Page 24 of Serpent In White
Mom used to tell Dad she wanted to have another baby, but he’d laugh at her. One was one too many for him.
“Oh,” I say, because I’m not sure what else I could. I’m a bit stunned.
Dan and Kara barely want me. Why would they want another foster kid?
“Kara’s on her way home with him right now.” He tilts his head at me. “And I want you on your best behavior, you little cretin. Got it?”
Anger bubbles inside me, but I nod anyway. I really hate this guy. I hate him so much, it makes me want to run far, far away.
Someday I will. I don’t think I can wait until I’m eighteen. I can’t do six more years in this hellhole. I just need to get a little bigger, save up some money, learn some more. I like school, but it’s hard to concentrate knowing I have to come home to this.
Dan looks around, at my desk, piled high with books, my makeshift shelf I built out of some old crates stacked with comics, and he scoffs, shaking his head. “Make some space and bring the cot up from the basement. He’ll have to sleep on that until we get him a bed.”
He turns to leave the room, and I take a breath. But then he stops.
“You’re a waste of a son, shrimp.” He peers at me. “No wonder your father got himself sent to jail. To get away from you, I’m sure.”
Then he leaves my bedroom. Leaves me staring at the door, fist tightened so hard at my side it’s going numb.
My father didn’t get sent to jail toget awayfrom me. He got sent to jail because he was a drunk and he killed my mother. Strangled her to death when I was nine years old.
I found her…
My gaze goes far for a moment while I remember waking up to go to the bathroom, turning on the light to find dead eyes staring up at me from the floor.
Pasty face. Mouth open.
She’d been dead for hours.
I close my eyes and shake myself out of it. I’ve gotta get out of this place. Detroit is a pit of sorrow. That’s all I’ve ever experienced here. The only place I’ve ever been truly happy was in the forest.
My parents took me camping once when I was little. We went to some place up near Flint; I don’t remember what it was called. But we pitched a tent and cuddled up in sleeping bags. They made a fire, and we roasted marshmallows. It was fun.
And plus, I was too young to understand my dad’s drinking or my mom’s unhappiness. I was blissfully unaware of all the trouble in the world, and the impending destruction of my life.
It was just good.
Someday I’ll go back to the woods.
I spend the next hour trying to get the damn cot upstairs. I’m only twelve and still sort of small for my age, so it’s really difficult. Dan should be the one doing this, but he wouldn’t. He just makes me do everything while he sits around, acting like a weirdo. That’s why he calls meshrimp, because I haven’t had my growth spurt yet. But I will, I know it. I’ll get tall, and strong.
Hopefully strong enough to fight back.
I set the cot up in my room, across from my bed. Then I get clean sheets and blankets, making it up nice. There are no more pillows, so I give him mine. My new brother probably needs a pillow more than me.
I assume if he’s coming here, it’s because something fucked up happened. Life is shit. I wouldn’t be surprised.
When Foster Mom Oblivious, I mean,Kara, gets back, I dart out of my room to the top of the steps and peek down. And sure enough, in walks a kid who looks about my age, maybe a little bigger, with a backpack on, clutching a pillow to his chest. I blink slowly as they pass the stairs, Kara showing him around. Eventually they come upstairs, and I run back to my room, acting like I haven’t been waiting anxiously to meet him.
“And this will be your room,” she tells him, bringing him inside. “You’ll have to share. Drake, I’d like you to meet Darian. Darian, this is your new brother, Drake.”
He turns his eyes on me and gapes at me for a moment. I look down at my lap, a knee-jerk reaction when people first see me. I know I’m a little different. My eyes are colored like marbles and kids at school call me a freak.
But when I look back up at Darian, he has this kind smile on. Then he waves at me.
“Hey,” he says, pretty casually.
“Hey.”
