Chapter Text
The first thing I've learned this semester is that everyone in the city is dying looking for something. I'm here for something too, but I'd be just as fine if I wasn't. Yeah, I'd be just as fine. I don't need to be here with my whole heart and soul. But even though the world won't end if the businessman who stops by every morning looking harried doesn't get his morning coffee, I guess the thing about the city is that it always keeps you searching. The businessman is getting coffee to wake up after staying up last night to work for the same company he's going to clock in at this morning, and he has to work that job to get his money and pay his bills to keep on living, and its very pressing and very important that he gets everything done as soon and as efficiently as he can. Sometimes, I think city people are drowning. I never knew how settled I was at home until I saw how unsettled everyone in the city behaves.
Maybe it's because I picked a gas station in the busiest part of town, though. All the most unsettled people come here, because they're in a rush or lacking money. I used to try to talk to customers, because I wanted to know why everyone was running around like a headless chicken. I still do want to know. But they never respond with more than a few words, and eventually Lucas, my manager, eventually told me that people didn't like chatting in the gas station, so I stopped.
Its a fine job, as jobs go. But when the bell rang halfway through my shift, just in the evening. I knew that hair. I knew something was wrong.
No, that's not true. My brain first registered it as Jay, because he's really the only person I know here other than Lucas, and Jay loves to bother me at work. But then I realize that really, this looks nothing like Jays hair, but instead Mr. Brooks. Joseph's father.
He's supposed to be dead. But he rounds up to the register like my chest hasn't stopped working a gun in his hand. It's him. It's really him. How is he not dead?
Here's what happens:
“What are you doing here," I ask him, standing very, very still. “How are you here. How are you here. H-”
“Give me everything in the register, kid,” says Mr. Brooks, looking exactly how I remember him. Oh, God, he looks the same. He looks the same. He looks the same.
I remember Quintus Sertorius breathing really really hard right before we had to put him down. He knew he was dying then, and I think I understand how it felt. His breath came so fast, so fast, just like Joseph in the barn milking Rosie for the first time, just like Joseph, and I can't believe that Joseph died trying to protect me from his father but he's still here!
“We buried you,” I said, standing just like Joseph, hands up and back against the wall, panting, panting, and there's not enough air in the whole world.
For a moment, I think Mr. Brooks is about to pull the trigger like I'm twelve. And then I get mad, so mad that I punch up and move my head as fast as I can without thinking about it, and Mr. Brooks falls back where my fist hits his jaw, and I feel so angry that I could kill him right then. I really could do it.
Bang!
Mr. Brooks shoots the gun into the television sending sparks raining down on everything. I clamber over the counter and punch him again, hard enough that he lets go of the gun and it falls to the ground. My blood get so hot it could melt out of my body. I barely breathe anything at all, only shallow gasps as I punch Mr. Brooks again, and again, and again.
“You killed him!” I shout and I punch him. His head knocks back against the floor with a small crack. “You killed him! You killed Joseph! You should be dead!”
“Fuck you,” Mr. Brooks spits, nose bloody. “Fuck you, you psycho, what the fuck is wrong with you?”
He doesn't know who I am.
Everything blurs out, and I'm so mad, so mad, and I punch his stupid fucking face so hard that my knuckles hurt, and the gun is somewhere off to the side and Mr. Brooks is on the floor and and I’m on top of him still punching, and I think words come out of my mouth but I'm not sure that I'm not just screeching, and my knuckles hurt and I'm so so mad, and he’s spitting out under me, “Fucking- its not me, it's not me, you're talking about my asshole brother, Josephs my nephew, what the fuck,” and then Lucas comes out and shouts “What is going on here!” and suddenly the world is clear again.
Mr. Brooks looks horrible, one broken and bloody, eyes already swollen. My knuckles sting with blood. My knees are on either side of Mr. Brooks, pressed against the tiled floor, I still can't catch my breath.
I clamber off of Mr. Brooks with hands red with blood, his or my own. “How are you alive."
“Aren't you fucking listening?” Mr. Brooks says, pushing himself up to lean against the chips shelf, "I'm not Joseph's dad. That's my fucking brother. Jesus fuck, kid, when did he die?”
Lucas is still watching us, except now he has the gun in his hand and is pointing it straight at the Mr. Brooks that isn't Joseph's dad.
