But that didn't mean that it was going to be easy for him and I could see that evidenced in his almost pained expression.

So, I took his hand, gave it a squeeze and started walking. I tugged at him to follow, informing him that it was my turn to take control. He responded with a quirk of his lips and a nod and soon, we were walking around the perimeter of the field.

"I honestly don't know why she thought I was interested in baseball," Derek started after a couple of minutes, eyes downcast as he watched where he was placing his feet. I simply remained attentive and listened to him. "I think she must have caught me observing a game we walked by or something and thought that I was intrigued by it. I'm not sure…"

He trailed off, as if he were merely voicing a thought and didn't really know where it was going. After a minute, he blinked hard and gave his head a quick shake. This really wasn't his element. Talking. I'm sure if I asked him about the quadratic equation he'd fall into a lecture and explain to me why it was relevant in everyday life despite how I felt about it or math in general. But that was because he was good at math. He wasn't good with talking about himself, his life, his feelings or, evidently, his past. By the amount he struggled to start speaking again, I worried if it was a particularly painful one.

"It's obvious Simon and Tori aren't my biological siblings and I'm sure you've made your own assumptions as to how we're related."

"I've juggled with a few theories." I admitted. Derek snorted.

"Ten bucks says your first guess is the right one."

"You were raised by wolves and the Bae's domesticated and civilized you enough that you're suitable to teach college students?" Derek tossed me a look that suggested that he should be less than amused but he was struggling to keep a grimace in place.

"Out of all the possible movies you've seen about the adoption of wayward orphans and 'previously raised by wolves' is the best you come up with?"

"Looks like you owe me ten bucks." I said with a shrug. Derek rolled his eyes and pressed on.

"Kit, my dad, adopted me when I was five. Before then, it was just me and my mother. Or, at least what I could remember of her."

"Despite my age, I was able to understand that we lived in a financial bind. Knowing what I do now, it seems almost impossible being able to live as well as we did. I mean, do you think you could possibly pay a month to month's rent for an apartment in New York City on your shift at the diner?"

I shook my head. That's why I had been saving every paycheck for the last two years of working the diner and living in the dorms under Dad's deal just so I'd be able to make a decent enough down payment on an apartment for a lower monthly rate once I started at Juilliard.

"Well, she worked at Michael's every shift she could get and yet she was able to maintain a comfortable standing in the apartment complex above the diner."

"Your mother worked at the diner?" Derek nodded and a saddened shadow crossed his features.

"She wore herself to the bone trying to support us. Her working at that diner is the most vivid memory I have of her. But here, on this field, is the last memory I have of her."

Derek went on to tell me of the last day he had ever seen his mother. With the way he spoke and portrayed his tale, I almost felt as if I were there, seeing it all through his bold, surprisingly intelligent green eyes- considering his young age- behind a curtain of messy dark hair.

I was sitting at a booth at the diner, watching as a strikingly beautiful young woman with light brown eyes and long dark locks pulled said tresses back into a ponytail and went to tie on an apron. She caught my eye and smiled, her lush lips curving tenderly.

My mother.

She always looked at me this way, even when I caught her with a different and opposite expression before she noticed me watching her. This time, she had looked exhausted, dark circles just beginning to form beneath her soft eyes as she prepared for her second shift that day.

After a moment, she reached across the walkway and picked up a few pieces of paper and some crayons off the breakfast bar before laying them on the table in front of me.

"Sweetheart, why don't you draw mommy a picture while she's helping the costumers." She offered, her voice as smooth and sweet as honey. I gave her a skeptical look and she rolled her eyes, amused. "Or you can work on your alphabet and numbers seeing as how you find that more entertaining for some reason."

I liked that idea and picked up a blue crayon, beginning to scribble down the letters of the alphabet. I knew all twenty-six letters and could count all the way to fifty, which seemed to be impressive considering a lot of Mom's costumers were surprised that I wasn't in Kindergarten yet.

My mother gave a false, exasperated sigh and leaned down, observing me as I wrote both the upper and lower case versions of my letters.

"Who would have thought that my son would be a genius? Before you know it, you're going to have to start budgeting my tips seeing as how you'll be so much smarter than me."

I gave her another look and she laughed, joked some more about how nothing gets past me, then set off to start work.

