Page 39 of In This Iron Ground
Hakan turned his head to look at Damien, frowning. “I don’t care what people say.”
“Well, you should. Being hated by everybodysucks,” Damien scoffed.
Hakan just looked at him. Damien sighed, turning away slightly so his back was against the tree again.
“We were talking about how to tell your mom, remember?” Damien said. A long silence followed, Damien caught up in his own thoughts before Hakan broke it.
“Why don’t you just give it a trial run. Just…a few months. Until the New Year or something. You’ll be in control, it won’t be…you don’t have to be scared,” Hakan said, his voice cautious.
“I’m notscared,” Damien muttered, fear gripping him.
He let Hakan’s suggestion seep into him. The idea took form far too quickly to come only from Hakan. It was a shape and weight Damien had imagined before, in places he didn’t dare look at. Places that always wanted more, even if it ended up killing him.
He could already feel himself losing the fight with something as simple as a nudge from Hakan. The truth was that Damien wanted a taste. He wanted—he couldn’t even think it in his own head, what the Salgados could offer. What it would be like, if only for a little while. It was too much. And, maybe, this way he could retain some semblance of control.
Damien blinked his eyes and, for a moment, the terrifying, beautiful image of him as part of the Salgado family was projected on the forest canopy. He closed his eyes.
“Let’s go back,” Damien said, sitting forwards.
“What about…” Hakan hedged.
“I’ll think about it,” he said, not wanting to let Hakan know how easy it had been to sway him, but when he looked at Hakan the boy was smiling. Damien stuck out his tongue. Hakan rolled his eyes but smiled, which was what Damien had been aiming for.
Everything is going to be okay, Damien thought as they walked through the forest.Everything is going to be okay.
If he only repeated that enough times, maybe it would come true.
**********
Damien could hear Nicola trying to contain her excitement when he called her the next day to tell her about his change of heart. It almost made him smile through his queasy stomach. It was nice to know he had someone in his corner, even if she was excruciatingly naïve.
Each conversation thereafter was worse than the last. The other kids at the foster home barely reacted, nodding and making jokes. Jack patted him on the back.
“Let’s hope this one’s your forever-home, huh?” It sounded sarcastic and bitter, but Damien saw through him.
Koko, to Damien’s great surprise, had hugged him. They had become close, but she was one of the least tactile members of the Salgado family, especially when it came to overt shows of affection.
“Now we don’t have an excuse not to start that comic book, eh?” She’d played off the hug by slugging him in the arm. Damien had been speechless with emotion.
Nadie was off to university, but Hakan relayed her message of excitement. Hakan himself looked genuinely happy. He’d grown a lot the past few months, not only vertically but laterally, his broad shoulders and square jaw giving him a football player look that would be intimidating if his quiet demeanour didn’t make his nature obvious. His broad, square face split into the widest smile Damien had ever seen on him when he was told the news. The hug that had followed had enveloped Damien completely.
The conversation with Mia and Cameron, however, had by far been the worst.
They hugged him too, but these hugs were different. They were parent hugs. Family hugs. Hugs from people that say that they care about you, that want you in their house, that still don’tknow. That don’t even suspect what Damien was like, at his core. The expressions on their faces was so distinct. It was caught in amber instantly. When the end came, he’d be able to compare their faces to the ones that would come. The exhausted, disappointed ones. The ones that said, “I just can’t do this anymore.”
All Damien could do was enjoy the feeling of flying before he hit the floor.
**********
On the day of the move, Damien was a mess. He’d actually learnt how to calm his heartbeat and breathing in an attempt to avoid his fears and anxieties being detected by the Salgados, but this time it was impossible. He sat in the front seat of Mia’s car and stared blankly ahead, feeling the creature of his fear truly awaken as they turned into the forest.
There was no turning back now.
To his horror, everybody rushed to greet him outside as if he hadn’t been there countless times before. Koko yanked his duffel bag out of Damien’s hands with a “Hey Dorkus Maximus,” before traipsing into the house as if the bag weighed nothing.
Nadie, who was visiting from university, took the small box containing the rest of Damien’s possessions out of the back seat, balancing it with one hand so she could ruffle his hair with the other.
“Hey!” he protested weakly, but she was already walking up the porch stairs. Mia smiled at him.