“You better get the fuck out of my store,” Lucas says, looking right at Mr. Brooks. “I don't know who you are, but if you come back here, you'll find out how good I can shoot.”
Mr. Brooks stands up, still looking at me. “Seriously, man,” he says, “When did he d-”
“Not a word!” Lucas shouts. “ You have a five seconds to fuck off!”
And then the bell rings again, and he's gone. And Lucas is still holding the gun trained at the window. And I'm still on the floor.
“Next time,” Lucas says to me when he finally puts down the gun on the counter, “Just give ‘em the money, alright?”
Lucas doesn't make me finish my shift, which is good, because I don't think I could have done anything more today. He just closes the place up and leads me to the bathroom and helps me wash my hands, and and steals ointment from his own stock to rub over my hands before bandaging my knuckles. I hadn't even known my knuckles split. Lucas pulls out a chair for me. I sit down. He trades my sweatshirt for an extra one of his, and gives me a plastic bag for groceries to carry my sweater in because it's splattered with blood. I would be embarrassed at him doing everything for me if the world didn't feel like it’s happening to me in the third person.
“Im not gonna delete the security footage in case the guy calls the cops, but I won't tell anyone unless he does,” Lucas says, breaking the static silence. “You can't be fighting in my store though, Jack. I do not condone gang violence.”
“Im not in a gang,” I say, voice hoarse, moving through molasses. "He was… my foster brother. Joseph. His dad drove him off the bridge. Are you firing me?”
“Ah, shit kid,” Lucas softens, crouching down. He sounds shocked. Wasn't it obvious? There's really no one else I would lose my mind over like this. “I'm sorry. I'm not firing you. Just don't do that again, alright? You could've died. Rule number one of working with me is that you do whatever the man with the gun says.”
I don't tell him I didn't mean to. I didn't mean to. But I'm not even sure how it happened. It doesn't matter.
“Get home safe, alright? I'll get someone to cover your next shift,” Lucas says after a long pause. He puts a hand on my shoulder and asks, “ Can you look at me?”
No.
I keep shivering in the oversized zip-up Lucas gave me. It feels like I'm going to fall out of my skin with tremors. The whole world is painful to look at. Just like when I had to stick my arm in the ice to pull Joseph up.
“Jack, hey, c'mon," Lucas says. He's being very gentle, even after I just beat up Mr. Brooks. What would my mother think? “Kid. I need to know if you can make it home on your own.”
And that's what does me in, I guess. I want to go home. I really want to go home. I really want to go back to mom and dad and Jupiter. I really want to go back. What am I doing here? I hate the city, I hate the people, I hate the way they don't smile back, I hate the fact that everyone is so unsettled here, I hate the fact that there's no routine and always chaos, I hate the smog, I hate the stink, I hate all of it. And most of all, I hate that knowing that somewhere out there, someone shares Joseph's father's face, down to the same angry sneer. I hate it. I hate it.
“Jack,” Lucas sighs pityingly. “It's alright, kid. It's okay. You're okay.”
I shake my head. I keep shivering. It's not, it's really not. My cheeks are wet. I hate this place so much I could choke on it.
“Is there someone I can call?” Lucas asks. I almost want to tell him my parents landline number, but then I remember that they knew Joseph, they know, and that was the stupidest move I've pulled since the locker room with him, and I can't think about Jupiter seeing me right now, with blood under my fingernails somehow and my head and body acting separate and behaving just like her father that she never met, maybe even worse, because Joseph knew the danger his dad posed, even when he finally got settled with us he knew, and he was always so smart, I don't think I'll ever feel smarter than him even though I'm now five years older than he was, because every thought left my head when it happened, and I acted all angry like I was insane.
He never would have put anyone in danger like that. What if there had been customers? What if Lucas had come out earlier? What if the bullet had hit me?
God, Jupiter would have lost another brother. My parents would have lost another son.
They can't know.
“Jay,” I say, “Call Jay,”
He's probably on his way home from his economics class right now. He can swing by. He's probably the only other person in the world that I can look at right now. He never liked Joseph, but he still has to care about him some way or another. He still has to understand.
“Here,” Lucas says, handing me my phone from my locker. “Open the passcode and I'll talk to him, alright? You'll be fine, Jack.”