This was just another ordinary day for us. Mom would work, share her free meals with me, then work some more. I didn't have to sit there at the diner. I could have just stayed home in our apartment upstairs but I didn't like leaving Mom alone unless she was working a night shift and she told me I had to get my sleep. So, I spent most days sitting at this table.

I was working on a new trick Mom had taught me where you add one number to another and get a bigger number, when a familiar voice interrupted my concentration.

"Hey, bud."

I looked up and saw a man that visited the diner often. I could never remember his name but Mom always called him her favorite costumer. He was taller than she was, with hair almost as dark and brown, almond-shaped eyes. He was a nice enough man. Always smiling. Always having something kind to say. Mom seemed to like him and enjoy his company. But Mom also seemed to like the man she paid to live in our apartment even though she always came home looking solemn and upset every time he called her to visit him.

"Mind if I join you today, Derek?" Mom's friend asked politely. I surveyed him. He always asked to sit with me when he ate at the diner. Sometimes he even brought things. Most times it wasn't anything more than a candy bar, but there were rare chances that he brought small toys or trinkets. I tried not to look eager or like I expected it of him, but when he caught my scavenging gaze, he chuckled and pulled a small box that rattled from his pocket.

It was a lego set where you followed the directions and it made something once you put all the pieces together. This one looked to be a spaceship. I took it from him, my 'thank you' his needed agreement to his request and he slid into the booth on the other side of the table.

Mom was busy with other customers so she merely settled for waving in our direction and my company was served by Roxanne. She was a woman who worked with my mother that I didn't much care for because she was always pinching my cheeks and cooing at me as if I were two. Well, I was almost five so she could take her sharp, manicured pinching nails and shove them-

"So what are you working on today?" The man asked. I moved my piece of paper in his direction, then proceeded to open up the lego set and dump the contents onto the table.

"Addition already." He stated offhandedly, smiling down at my work. "Do you know how to subtract too?"

I looked up from the set of instructions and gave the man a quizzical look, unsure of what he was talking about. He pointed at the paper where I had done a few problems and said, "See, you added six to seven here and got thirteen, right?"

I nodded.

"Well, if you take that seven away from thirteen, you're back down to…?"

"Six."

"And here you've got five from adding two and three, but if you take away the three then you're left with-"

"Two."

"That's subtraction. It's just like adding but backwards."

That seemed easy enough. I asked the man if he could give me some more problems to solve and he agreed, writing them on the paper with the green crayon. He passed the paper back over and I tried solving them, legos forgotten.

"If only I could get Simon to pay this much attention to math. He's got a big mouth and can have a full conversation with anyone but can barely count to ten." He laughed as I subtracted seven from nine.

I remember him talking about Simon. His son that he mentioned before, being about my age. I had never met him though. However, the man did promise that I would someday. He even said we'd probably be good friends.

When I finished all of the man's problems, he checked them and said I got most of them right. Then he helped me put together the lego spaceship, asking me how I felt about starting school soon. I just shrugged. Before he could try and get more of a committed answer out of me, my mother came over to refill the man's coffee.

"How have you been, Kit?" She asked with a warm smile. Right. The man's name was Kit.

"Same as usual. What about you, Carry?"

Mom looked at me for a brief moment then turned back to Kit with a more wary look.

"Hanging in there." She said lowly. Kit nodded, understanding flickering through his eyes.

"Listen," She continued, smile back. "I was thinking of taking Derek to the stadium tonight after my shift."

I sat up a little, paying more attention to what she was saying. Every now and then Mom would take me to Yankee stadium. I'd never played baseball but she thought I enjoyed it so she got help from her friend Jon to let us in sometimes when the custodians were cleaning up for the night. As long as we were together, I was happy. As long as we were tossing a ball back and forth or running through the field playing tag together, I was happy. And I knew that it made her happy to see me happy. So I even pretended to want to be a baseball player when I grew up to show her that she was doing something right, because I often caught her blaming herself on everything that went wrong.

"You should join us." She suggested to Kit.

When Kit looked a bit skeptical, Mom added that there was something she really needed to talk to him about and he hesitantly agreed. For the next couple of hours, Kit helped me with numbers that followed fifty and kept making the numbers that I was adding and subtracting bigger. He mentioned that by no time I'd be multiplying and dividing. When I asked him to teach me, he laughed and said I might be biting off more than I could chew.

