Chapter 12
Luca
It’s late when we drop Noah off in front of his house. His cheeks are still flushed and his gaze stunned as I kiss him goodbye. “Bon nuit, mon papillon.”
“Quoi?”
“Mon papillon.” My butterfly.
“Why butterfly? I’m not sure that really suits me.” Noah looks up at me skeptically.
“When butterflies have their wings closed, they’re usually inconspicuous. To blend in and stay safe. But when they spread their wings open, they’re the most beautiful creatures. Just like you.” Noah rolls his eyes again, and my heart skips a beat.
“Good night, Luca.”
***
“You were just like him when you joined the family.” Valérie’s comment comes completely out of the blue.
“What do you mean?”
“Definitely not. Val, please?” That was Jannis.
“What? Luca was lonely and lost, too.”
Was I?
“Okay, fine, but first and foremost Luca was a huge asshole, and he backed out of anything that even remotely had to do with family. You didn’t want to be with us, and you really let us know it.”
Oh, I wanted to be with you, but I was terrified of getting used to you and then having to leave, like so many times before.
“You didn’t even talk to me.” My reply back to Jannis was a cheap shot, even for me.
“Are you serious?” Jannis gives me a stern look.
“Okay, sorry, that was as shitty thing to say, but it was tough at first. I really didn’t know where I stood with you.
” For the first four months, I thought Louis and Jannis were Papa and Paps’s biological sons.
They both had their last name, and I didn’t know the two of them had already been adopted.
I only found that out when Louis and Jannis had a proper talk with me.
From then on, I dared to hope. I tried to be there for breakfast and dinner, and I went back to school.
School was tough at first. Some teachers really let me know what they thought of my truancy, but that wasn't even the biggest problem.
“Luca, we need to talk.”
Everything inside me tightens up. I knew this day was coming. And I’ve tried so hard these past couple of weeks. I’ve only missed dinner four times, I’ve only fallen asleep in class eight times—and that was only because the topic was really boring.
“Can I come in? Or would you rather talk to Adrien?” Adrien has been teaching me French for a few weeks now.
We usually find an hour or more every day to sit together in my room, listen to metalcore, and translate the songs into French.
That’s our thing. Everyone picks a song, or even two.
Lately, Adrien has been bringing other songs too, French songs that we translate into German.
It’s so much fun, and I’ve gotten really good at it.
When Adrien and Philipp talk to each other, I can already understand quite a bit.
I understand why Philipp asks if I’d rather talk to his husband, but I like him just as much, even if I’d never admit it.
“When do I have to leave?” The question shoots out of my mouth without me having even a shred of control over it.
“What… Oh! Okay, my bad! Oh my goodness, what a case of déjà vu.” Philipp laughs heartily, and I’m completely lost. “When we were asked to take Jannis in, we called Louis over to discuss it with him, and he asked us a similar question. At the time, he’d been with us for four years, but hadn’t been adopted yet.
That wasn’t really on the table for us, since he still had a biological parent—and still does have.
But Louis wanted it, and his biological father agreed. With Jannis, it was easier.”
It would be easy with me, too. There’s no one who has any claims on me, never had for the past ten years.
“You don’t have to leave. You don’t have to stay if you don’t want to, but we’re glad you’re here, and we’d love to continue this journey with you. So don’t worry, I’m not here to get rid of you.”
Relief floods through my body. “Okay. Why are you here?”
“I got another call from school. They’re worried because you fell asleep in class again.
” I want to say something, but Philipp won’t let me.
“We all know why that is, you don’t have to explain yourself.
I think everyone in this house has figured out by now that you can’t be in your room at night, but you’re not sleeping anywhere else either.
We have to find a way to change that, or we’re going to run into real trouble. ”
“But my grades are good.” They really are, everyone’s surprised that I’m keeping up so well, even though I haven’t set foot in a school for nearly six months.
And before that, only sporadically. I’m highly gifted.
I was tested sometime in elementary school and have an IQ of 165, but I don’t advertise that.
I already knew the material we’re covering now two years ago.
“It’s not about your grades. If you’re always tired, and the school contacts Child Protective Services because of it, they may find out that you’ve been spending your nights awake in the garden shed for months and we’re going to get in trouble.
” I take a deep breath. Okay, admittedly, that makes sense.
I just don’t have a solution to the problem.
“I can’t stay in my room at night.”
“Why not? What’s the problem? Explain it to me.” This is ridiculous and I’m embarrassed, but for the first time somebody is listening to me and Philipp is so understanding. Fuck it.
“When I’m alone in a dark room, I hear noises, I see shadows, and I always feel like I’m not alone and that someone is there and wants to grab me.” I squeeze my eyes shut really tight, so I don’t have to look at Philipp.
“Luca, I have to ask you this, and I don’t ask it lightly. You’ve been in a lot of different families and facilities—did you experience any abuse? Did anyone come into your room at night?”
“No. At least not that I can remember. But I do have a few black holes. I can’t remember everything equally well anymore. I was in a group home where I often woke up in the morning and everything hurt. I felt like a truck had rolled over me, but that’s all I can recall.”
Philipp looks at me seriously. “According to the records, you were in a foster family that gave you back because you screamed all night. You were eight then.”
That was the foster family after said group home. The foster parents insisted I sleep in the dark because I had to share the room with another child, but I was so scared. Not of the dark in general, but of the dark in closed rooms.
“I’m afraid we won’t be able to find out what happened to you back then. But maybe we can help you feel safe in your room again, even at night.”
At first, we hoped that maybe it would be enough if I left the light on in my room.
Something I simply wouldn’t have dared to do before, because everywhere I’d been so far, it was “Lights out!” by 10 p.m. at the latest. No exceptions.
But as soon as I got tired, the panic set in.
Out, I had to get out. I ran into the garden, gasping for air, and hid under a big fir tree.
The next day, Philipp came with a mattress.
“Do you feel safe with me?” he asked, and I nodded.
“I’ll lie down with you in your room, and whoever comes to you tonight, they won’t get past me.
I’ll watch over you. You don’t have to sleep, but we’ll make sure you stay here, okay?
” The light stayed on all night, and when the fear came, I lay down on the mattress with Philipp. Not in my bed—never in my bed.
Eight years later, I say goodnight to my brother and Dayyan and let myself fall onto that very same bed. The aroma lamp bathes everything in a soft, muted yellow and emits white steam that fills my room with the scent of Swiss stone pine. Paps turns it on for me every evening.
I’ve come so far in the last eight years. I breathe in and out deeply, loving the familiarity of this room.
What a night… Valérie is right. Noah and I aren’t so different, we just show it in different ways.
Maybe that’s why he feels so familiar to me, maybe that’s why I can be so completely myself with him.
Because I know he understands me, and because I know he won’t laugh at me for who I am.
And with the sensation of Noah’s lips on mine, I drift into a deep sleep.