Chapter Thirty-Three
Ash
Instead of staying at the hotel, we just wanted out, so we hit the road. We got home just as it was getting light, and I was fucking exhausted, but somehow in addition to taking out a twisted godbotherer who liked raping kids, we’d also managed to adopt one.
“Ren, it’s safe here, I swear,” Cal was saying as he led him to the door and I used the code to let us in.
“Yeah, I know it’s like a fucking fortress, but we’re the only psychos inside,” I added, trying to offer a layer of comfort, but for some reason, my words seemed to have the opposite effect.
The kid made a panicked kinda of squeak, and drew back from me.
It surprised me how much that bothered me, like how could I be scary to him after what he’d been through?
“It’s okay, Ren, he just means you’re safe here. It’s just the three of us, okay?”
“Why?”
I groaned, because wasn’t that a kid thing? Nix had gone through a phase of why this and why that, to the point that I wanted to punch myself in the head, just to escape it.
I strode inside, and headed straight for the shower off the main bedroom.
I needed the filth of this night off me, and I needed some time to get my head together.
How the fuck Blaze and Ethan, of all people, seemed to relish killing, I didn’t know.
I just didn’t quite have it in me to enjoy it.
Beating the hell out of someone, sure, but spilling their blood, and ending their life?
I guess I had some manning up to do, so I didn’t let the fucking side down.
I tossed my clothes in the nearest bin, because they were never going on my body again.
I felt like they were tainted by the evil of that place.
Like every part of me was too. I set the shower running, and fell back into my thoughts as I waited for it to warm up.
That kid out there, he’d been seconds away from the same hell we’d both been through.
Had we arrived in time was the question running around in my head right now.
Had we actually saved him at all? What had he been through already?
How much of that drivel that bastard spouted filled his head, and kept echoing back at him.
Filthy. Dirty. Abomination. Why the fuck couldn’t we just be gay and it be okay?
I knew I’d been lucky with my parents, because they’d never once tried to enforce anything over us, letting us choose our paths.
Was it so fucking hard for other parents to be as good as mine?
I wouldn’t ever try and constrain my children just to make them fit a fucking out of date template.
Kids. Oh yeah. Probably wasn’t on the cards for us, was it? Unless we rented a fucking uterus. Or adopted one… like Ren.
“Ash, I made coffee,” I heard Cal yell from the hallway.
I wanted to drag him in here with me, wanted him to fucking distract me from the chaos of my mind, and the horrors of this night, but he’d be looking after Ren.
Did we literally just adopt a kid, because that seemed to me like something that had more rules to it.
Still. I’m a Cross. Rules are meant to be broken.
They’re starting points, for us to bend to fit how we want to live.
See. My family is way better than anyone else’s.
“I’ll be right out.”
I didn’t know if he was still there by the time I answered, or whether he’d showered, or eaten, because I’d lost track of time in here, and that hadn’t happened in a while, but sometimes minds needed to be explored, or you never knew what shit was hiding in there.
Downstairs, I found Ren curled up on the sofa, wearing what looked like some of the generic sweatpants and t-shirt combos the houses were always populated with.
We’d asked as kids, and the answer was always the same.
Being prepared isn’t a crime. To be fair, I think it’d helped us all out at some point, so we’d stopped questioning our parents on it.
“Yours is there, and I’m just about to make some toast or something, so we don’t go to bed hungry,” Cal said, being the little homemaker I didn’t expect him to be.
“It’s past six am, we may as well just stay awake.”
I sat down and cradled my coffee in my hands, staring at the dark liquid, because my mind was still kinda twisted up.
“You okay?” Cal sat beside me, and tried to turn my head to look at him. I guess I fought it because right now I felt like a fucking pussy. He seemed to be handling it better than I was. Maybe, like Ethan, he was more of a Cross than I was already.
“Ash, it’s okay to be weirded out by what happened there.”
Yeah, keep laying it on me. I’m a pussy, and I shouldn’t be dwelling like this.
“How’s the kid?”
Cal sighed, running his fingers through my damp hair, an idle gesture that lifted my heart a little, and cleared my mind a touch.
“Confused. Afraid. Lost. Probably all the same things I was, and you were, only so much younger that it’s even harder to comprehend the evil he experienced.”
We watched the kid lift his head, eyeing us warily from his hiding place.