When Mom finished her shift, she hung up her apron and we left the diner. We took the bus as we usually did to get anywhere except Kit accompanied us. I didn't mind. He wasn't like the man that let us live in the apartment. He didn't patronize me or sneer in my direction whenever my mother wasn't looking. And he was nice to her. He never touched her more than a friendly hug or a reassuring pat on the shoulder. Whereas the guy who took Mom's money would touch her differently, in taunting ways that made my skin crawl.

Kit asked on the ride over to the stadium what my mother wanted to talk to him about but she only shook her head and asked him if he'd wait to discuss it once we got to our destination. He agreed, but I could practically feel his uncertainty and oddly enough, that made me feel uneasy. What was it that Mom wanted to talk to him about?

The bus ride always took a while. By the time we were getting off, the sun had fully set and it was dark out. Mom grabbed my hand and pulled me across the street towards that large parking lot in the front of the stadium. We disregarded the front doors as usual and Mom pulled out a set of keys as we made our way around to the back. Kit wondered if this was okay and Mom relayed to him that she had already called her friend Jon ahead of time and was told that they should be fine. We made our way through a series of hallways until we reached the door that led out to the pit where the players sat when they weren't on the field. Mom urged me on ahead. I obeyed and raced towards the rack of bats and baseballs near the bench before leaving the pit.

I made my way onto the field thinking that Mom and Kit were only a few steps behind me. However, when I glanced back to see if Mom was willing to be the pitcher or the batter today, I noticed that I had ventured out onto the fake grass by myself. Mom had held Kit back in the pit, quietly speaking to him in a way that made his dark brows furrow in confusion.

"Mom?" I questioned, wondering if she was choosing now to discuss what she had wanted to with Kit, or if she were just asking him a quick question. I wasn't too sure, but whatever my mother said to him, Kit only took a moment to think about it before nodding his head in a somewhat hesitant agreement. When he did, my mother glanced in my direction and called over, "Go ahead and start without us, sweetheart. We'll join you in a couple minutes."

Whatever they discussed in those couple of minutes, I'm sure it had to do something with money. I don't think Mom ever realized how much I caught on about our financial instability but, whenever I heard Kit say things like 'not enough money' or 'let me help you' it was easy to see that me and my mother's lives revolved greatly around the seemingly insignificant piece of green paper and that we didn't have that much. As I pretended to put effort into throwing a baseball in the air and hit it with the bat that was just a bit bigger than me, I noticed that familiar displeasured frown of Kit's whenever my mother denied his help.

Only, this time, it seemed different. As if he wasn't just frustrated with her stubbornness, but disappointed and saddened as well.

Kit shook his head, refusing.

Mom clasped her hands together, brows bowing, begging.

Kit whispered something, expression angry.

Mom slumped, looking tired and worn, giving him one last pleading look.

Kit sighed, closed his eyes, took in a deep, slow breath, then nodded.

Mom took his hand and squeezed it but he refused to look into her eyes. After all that, even if a second ago I believed they were talking about money, I knew now that it was of something else entirely. I wished I had been closer to hear what had been said, for I had never seen them talk like that before. But, before I could dwell or think any more of it, Mom turned towards me and smiled. That forced elated smile even though she wasn't fooling anyone with how exhausted she looked. Physically and emotionally.

Kit wound up pitching while Mom watched. He was better at throwing a ball than she was, but I had rather played with her like we always did. I didn't complain though because it gave her a moment to rest and Kit was easy to get along with. I stroke out once but made up for it with my three homeruns, even if Kit pretended to be slower than me as I ran from him around the bases. He talked most of the time, saying how much Simon liked playing sports too and how much the two of us would get along. I wondered when I would get to meet this infamously great son of his. He gave me a weird smile and told me that it would be sooner than I thought.

Later on that night, I crawled out from beneath my covers to use the restroom. Mom had tucked me into bed a couple hours before but, I had an unsettling feeling in my stomach that wasn't helping me sleep. I wasn't sure if it was the unusual amount of kisses she placed on my forehead and the abnormally long, tight hug she had given me goodnight, or the fact that I simply had to use the toilet. I just pegged it as the second option and made my way to the hall right outside my room where the bathroom was. I noticed, though, a light on at the end of the hall that led to the kitchen and the living room where Mom slept.

