Chapter Twenty-Seven
Moskins
It’s hard to figure out where to begin when Winter settles onto the couch with Oreo draped across her lap. She focuses solely on her, cuddling into the cushions as the feline nuzzles her for more affection.
“I was put into foster care for the first time when I was six,” I begin, only then earning her attention.
Her eyes meet mine, but there’s no sympathy there.
Only a desire to listen. “I’ve told you that my parents were—are—shitty people.
They’re drug addicts and alcoholics who should never have had a child.
In their minds, I ruined their lives by existing. ”
Winter stares at me with gaping, somber eyes, but remains silent.
I shift in the armchair I occupy across from her, because being close to Winter isn’t a good idea.
I would want to touch her. Comfort her. There needs to be space if I’m going to tell her the sordid tale of my past. “My father used to beat me whenever he’d be coming down from a high or in between twelve packs, so the school called CPS when the bruises became harder to hide.
I was put in a home for four months before my parents were awarded custody again.
They behaved well enough not to warrant any suspicion from the system, so eventually, the social worker wrote the case off and closed it. ”
But that was far from the end of it.
I learned over the next year to lay low.
To not make much noise. To stay out of sight whenever I could.
Because if I didn’t, chances were I’d be on my father’s bad side again.
And my mother would be too far gone to step in or do anything about it.
She may not have done most of the beatings, but she certainly didn’t care enough to intervene when they happened.
“The second time I was taken away was two and a half years later,” I explain, looking down at a random spot on the rug beneath the coffee table.
“I spent my ninth birthday locked in my bedroom alone. And maybe I should have been sad about that, but I knew it was a gift on its own. I may not have gotten cake or presents like most nine-year-old kids on their birthdays, but I didn’t have to endure the shit my parents put me through.
I was given some semblance of peace, and I found myself enjoying the time alone. It gave me time to think.”
Winter lets out a tiny breath. “What could a nine-year-old possibly have to think about?”
I lift a shoulder. “The future,” I answer easily.
“I thought about what I was going to do when I was old enough to control my life. I dreamed of better days and better things when I didn’t have to answer to anybody.
I thought about what freedom would taste like, and how I wouldn’t take advantage of it once I got it. ”
Her brows furrow, and her frown deepens more than it was moments prior. “That’s a sad thing for a boy to concern himself with.”
I don’t deny it. “Oddly, it gave me something to work toward and look forward to. Especially when I was sent back home. Apparently, there was some error, and the case against my parents was dropped. I went home and watched them fade away, drowning in liquor bottles and taking pills. There were some days they didn’t even know I was there.
There were some days I didn’t eat unless I had school.
And when my mother found the food I’d snuck into my room and hid under the bed after some of it went bad and started rotting and smelling, she took it all away and locked the cabinets and the fridge, so I didn’t waste anything.
They spent most of their money on drugs, so they couldn’t afford to have me wasting what little food we did have. ”
I’d lost so much weight that I looked skeletal from the time I was ten until I was thirteen.
Puberty hit, I grew at least a foot and a half, and you could count each one of my ribs.
Teachers would ask me if I wanted to speak to them about anything, and counselors would try getting me to talk about my home life, but I never would.
What was the point? I knew by then that the foster system was flawed, and even if I were taken away, I’d be back again soon enough.
I wet my lips and lean back in the chair stiffly.
“The last time I was taken from my shitty childhood home was when my mother overdosed on the front lawn. Our neighbor called because he thought she was dead. There was still a needle hanging out of her arm. The medics revived her, sent her to the hospital, and sent me to a new home in a better part of town. I was almost fourteen.”
Sometimes, I’m sad that the paramedics gave her Narcan.
What kind of fucked-up thing does that say about me?
But it’s true. Both of my parents would overdose so much that they had their own Narcan kits at home.
Once, my mother made me use it on my father after he’d taken too much fentanyl.
And for the briefest moment, I hesitated to administer it.
I kneeled there over my father’s body across the kitchen floor, wondering what it would be like if he weren’t there.
Then my mother started screaming and crying and begging me to help him, so like an idiot, I did.
Shortly after, CPS came for the final time and took me to the house that would be the beginning of a fresh new start I didn’t think I’d ever get.
“The woman who took me in lived in a huge house in a nice community. Apparently, she couldn’t have children of her own.
So, she and her husband used to foster them.
Before me, they’d only taken in babies and toddlers.
Then the husband, who was a well-known cardiologist, passed away.
From a heart attack, ironically. And the wife continued to take kids in need because she had the money, time, and space.
She wasn’t the nicest person, but she was nice enough.
She didn’t lock me in my room, limit my food, or give me strict rules.
I think her heart was broken after losing her husband, and she wanted company in the house that was far too big for one person.
All she asked was that I stay out of trouble, so I did my best to do that.
“I soon learned that the house next door belonged to a very wealthy family who split their time between the United States and Russia. I’d seen a girl around my age coming and going with ice skates hanging from her arm, so I followed her down to a pond behind our houses one day.
It was the middle of winter, so the water was frozen over.
I kept my distance as I saw her skate and spin and fall and get back up again.
Over and over and over. She’d go every single day, so I watched her whenever I was home.
Then, one day months later, she called me out on it. ”
I smile to myself, thinking about the dark-haired girl looking directly at me from where I stayed on the hill. She’d yelled, “Aren’t you finally going to come down and join me?”
At first, I thought she’d been talking to somebody else. Maybe a friend. A family member. There was a boy who I’d seen at their house too, but he never joined her on the pond. He usually went with one of the adults somewhere else, typically for hours at a time, while the girl stayed home.
But she wasn’t talking to anybody else.
“Yeah. You! Come on.”
It’d taken me a long time before I eventually slid down the hill and walked over to her. There was a second pair of skates beside hers that looked much bigger than hers.
“They’re my brother’s old skates,” she tells me when she sees what I’m staring at. “But don’t worry. He has new ones, so he won’t miss these. Put them on.”
I stare at her dubiously. “What?”
She points to the skates, like I’m dumb. “The skates. Put them on your feet. Like shoes. All you have to do is lace them up. I’m pretty sure you’re the same size.”
Shaking my head, I swallow. “I don’t know how to skate.”
She blinks at me. “Really?”
Sheepishly, I shrug. I’ve never thought much about skating, but it does look freeing whenever I see her on the ice. It’s like she’s flying. Free.
She watches me for a minute before nodding to herself. “Okay. I’ll teach you. I’ve been taking lessons since I was four. I’m not the best, but I’m okay. You’ll learn the basics at the very least.”
Why is this stranger being so nice to me? She doesn’t call me out for watching her for months like some weirdo. She’s friendly. Welcoming. A little bossy.
“Why?” I ask with a frown.
She looks up at me because she’s much shorter than I originally expected. “Because you look like you need a friend. And so do I.”
As I retell the story of Emaly and my first meeting, Winter gets a small smile on her face that matches my own.
“We became fast friends after that,” I recount thoughtfully.
“We spent a lot of time together. As much as we could. And when I learned I wasn’t going to be sent back to my parents’ home, it gave Emaly and me even more time to bond.
We grew close. Closer than I thought I’d ever be to someone.
She taught me how to skate and suggested I join the hockey team at my school.
Turns out, her father sponsored the athletic departments at a lot of the local schools, so his money was what afforded me equipment and jerseys.
When I wasn’t at practice with my team, I was on the pond with her. ”
“That’s sweet,” Winter says softly, still petting Oreo, who’s fallen asleep on her new favorite human. “It sounds like you needed her.”