Yesterdays Gone: SEASON TWO (THE POST-APOCALYPTIC SERIAL THRILLER) (Yesterday's Gone) (57 page)

He would often disappear, taking different girls into the back of the house and leaving Boricio and Ricky alone, and bored. Granted, it was better than being home and listening to Joe scream at his mom, or worse.
 

Boricio couldn't play with Julian anymore since Julian was sent away a few months ago. Ricky didn’t know where he’d been sent to, only that it was for his own good on account of their mom saying Julian was gonna grow up bad if she didn’t do something quick. Julian once told Boricio that his dad left about an hour after Ricky was born. Boricio figured that made the two of them lucky. Boricio’s real dad had left an hour after he’d been born, too. At least their mom never ended up with a Joe.
 

Boricio didn’t want to play with Ricky anymore, but he didn’t want to go home. So, Boricio balled up his fist, just like Joe, and clocked Ricky in the left ear as hard as he could. It was mostly out of curiosity, wanting to see what would happen, though a little was from the stuff that comes when your inner hate starts to simmer, but instead of taking his turn.

Boricio had taken plenty of hits, but had never thrown one, not like Joe gave him, anyway. He wasn’t exactly sure what to do, but figured it couldn’t be too hard since Joe did it all the time. Ricky had the sticks in his hand and his eyes on the pile, so he never saw Boricio’s fist.

Ricky’s face filled with surprise, the emotion quickly followed by pain, then fear – in an order that fascinated Boricio, even though all three flashed by in less than a second. He used a punch to Ricky’s gut to knock the wind from him, then erupted in laughter as Ricky exploded in tears.
 

Ricky doubled over the scattered pile of sticks, clutching his stomach, which made Boricio picture Joe, and the way he smiled down on Boricio when he was doubled over just the same.
 

Ricky cried “NO!” as Boricio’s foot landed hard on his face. It was the last intelligible sound he made, everything after that was just screams and cries and sobs and whimpers as Boricio started on Ricky with his fists, then finished with a pile of sticks, grabbing them in handfuls and stabbing them all over Ricky’s twitching body.
 

Suddenly, a scream.

Ricky’s mom, who rushed over to the boy to make sure he was okay. The boy was bloody, but he’d live.

Then she grabbed Boricio by the back of the neck, dragging him away, as Boricio kicked, swung, and cursed at her, trying to break free.

But she was holding on to the back of Boricio like he was the buckle of a belt.
 

“Let me go, you dumb bitch!” Boricio cried.
 

Ricky’s mom didn’t say a word. She dragged him across the yard, and then the street, until he was standing on his bottle-littered porch while Ricky’s mom pounded her tired knuckles on the broken screen.
 

Boricio’s mom was at the door a moment later, eyes bloodshot, hair hanging in damp and clumpy ribbons. The smell of cat piss and burning plastic poured from the house.
 

Ricky’s mom was screaming so loud, Boricio could barely make out a word she was saying, and wasn’t sure how much his mom would be able to gather. She sure looked like she had a problem standing there listening, though she knew she couldn’t leave.
 

“You’re raising a monster!”

”He almost killed my son!”

“How can he do that? They’re friends!”

“I’m calling CPS immediately!”

“You all deserve to get locked up!”

The last thing Ricky’s mom said before throwing Boricio through the doorway and marching back to her house was, “Your boy is broken.”
 

Broken? That would explain a lot.

Boricio’s mom slammed the door and slapped him across the face. “You think I need this shit now?” she yelled, her face as red as her eyes.

Boricio didn’t cry, but he did fall to the floor and crawl backward toward the kitchen. She was wearing the look that meant his body was gonna hurt real bad, real soon. At least it wasn’t Joe. Joe was worse. Much worse. Most of the time his mom protected Boricio from Joe, kept him safe from the worst of his temper. Kept him out of the dark room, away from the hotplate, safe from the baseball bat. But tonight, Boricio might not be so lucky.

