Boys Like You by Jaye Pratt
As the sun starts to dip below the horizon, a sure sign the day is coming to an end, the orange glow on the water offers a moment of tranquillity from the thoughts running through my head. A wave of crisp, salty air whips at my skin causing a shiver to roll over me, my Nike hoodie offering limited comfort.
Sundays are my favourite day of the week because Levi, Maximus, Rory and Rocky – my brothers, not by blood but by bond – meet at Mumma B’s for dinner, as we have for the past ten years. We never miss it if we can help it, but I know that today they’ll all be there. They know what today means to me. I try not to dwell on it, but it’s the one day a year the memories of my young childhood rear their ugly heads. I try to tamp those thoughts down and focus on Mumma B instead.
Mumma B is hands down an angel on earth. There is no other way to describe her. She takes in foster kids, usually ones no one else will, and our issues were particularly bad. How she managed the five of us at the same time is a mystery. Ten years ago, almost to the day, I was taken to Mumma B’s home.
The wind picks up, causing me to shiver momentarily, but even the weather can’t stop my mind from taking a trip down memory lane. Not today anyway. I remember the night like it was yesterday.
I was cold and hungry. I don’t know how long I had been without food, but my drug-addicted mother and her shitty-ass boyfriend preferred to spend the weekly money on drugs. Whenever their drugs ran out, I was beaten. But that night, the beating wasn’t as bad.
They were yelling at each other when the police showed up. I knew the drill, what I was meant to do when anyone of authority showed up: I had to hide until they were gone. This time, for whatever reason, they didn’t hear the knock at the door, so I broke protocol and answered it. I knew I shouldn’t have opened it, that it would mean punishment, but I did it all the same.
A lady officer tried to take me from the house once my mother was in the back of the police car, but I lashed out. That’s when a male officer stepped in and convinced me to leave. He took me to Mumma B’s.
My mother never tried to fight for me. I’m glad she didn’t because I was adopted by my dads. Yes, you heard me, my dads. If anyone has an issue with that, they have to go through me.
The early days with them weren't easy. I honestly don’t know why they kept me. I was an angry kid and made their lives hell. Hell, I still am angry – that doesn’t just go away, especially when your mother does what mine did. That kind of betrayal hurts right down to your core and does lasting damage.
Sometimes I think I’m defective. Yes, I was dealt a shitty hand as a kid, but it has been ten goddamn years; shouldn’t I be over it by now? Boo hoo, my mother didn’t love me.
Now I have the opposite problem; my dads love me too much. My therapist says it’s normal for teenagers my age to feel smothered by their loving parents. Apparently, I also have an issue with females in a position of power. I would never hurt a woman if that’s what you’re thinking, but I am working on my trust issues.
“Yo, Merce! Mumma B sent us to find your ass,” Levi calls out, disturbing me from the thoughts of my past. It’s a welcome distraction.
I turn to see my brothers standing on the stairs that lead down to the beach. Rocky jumps and clears the stairs, running towards me at full speed. He smirks at me, his intentions clear: that fucker plans to tackle me into the water.
Turning and sprinting away, I hear the laughter of the others as Rocky gains on me. I stop before I lead us too far down the beach and Rocky slows, coming to a halt beside me.
Levi easily catches up to us. We all came out here knowing that Rocky needed to blow off some steam. Rocky jumps onto Levi’s back and Levi starts running towards the water causing Rocky to jump from his back, laughing.
“Come on, we need to head back up to the house,” I say. Levi agrees but Rocky whines; he hates sitting still at dinner. He gets weird around small children because they have so much energy that it sets off his ADHD. He takes off at full pelt back towards where Maximus is sitting on the top step, waiting for us.
As he runs, he passes Rory who has come to meet us half way, and the three of us laugh as Rocky trips face first into the water. Spluttering and spitting out a mouthful of salty water, he joins in our laughter and strips down to his boxers, slinging his wet clothes over his shoulder.