What was she doing still awake? I could have sworn she mentioned something about an early shift before hugging me goodnight.

I padded down the hall and peaked into her room. Her lamp was on and her dresser drawers were open. I glanced behind me towards the front door to see if her apron was on the coatrack. It wasn't. Sometimes she got called into the diner late at night whenever they needed extra hands for the swing shift. She was the most convenient employee since we lived in the apartments built above the restaurant. I always hated it when she got called in because that was the time I couldn't be down in the diner.

So, I did exactly what she would have wanted me to do and what I always did whenever she had to run out for a swing shift. I used the bathroom, got myself a glass of milk, then went back to bed.

I woke up the next morning to a knocking sound. For a second, I just thought it was Mom rummaging through the cupboards out in the kitchen and I burrowed my head under my pillow to drown out the noise. Once the sound stopped, I thought it was safe to assume that I could go back to sleep. Only, the knocking started up again less than a minute later.

Someone knocking on the front door.

It definitely wasn't the man that Mom paid to live here. He usually just walked on in whenever he wanted, or banged on the door, making Mom rush over to answer it before he got angry. This knock was sturdy, but patient.

Silence.

Then another succession of steady knocking.

Why wasn't Mom answering the door?

When another round of knocking started, I slid out of bed and trudged out into the hall. I went to Mom's room to see for myself why she was ignoring the visitor, but it was empty. Could she still possibly be downstairs working?

Three more knocks.

"Derek?"

I glanced towards the door, hesitant that the owner of the muffled voice on the other side knew my name. It was definitely a man.

"Hey, bud, are you in there?"

I exhaled a breath I hadn't been aware of holding. Bud was a nickname that only one man I knew of used.

"Derek, it's Kit. It's alright, you're mother said you could let me in."

I liked Kit. Easy as that. I opened the door.

Kit greeted me and when I asked him if my mother had sent him up here for something, he gave me a questioning look.

"Mom's busy at the diner, right? Did she send you up here to get me?"

"Not exactly-" Kit started, expression solemn. "You're mother isn't working a shift right now, Derek."

"So you're looking for her then?" I asked. I thought about it and wondered if she had decided to run to the store after her swing was over before coming home. We were pretty short on food after all. I relayed this to Kit, telling him he could probably find her at the supermarket the next block over, but he shook his head.

"That's not it either."

"You're not here for my mom?" I asked, simply perplexed now.

"No, Derek. I came here for you." Kit said, slowly, tone forcibly even. I felt my brows inch closer together.

"Why?"

"Listen," Kit began, taking a step back out into the hallway of the apartment building and gesturing down towards the exit. "Why don't we go down to the diner and I'll buy you some breakfast. There's something I need to talk to you about."

I liked Kit. But it was a little bit hard to at the moment when he wasn't making any sense and I still had no idea of where my mom was for sure.

"What is it?"

"I'll tell you about it once you've got some food in your stomach, so let's-"

"Tell me about it now." I interrupted, inching a bit back behind my door, just in case.

Kit looked down at me for a good long minute, features stern while his calculative, almond orbs held mine. When I didn't budge, he broke and released an exasperated sigh followed by a small chuckle.

"You're just as stubborn as she is, you know?" He stated quietly, almost to himself. Then, he lowered himself down onto one knee so that he could speak to me at my level. I waited patiently as he seemed to struggle to gather his words.

"Derek, I'm going to give you the honest to God truth, but, I'll understand if you don't believe me. I know you probably don't trust me that much-"

"Mom trusts you." I said. Kit gave a nervous laugh and said, "Well, apparently a little too much."

Again, I waited until Kit continued.

"You're mom has worked very hard to take care of you." He explained, his statement soft and sincere. "She's the hardest working woman that I've ever met and an incredible mother, wouldn't you agree?"

I nodded.

"But, even hard working people that have had to struggle to make ends meet run into hurdles that seem nearly impossible to jump over."

"Like not enough money?" I asked. Kit's eyes darkened with an emotion I didn't know of. But his lips quirked in a sad smile nonetheless and he nodded.

"Like not enough money." He agreed. "Your mom has some things she needs to take care of, which means she's going to be gone for a while."

"How long?"

"Honestly, bud, I really don't know." He murmured.