God, where was Joseph's uncle this whole time? Did he even know what had happened? He didn't know Joseph had passed, how would he know about Jupiter? Would he fight us over when he found out? Jupiter was too young to really remember the first time around, and we were careful not to let her know, Jay and I, at least. She doesn't need to know about how much they all hated Joseph. He was good. He was the greatest.
Joseph's uncle can never know about Jupiter. And I can't tell him anything about Joseph, either, because if he sees me and he follows me and he sees Jupiter and he fights the foster system again and he takes her away from us for real this time, I'll never let it go. I'll never trust them again. Mrs. Stroud is kind, but I don't know if I can ever stop seeing her trying to warn us off Joseph. She's sweet with Jupiter. I know she's nice. But she can be mean too, especially when the legal system is concerned.
How didn't we know about Joseph's uncle?
Did Joseph even know about his uncle?
“Jack, c'mon man,” Lucas is saying, suddenly waving a hand inches in front of me. “Jack. Jay is asking about you. Snap out of it.”
“Whats wrong," I want to say, but my lips won't unglue. It's all coming down on us. It's getting ruined.
“Sorry, dude, he's completely out of it.” Lucas says into my phone. “He said it was his foster brother's… Dad? Uncle? something like that. Completely beat the fuck out of him.”
“Ah,” Jay's voice is small and tinny over the line. “Shit.”
Jay comes a whopping six minutes later and out of breath. He's not wearing his jacket, even though the weather's been getting cold. I wish I had the energy to tease him about it. He talks with Lucas for a moment, and then comes to stand awkwardly in front of me. We don't say anything for long long moments. And then,
“He's gonna take Jupiter,” I whisper. Jay suddenly stands straight and alarmed.
“Did he actually say that? He can't have rights over her, can he?”
I shake my head. But when have things ever been smooth sailing? When have we ever gotten to keep anyone?
“...Okay,” Jay says, folding his legs underneath him as he sits on the floor. “Did he imply he was gonna take her?”
He doesn't believe me.
“No,” I want to say, “But why wouldn't he? Why would things ever go right?”
Except I don't say that. I just shake my head no again and watch an unreadable expression cross Jay's face. “There has to be a reason Joseph wasn't placed with him before your family,” He says. “A criminal record, probably. He can’t fight for custody that well with a record. And even if he could, you could make the argument of how you met him. He can't get custody if he's on the run.”
He could always kidnap her. He could always hold me gun to the head and make her get in the car. He could always drive her off the bridge.
“Jack,” Lucas says from the doorway. Jay looks up sharply. “Do you want me to press charges?”
Do I?
“If he's in doing time, he won't be able to do much about… Juniper”
“Jupiter,” I correct. Jay's eyes turn to me.
“Jupiter,” Lucas agrees easily. “We could get him for a few years at least. Its a pretty open and shut case.”
But… if he doesnt get charges pressed. If things go wrong. If he gets angry at us.
Jupiter.
“Yes,” Jay blurts out before I can speak. “Yes, please. We'd like that.”
Lucas narrows his eyes at Jay. “And who are you, exactly?”
“We're… cousins. sort of.”
I'm not sure what to do.
“He’s gonna be mad,” I say. “Mr. Brooks. If he isn't sent to jail, he's gonna be mad. He's gonna look for Jupiter.”
“He won't find her,” Jay says instantly. “We can figure something out. Either send her to Maddie's parents with me, or she comes with us for a few days, or my dad if he’s really going at it, or-”
“Hey, hey,” Lucas frowns. “I really doubt that the courts will rule against us. We have the security tapes on hand. I took a look at them already. Everything's intact, it's a pretty safe risk. No need to jump the gun.”
Jay cringes.
“Joseph wasn't safe with us,” My voice isn't very loud at all. “He wasn't safe with us.”
“No,” Jay sighs. “He wasn't.”
“If we kept him out of the picture. We can… prepare. For if he comes after her. We can have more time.”
Jay looks up at my face. Lucas does too. I nod.
“I'll call the authorities, then. They'll want your hoodie as evidence, Jack.”
I throw the bag at him, and he catches it.
“You seem pretty good at this, Lucas,” Jay says with his eyes narrowed.“Is there a reason you're so used to police work?”
“Don't worry,” Lucas laughs, a little bitter on his way to his office. “You guys aren't the only ones who don't trust the system to do its job.”
Once the door closes, Jay pats my knee. “We'll keep her safe,” he whispers, and I close my eyes.
We sure will. We sure will.