Mumma B appears at the top of the stairs, hands on her hips, shaking her head. She looks young for her age, not that she will tell us exactly how old she is; all we know is she is in her late forties. When she found out she couldn’t have children in her early twenties, she decided to work with young kids and got herself a desk job at a child safety office. With the amount of kids she saw coming in, she said it was an easy decision for her to become a foster mother. Mostly she helps the ones who have no chance of going back to their birth parents and helps them find a new family.
At the moment she’s fostering three siblings and they may be staying long term. Occasionally, at Sunday dinners, other kids she has fostered show up, but most of the time it’s just us. The older ones have moved on, and some of the younger ones live too far away. We were all lucky to stay within half an hour’s drive – except Rory; he lives about forty-five minutes away.
Rocky takes off running towards Mumma B, and when he yells out, ‘coming’, her eyes go wide. She starts walking backwards holding her hands up in front of herself, telling him not to dare. But she’s laughing at him too.
Maximus must have gone inside; he isn’t a fan of Rocky’s antics. He’s more reserved than the rest of us. Quiet and cautious, he notices things most don’t.
Levi, Rory, and I walk up the stairs watching Rocky chase Mumma B into the house.
We pretty much do everything together, even attending an exclusive private school. The four of us were ‘magically’ offered scholarships one day. Rory’s mum thinks we have no idea it was her.
Rory was the second to last to arrive at Mumma B’s. He was also the only one who called me on my shit, and the only one of us still with our biological parents. His father is some rich dude who is never home, none of us knows what he does, and his mum is… well, a gold digging bitch, but my dads told me, if you don’t have anything nice to say, then say nothing at all.
The day she came for Rory, he threw a tantrum and didn’t want to leave. I recall it vividly because I slashed her tyres, thinking it would help our cause and Rory would be able to stay. I remember thinking, how dare this witch try and take our brother away? She put on her fake nice voice and told him he would see us at school, to which he replied not everyone goes to private school.
Rory ran away almost every day until one day we all received the news we would be going to the same school as him. He never ran away again. Keeping Rory happy keeps her happy, because then she is free to do whatever rich mums do during the day.
By the time we get inside after hosing the sand from our legs, Rocky is wrapped in a towel, the sound of the dryer running as we take our seats.
“Hurry up you three, I’m starving over here,” Rocky announces, as if he has been waiting on us the whole time.
We all take our seats. Altogether tonight there are nine of us. The three siblings – two boys, eight and four, and the girl, six – are already eating as soon as the food is placed in front of them. The rest of us serve ourselves from the dishes on the table.
The eight-year-old kid, appropriately named Damien, stares me down. He reminds me of myself: so much anger all bottled up. I think it annoys him that he doesn’t get a reaction from me. I notice him shift and stare at Maximus. When he looks back at me, I shake my head no at him and he nods back at me. The little shit has worked out my weakness. We have a stare off while everyone around us eats and talks about their week.
“Mercer,” Rory says, snapping his fingers to get my attention. “Mumma B was talking to you.”
I look from Rory to her and force a smile for her benefit.
“Sorry, I was elsewhere.”
I look over at the little demon child then back to Mumma B.
“I was just asking how your training is going, I know you have a fight night coming up soon.”
She fusses over Dawson as I go into detail about my new schedule for training. When Dawson spills a drink on himself, we’re left alone while Mumma B takes him to change his outfit. Levi jumps up straight away to clean some of the drink that was spilled on the floor while Rocky tries to steal food from Rory’s plate.
“Is there something wrong with him?” Damien spits, his tone full of hatred. He stares at me, a smile on his lips. I try counting to five in my head, because I know I won’t reach ten.
“Wrong with who?” I snap back maybe a little harsher than needed, because I know exactly who he is referring to. Maximus is frozen; he hates when people talk about him as if he isn’t in the room, it’s one of his triggers.
“The nerd with the glasses. Is he slow or somethin’?” He doesn’t take his eyes off me as he says it. People like to label Maximus a nerd because of his glasses, good grades and the fact he never talks to anyone except us. But it’s much simpler than that: if he doesn’t trust you, he won’t talk to you. All you get is silence.