We stood there in a painful silence for a moment, my mind racing through all the things that Mom had been going through that led up to this. Her long nights hovering over paperwork and the machine that counted numbers for you. Her excessive hours at the diner. Her forced happiness whenever she spent time with me. Her argument with the man she paid after he shoved me against the wall, all because I told him not to touch my mother the way that he did. Her quiet sobs on rare nights.

Her conversation with Kit the night before. Her tight hug and quiet 'I love you so much, sweetheart' before I went to sleep. And her empty room...

"Last night, at the stadium-"

Kit chuckled quietly.

"Well, she wasn't lying when she told me nothing gets past you." A short pause and then, "Yeah, she was asking me if I would take care of you while she was gone. That's what I'm here for, Derek. I'm here to ask you if you want to come home with me."

I liked Kit. Easy as that. I let him take me home.

Derek's eyes had been going over the field as he spoke, looking nowhere in particular. It must have helped him to speak that way, without having to focus on anything. When he finished, though, he glanced down, refocusing, a light flash of that pain returning in his orbs before it vanished. On reflex, my grip on his hand tightened and I wondered aloud, "That was it? Kit asked and you just left with him?"

Derek shrugged.

"I knew that he was telling the truth, that my mother had really asked him to watch after me. So I went. I honestly thought she wouldn't be gone more than a couple weeks."

"But it wasn't just a couple of weeks." I murmured quietly.

"Ten years after I left with Kit, he offered to hire a private investigator. But, I was a teenager, going through a particularly brooding and untrusting phase. I was angry. When I was fifteen, I had been thinking for a couple years by then that it was less of the fact that she couldn't take care of me and more that she didn't want to. My memory of her was being clouded. I was pushing away at Simon, at Dad. I was being an idiot really." Derek shook his head as he remembered himself in his younger years.

"Even though I told him against it, Dad sent out someone to look for her anyways."

"Did you ever find her?"

Derek shook his head.

"The private investigator started with Zachary Cain. My biological father. He was in prison when I was born. I don't even think he was aware of the fact that he had a son. Must have been good reason that my mother never informed him, though, because it turned out that he died a few years later in some sort of gang fight. An uprising or whatever that seemed exceptionally stupid on his part."

When Derek caught my expression he only shrugged.

"I didn't know him and he didn't know of me. Kit is my father. And I had to remind myself of that as time went on and no word of Caroline Souza came up. I also had to remind myself of what my mother had done in order to take care of us. Right around that time is when Kit fully explained how that conversation went that night, just over there." He gestured his head in the direction of the pit.

"He told me of my mother's proposal and that, at first, he had refused. He told her that I needed my mother and that if she would just accept his help then things would get better. But she disagreed. She thought that the only help that he could give her then would be to give me a comfortable life. One where I could go to school, make friends, have a real family. I knew then the real sacrifices she made for me and that there was so much more going on than the idea that she didn't want her son. So, for the next ten years after that, I asked Dad if we could visit the diner whenever he had to come into the city for work. I made trips here from Syracuse while I was in college and I even got in touch with Jon again to renew his old favor to Mom. When I graduated, I didn't really think that I would be teaching at the University, but things happened and that's where I wound up. Now I visit the diner often and come here every other weekend."

"It's the last connection you have with your mother," I stated, understanding.

"That and, I have this silly notion that, one day, she might return, you know? If she ever needed a favor in case things didn't work out out there, then maybe she would think that she would have the diner to fall back on."

For a moment, Derek paused, thinking about what he said. Then, after a second, he snorted.

"What?" I asked.

"I've never been a firm believer that things happen for a reason. I always thought that every action had a reaction and that it all trickled down, leading to where people are today. I didn't think that there was such a thing as fate when the world is far too scientific for that. But, then again, I never thought that I'd ever be frequenting Michael's diner for any other reason than the possibility of seeing my mother again." Derek added, looking down at me. I felt my cheeks grow warm and I smiled.

I smiled because out everything he went through, hardly being able to see his mother and then losing her, then searching her out to no avail, constantly revisiting a large mark in his past that no doubt brought about unhappy memories, he was able to find something that made him hopeful again. Aside from having his father and his siblings, he found something that made him happy, because he deserved to be.

And I was smiling because that something happened to be me.