“They did it to both of you?”
Well, hell. There’s a conversation we probably didn’t want to have, right? I cleared my throat, suddenly unwilling to let the young boy know what Cal had done, because it’d just take away that little trust they’d built.
“Yeah. They did, but we survived it, and so will you.” Cal turned to blink wide owlish eyes at me. Yeah, I covered your fucking ass, so don’t mess it up.
Cal
I expected him to throw me under the bus, because I deserved it, didn’t I? Ash hadn’t been the dealer of my horrors, but I’d been that for him. I’d been through it, suffered all of the nightmares and dark thoughts, and yet I pushed that same evil onto him.
“Well-”
“The main thing is that we got to you before it happened, right, Ren?” Ash dug his fingers into my thigh and I got the point. Shut up, and move on.
“He said it was time for my rebirth,” Ren said quietly, and I shuddered, remembering it being called that for me too.
Ash’s fingers softened and he rubbed my thigh gently.
Ash being gentle. It was weird, but comforting right now, especially in front of this child who’d seen the worst of life already.
“How old are you?”
Ren sighed softly. “Eleven.” What. The. Actual. Fuck. Going through it at fifteen had been debilitating enough. That fucker was doing this to actual children too?
“And you don’t have a family wondering where you might be?
” Ash looked stunned, like kids not having families was some kind of rarity, but I was starting to realise that his upbringing, while holding back on nothing that should be held back on, to develop the correct boundaries for children, had also closeted his mind from some of the realities too.
“He doesn’t have anyone,” I said quietly, but Ren suddenly groaned, and shook his head.
“I do have parents, but they pretty much handed me over to that monster, so why should I want to go back to them? They’re so afraid to have a gay kid that they wanted me to get ‘fixed’. I don’t need to be fixed!” Well, there was still some fire in him, and what a relief it was.
“No fucking way you’re going back to them. Fuckers. Want us to kill them too?” Ash suddenly looked fired up, and as insane as his family, even though I think the whole murder thing had hit him pretty hard today.
Ren laughed, sitting up taller in his seat, and I hoped to fuck that he wasn’t about to say yes, because this wasn’t meant to be a long term thing, killing anyone who disagreed with being gay.
It was about removing the ones from my life who’d caused me harm.
My own personal fucking crusade, or whatever. Was that selfish of me?
“I don’t even want to think about them again. They’re dead to me already,” Ren said firmly, looking from me to Ash, “can I stay with you?”
Ash looked at me, and I paused to see if he was going to answer, but he just patted my thigh again, and stayed silent.
I could see it in his eyes though. He wasn’t kidding before.
He was willing to take this poor troubled boy in, and I really wanted that too.
Would we get it right though, or would he end up a mess no matter what?
“Cal, he’s waiting,” Ash said quietly, so I took a deep breath and turned to face Ren, the hope fading from his eyes as he took my silence for something other than it actually was.
“Yeah, kid. We have tons of room here, and… I mean, are we staying here, or…” I suddenly wondered if I was commandeering a property that we didn’t have any right to, long term.
Ash laughed. “My parents will be fine with us staying here, dickhead. Ren, we’d love to have you stay, but we’ll have some ground rules, no matter how cool we might seem.”
Ren sighed, waiting for Ash to drop whatever the hell these rules might be on him.
“Rule one, don’t hide from who you are. If you’re gay, you’re gay. If you’re not, then be whoever the fuck that is. We’re not going to judge, because we’re not assholes. Oh, and rule two… if you accidentally kill someone, you call us. We’ll have your back no matter what.”
“Ash! Fuck’s sake! Don’t kill people, Ren. Despite our example, it’s not generally okay.”
Ren snorted, rolling his eyes at both of us. “I can live with those rules. Can I go to my room now? I’ll get my own room, right? Please?”
Ash grinned. “Yeah, let me show you the available ones. Anything but ours is cool. Oh, there’s a third rule.”
I watched them head out of the room, catching that ‘rule’ as they disappeared.
“… if we’re fucking, you don’t bother us. Well, unless it’s an emergency. Like a real emergency, not I can’t find the fucking crisps or something.”
Jesus Christ, we were going to ruin this kid, but then, were his alternatives any better for him? We’d keep him from being forced into anything else in life, and that had to count for something.