VI.
Jack wondered if they had been talking about him. Angel-- obviously-- didn't like him. He made that apparent. Of course, Jack was used to it. It always happened that way. Someone wouldn't like him. He would be thrown back just as easily as he had come.
Now, naturally, Jack knew that he never did make it easy.
Sometimes he would purposefully get kicked out. He had always planned on riding the adoption train until he was eighteen. Never settling down with one family. That seemed the smart way to go.
He never really liked the people anyway.
They were all so-obviously flawed. So easily-taken advantage of.
And Jack couldn't help but to wonder, at that moment, how long it would be before he took advantage of Evelyn and he wondered how long it would take her to look at him the same way all of the others did.
"I know, I know but...I can't just ignore it. It's fifty dollars! Missing!"
Or:
"We really don't have enough money for him. I mean. We thought we did but then he started stealing food..."
He wonders how long it would take for Evelyn to see the real him.
It only took Angel a minute.
And then he had to go off and tell Bobby about it.
Jack tried gripping the remote, unsuccessfully. He tried pressing in numbers. He didn't know why it mattered to him but he knew that they had to be talking about him.
He had just given up on the whole TV thing when Bobby walked in.
The first thing he noticed was that Angel wasn't with him.
He briefly glanced at Jack before moving on to the kitchen. "Ma not here yet?" he called over his shoulder, even though he had clearly seen, just as Jack that her car wasn't in the driveway.
"No,"
Jack was uncomfortable to say the least. How could he possibly be at ease? It seemed weird because he was more uneasy than all of those times he had followed unfamiliar people into dark alleys. He was more uneasy than he had been all of those times he had been "forced" to go with a family.
"Shit," Bobby mumbled under his breath, "I totally forgot about going to the store. You mind if we go tomorrow kid?"
Jack thought of the right answer. He, honestly, hadn't actually expected Bobby to buy him clothes. Was he obligated? No. He had only been living there for a day. A day and a night. Jack still couldn't trust that he wouldn't be back on the streets the next day...or the day after that.
"No," he mumbled, sinking down into the couch cushions further.
He couldn't trust that he wouldn't want to be back out on the streets.
Jack heard the car pull into the driveway and even with his limited experience he already knew that it was Evelyn's.
"Is that ma?" Bobby called out from the kitchen.
Jack wanted to tell him how it wasn't his ma. How he wasn't apart of their weird family. How he didn't even know if he wanted all of this.
"Yeah," he mumbled instead, already up and ready to help Evelyn with her groceries.
"I'm going to make this dinner if it's the last thing I do," Evelyn mumbled, nearly stabbing the bag of peas. She looked back, kind of embarrassedly, when she saw Jack coming out of the bathroom, "you would think that they're making everything child-proof now-a-days with how hard it is to get stuff to--" Evelyn pulled the top of the bag of peas apart, a smile of triumph flashing over her face, "ah ha," she turned quickly to face Jack who looks terribly out of place, "You can make the salad if you want,"
Jack chuckled inwardly, knowing that a salad was one thing that he couldn't screw up. And maybe that's why she figured it would be perfect for him.
He dumped the bag of pre-made lettuce into the provided bowl.
He wanted to ask her about where she worked. He wanted to ask her about her bringing him home. He wanted to ask her about what she really wanted from him. About Angel and Bobby and adoption and giving and taking and everything else. But his tongue, as always, seemed stuck.
She spoke next, conveniently with her back turned to him.
"I should warn you Jack that... we have to talk. About your parents,"
Jack nodded, instinctively, even if he didn't know how he felt about that.
"Are you ok with that?"
He nods.
"I can't have you here without it being...legal," she paused when she saw that Jack was blocking out everything she had been saying, "but we can figure that out later. I'm going to go tell Bobby to get his butt in here and help cook,"
Jack hates the way she smiles at him. Warm. Like she has some kind of joke that he's supposed to be in on. Like they share something they don't. Like he's supposed to know what she's thinking. It killed him that he didn't.
And yet, when she walks out of the kitchen he doesn't make a dash for it. Once more, he stays still and he isn't even sure why.
"Where's Angel?"
Jack can hear voices faintly.
Bobby explaining how Angel and him had gotten into a fight and how he had "run away to Sofi's once more"
When she came back she was with Bobby.
"Well," she smiled even though Jack could tell Angel not being there bothered her, "let's eat,"
And he couldn't help but to compare this to those families he had seen on tv or in the few movies he had seen. They measured up pretty good. At least, compared to what he'd had before.
And that, although not saying a lot, meant something to him.
Man that took a long time. Hopefully I still have some readers left...
I have some new ideas but I'm still trying to figure out how I'll work them out so..yeah..look for it soon!