“Just wait until your father gets home!” his mother screamed, her foot landing smack in the middle of Boricio’s crumpled body. He cried. She said, “You don’t have anything to cry about you crazy cocksucking parasite!” She finished her sentence with a hard kick to her son’s side. Boricio felt like he was bleeding inside instead of out. The doctor had said that was the most dangerous kind.
 

His mother kept kicking him and screaming: “You dumb shit, diarrhea for brains, more trouble than you’re worth, stupid sonofabitch! I will NOT be yelled at, and I will NOT be humiliated, and I will NOT be threatened. That dumb bitch outside did all three. Because of you!”
 

She stopped kicking and Boricio stayed in a pile crying. She said, “That’s nothing, Bo. You wait until Joe gets home. He’s gonna make sure you’re sorrier than a skinned cat.” Then she left the room, slamming the door so hard that a picture frame hanging in the living room fell and broke. The picture was the last school picture taken of Boricio, way back in kindergarten.

“Fuuuuck!” his mother screamed.
 

The smell of cat piss and burning plastic bled through the crack beneath her door and spread like a fog through the house.
 

Boricio thought about leaving since home was the last place in the world he’d want to be when Joe got home. But Boricio had no idea where he could go. He didn’t have any food or money, and the farthest he’d ever been out of the neighborhood was to school a couple of miles away. Leaving the house would be scary, but less scary than whatever his mom would do once she opened the door, and a world better than Joe.

Boricio cried harder, thinking about what would happen when Joe walked in the door.
 

Once he could breathe again, he went to the kitchen and took the four packs of Ramen from the cupboard and put them in his backpack, along with two cans of Shasta, a box of powdered potatoes, and some mustard. He added a change of clothes, then turned on the TV to think. His mom would be in her room for another couple of hours, at least. He had at least six before Joe came home. That gave him at least an hour to think.
 

Boricio watched a rerun of
Family Ties
and wondered how much of it was bullshit. Sure wasn’t like any family he had ever seen. That, and
The Cosby Show
.
French fried fucking lies
, as his mom would say.

Boricio figured that
maybe
life could be all happy, funny, and loving like it was on TV, if he could get to a place where it still looked like it did in the old days. Maybe if he was lucky, he’d find a family like that one day. Boricio had a few teachers who told him he was smart. The same teachers who stared at him with big, sad eyes when they asked him what was wrong at home. It was the only question he never answered. The teachers were right, Boricio
was
smart. He wasn’t about to fink on Joe and wind up six feet under.

Family Ties
ended and Boricio stood from the couch, turned off the TV, slung his backpack over his shoulder, and headed toward the door. Halfway there, he turned back and grabbed the White Pages from beneath the phone that had been disconnected three months earlier. Enough people had used the words
child,
protective,
and
services
together for Boricio to know that maybe someone there could help him.

He thumbed through the C pages, found what he was looking for, and then tore the page from the book and shoved it in his pack.
 

The other side of his mom’s door was still silent. Boricio figured it was now or never, then crept toward the front door. Joe opened it before he could.
 

Boricio’s heart nearly exploded in his chest, and the look on his face must’ve been all guilt, because Joe stared at him hard.

Joe wanted to know where Boricio was headed off to with the backpack, and when he opened it up to a change of clothes and Ramen, plus the paper with hotline numbers for CPS, his eyes went blacker than black, which meant he was about to get meaner than mean.
 

Boricio cried, “NO!” then turned and ran as fast as he could. Joe was faster, grabbing Boricio by the neck and throwing him to the floor.
 

Boricio’s mom opened her bedroom door and even though she threatened punishment, she begged for Joe to stop.
 

But it was too late.
 

It was always too late once you let the monster out.

* * * *

LUCA HARDING: PART 1

Kingsland, Alabama

The Sanctuary

March 27

morning

two days after Will left.

Luca looked across to Paola, sitting in the back of the room at the desk beside him, obviously uncomfortable in the long, dark blue dress she’d been forced to wear after Mary decided they would stay at The Sanctuary.

