“Any new girls you like?”
An image of Molly Miller sitting with her father attheirdinner table flashed into my head. I wondered if she’d run to Daddy after I’d fucked with her in the lunchroom. Storm said the opposite, saying Molly had calmly cleared up the mess I was responsible for and re-joined the queue with dignity and grace. I wasn’t sure whether Storm added thedignity and gracebit topissme off or if that was the case. I suspected it was. Storm rarely gave other girls compliments.
I hadn’t weighed up the possible consequences of my actions; I’d just gone with my gut. If little Molly Millerhadreported me to her father, he would have more ammunition to throw me off the team. I needed to mess with his child, but I had to make sure she didn’t grass me up.
What leverage did I have to ensure she kept her mouth closed? Threats were always a good place to start with tattle tellers, but I had never liked making empty ones, and it’s not like I would physically harm the girl. The thought of anyone putting their hands on a woman in anger made me sick to my stomach.
Oh, Molly. You could have been anyone’s daughter. Why his?
No matter how hard I tried, her face swam into my mind; those blue, ocean-wide eyes had looked up at me like I had all the answers.
Knock it off. It’s done with. Your stupid idea of having found something special was a crock of shit.
“Hudson met someone, isn’t that right, Hud?” Micah piped up, and my fingers tightened around my fork, but I managed to twist things.
“Don’t listen to a word he says, Ma. You know there’s only ever been one woman for me.”
Ma could read my bullshit from a mile away but she just smiled and didn’t dig further.
The guys started talking about the game on Friday, which fortunately dragged my thoughts away from the girl I now couldn’tstopthinking about.
It would be the first game of the season. We’d been practising for it at a sports summer camp we attended, and were more than ready.
I thanked Ma as she handed me a plate.
Bethany Sawyer, aka Ma, had recently purchased the rental property she had lived in for the last twenty years. It was the place we had called home since she had fostered us in our early teens.
Home to us was a traditional two-storey, modest, wood and brick house. It was clean and comfortable, with six bedrooms, two bathrooms, a living area, a kitchen, and a separate dining room. There was a small garden out front, and at the back, there was a yard. My brothers and I would sit out there for hours talking about football, chicks and shooting hoops. The house was in a suburban part of Newport where most kids from The Heights lived. The school was within a twenty-minute walking distance, if you craved the exercise. The area was leafy, and kids would play in the street outside. Considering where I had been raised, it was idyllic.
I occasionally walked the long way to school. It took me past my childhood home. That shithole still stood empty and was boarded up, but the last time I went there, someone had prised them loose.
Did I give a shit about that? Nope.
Although I still dreamt about my old home, I had turned my back on it. For almost four years since I was escorted out of that house in handcuffs, I had lived with the boys I called my brothers and Ma. I had spent three weeks prior with a Mr. and Mrs. Bexley, but that was short-lived, and so it didn’t count.
We had all come through the social services system at different times in our lives and carried an assortment of baggage that went with that.
Ma had fostered boys from broken homes with questionable pasts for years, and one by one, she saved us.
Micah and Reed were the first to join Ma’s family when they were eight. They were both orphans and were fostered by the same family for years until the ill health of their foster mother threw them back into the system. During that time, they had bonded as brothers, and as part of agency protocol, they werealwaysre-homed together. Unfortunately, their following placements were not as successful as the first, and they were yo-yoed in and out of care and separated for a few months. Reed got the worst end of the deal and went through some shit, but he never talked about it, even with Micah.
After her last foster son filed for emancipation at eighteen, Ma re-registered with a new agency and fostered both Micah and Reed on a permanent placement.
When the boys were thirteen, Ma was asked if she would consider taking on another foster. She was promised a boy of a similar age to the ones who had been in her care for the last five years, and along came the giant that was Phoenix.
Nix had been taken away from his mother when he was five. She was a single parent, unemployed and a user. I’d seen his file in Ma’s room once. She’d left it out by accident. A social worker found him trapped in his room behind a rusted baby gate, wandering around none the wiser in his own filth.
I’d read that chaperoned visits had taken place with his birth mother until she fucked off with some big hot shot. She’d turned her back on her own flesh and blood to start a new family. The bitch now lived in Jamestown with her rich husband and their kid. Ma had caught me reading Nix’s file and had gone ballistic.
I was the only one of my brothers who knew Nix had a half-brother, but had been sworn to secrecy. Ihatedknowing something so important and not being able to say anything. Ma had explained that she had files on all of us, but they were strictly confidential. When we turned eighteen, Ma said she would give us back that part of our pasts. I still wasn’t sure if I wanted mine. I remembered what happened to me like yesterday.
After my father was sent to prison, I was the last person to join the family. This came around a year after Phoenix, when I was fourteen. Our birthdays were all within a few months of each other. For compatibility reasons, Ma had specified with the agency that she preferred boys of similar ages, and they had honoured that request.
Ma was the kindest and sweetest woman you would ever meet, but she had grit. You fucked with Bethany Sawyer; she tore you a new one. You’d have to have a backbone to allow four large boys into your life.
We were now seventeen and seniors in high school. I would be the first to turn eighteen in October, followed by Phoenix Carter, Reed Prescott, and Micah Mehari.
We were now seen as the Sawyer Brothers. Hell. Although not legal, we used the name, too. Embraced it.