Luca didn’t mind his change in clothes, wearing dark slacks and a long-sleeve light blue shirt with suspenders; it made him feel more like he matched the body life made him wear.

“This looks like a children’s classroom,” Paola whispered. “I’d rather be washing dishes and cleaning.”

“It’s all-ages,” Luca said.

“Shh,” 11-year old Tammy Watson whispered from up front, casting a nasty look back to Paola and Luca, even though the teacher had yet to arrive.

Paola stuck her tongue out. Tammy’s eyes widened as if Paola had said the F-word.

Though the classroom was on the bottom floor of the children’s house, the room’s interior looked just like a schoolroom, complete with a chalkboard, chairs with desks attached, and colorful pictures on the wall. There were six kids in the classroom other than Luca and Paola, ranging from ages six to 15. There were 20 chair/desk combos in the room, and though Luca usually sat up front, he followed Paola to the back of the class. It was her first day and he didn’t want her to feel alone.

“So, what do you do all day? Learn Bible stuff?” Paola whispered.

“Yeah, and regular math, and English stuff,” Luca said. “It’s not bad.”

“Ugh, you’re one of those kids who
liked
school, aren’t you?”

“Yeah, didn’t you?”

Paola rolled her eyes, “Um,
nooo.
”

The teacher, Ms. Autumn, a young brunette with a pretty smile and beautiful blue eyes, arrived just after eight, apologizing for being late.

“I’m sorry,” she said, “I was helping Sister Theresa with something. Good morning, class.”

“Good morning, Ms. Autumn,” the children said in chorus.

Paola looked at Luca with narrowed eyes, “
Oooooh
, I see why you like school so much; you have a crush on the teach.”

Luca went red-faced at the accusation, and was about to deny it when Ms. Autumn said, “Ah, we have a new student, Miss Paola Olson. Say hello to Paola, class.”

“Hello, Paola,” they all said, including Luca, who giggled while doing so. Tammy Watson shot Paola a dirty look as she said her hello.

“Why don’t you tell us a bit about yourself, Paola?” Ms. Autumn said.

Paola went from jaded to shy in seconds, “I dunno, I’m 12. I’m from Warson Woods Missouri. And I like hanging out with friends, going to the mall, and playing video games. Well, I did, anyway.”

“Welcome to our class, Paola, we’re glad to have you,” Ms. Autumn said as she sat. “Now, let’s begin with our morning prayer, shall we?”

Paola gave Luca a weird look as he folded his hands and closed his eyes. He didn’t remember the prayer, but he kept his mouth moving as though he knew every word. He peeked over at Paola, grimacing through the prayer, and smiled. She opened her eyes and caught him, then furrowed her eyebrows in playful anger, which made him almost giggle out loud.

He closed his eyes, since he didn’t want to erupt in a laughing fit and get in trouble.
 

As Ms. Autumn began talking about the day’s lessons, Luca found his mind drifting to Will, and wondering if he was okay. Luca hadn’t seen Will since he left two days earlier, in real life or in his dreams. He hoped he was okay.
 

Though Luca was sad Will had left, things had been running smoothly at The Sanctuary ever since.

Desmond and Mary told John and Brother Rei that they would stay at The Sanctuary, a decision Luca knew they’d been fighting about, from the snippets of conversations, and thoughts, he’d overheard, though he never intended to eavesdrop. Once they made their decision, they were all given new clothes like the rest of the people wore.
 

Now that they were officially part of The Sanctuary, Luca noticed that people were thinking less bad things about him and the others. They were starting to accept them, though some people, like Tammy, didn’t care for them at all. Tammy, Luca had discovered while accidentally tuning into her thoughts, was jealous of Paola’s beauty. Luca thought it was odd, considering that Tammy was pretty. But she was blonde and pale, and secretly craved to have Paola’s olive skin and dark hair. Tammy’s nastiness was almost an obsessive string of thoughts. Thankfully, Luca was now learning to tune out people’s thoughts.