Levi and Rory gasp at the kid’s rudeness, but we need to remember this kid is hurt, confused, and his life has been turned upside down. He probably doesn’t even know any better. Maximus stands, politely pushes his chair back in, and starts to walk from the room.
“If you’re not back in half, I’ll come look for you,” Levi says, watching him leave. Maximus gives him a nod. He and Levi are close; Levi knows how to help when he gets like this. Levi is the only one of us that wasn’t physically or mentally abused in some way by a parent. His parents died, and while his aunt went through the process to get custody, he had to stay with Mumma B. His aunt was fairly young when his parents died and the courts wanted to make sure she was ready to take on a six-year-old kid who just suffered a major traumatic event.
With Maximus gone, we fall silent. Damien goes back to eating as if he hadn’t said anything to upset the balance in the first place. His sister, Emmy, starts to cry and Levi tries to console her while I turn to the kid.
“Outside now,” I demand, staring down at him. He looks up at me with no fear.
“No,” he states simply.
“Get your ass up now. We’re going outside. I will carry you if necessary.”
He doesn’t waste any time. He huffs, pushing his chair out with his legs, sending it crashing backwards onto the floor.
“When Mumma B comes back, just tell her we had some stuff to sort out. I promise not to hurt him.” They all nod as I follow the kid outside.
The backyard brings back memories: the treehouse in the back corner, the same tyre swing hanging from the large mango tree, and the massive trampoline. Rocky still comes out and practices back flips every time we are here.
“So, what, you going to beat on a kid, too?” he says, holding his arms across his chest. His eyes seem slightly worried now, despite his bravado.
“Of course not. You may not see it, kid, but I was like you when I came here, so angry at the world. But one thing you need to learn is just because you’re angry, it doesn’t give you the right to be nasty. What you said about Maximus was rude.” I match his defensive stance, mainly out of habit.
“Well, thanks for the lecture. I’m leaving.” He turns to walk back inside.
“We are not finished here. Let’s see you punch me. You clearly came at me looking for a fight tonight, so try to hit me. I won’t hit you back, I’ll only block.”
He turns back to face me and looks me over, sizing me up, wondering if he could really take me.
“You won’t hit me back?” I know he doesn’t trust me, and he probably never will.
“Nope.” I shake my head.
He still looks skeptical, but steps forward, assessing where he wants to punch me. I know he will go for the guts. I let him get in the first hit.
“Did that make you feel any better?”
“No,” he snaps, trying to hit me again, only this time I block him.
He comes at me again and again when he realises I won’t hit him back. We spar for a good half an hour until Levi comes outside.
“Send the kid inside, we have to go look for Maximus.” He has a no-bullshit tone.
I send Damien inside, telling him if he behaves as best he can, we can spar again when we come back for dinner next week and I’ll teach him some moves. His face lights up for all of two seconds before it drops; he must have been promised things in the past and been let down. He moves slowly inside.
“Hey, kid.” He turns and looks at me. I walk over to him and take off my leather necklace with a shark tooth attached. My dads got it on a trip they went on recently. “Take this. You can give it back to me when I come next week – call it collateral. If I break my promise and don’t show up, you keep it, but ask Mumma B if I have ever missed a dinner in ten years.”
He looks over the necklace and really does smile this time. He slides it over his head and runs inside, calling out for his sister.
Rocky and Rory are chatting with Levi when I join them. Levi knows where Maximus is; we all have GPS tracking on our phones. Maximus knows we use it when he needs space.
“He’s down the beach about a kilometre towards town.”
We all nod and start walking at a brisk pace. The sun has fully set and the beach is pitch black besides the moon’s reflection. We all walk in silence. Maximus has been off lately, more so than usual. When we checked in with his folks, they assured us he has been attending extra therapy sessions. We have a feeling his latest anxiety stems from girls – none show interest because he is different, never taking the time to get to know him. It’s their loss; they miss the chance to see how loyal and caring he is. Though I’m sure he doesn’t see it that way.
We walk in silence; no words need to be said. We have all been off. This time of year is exceptionally hard for all of us.
“Is that him?” Levi asks, pointing to a black figure in the distance.
The four of us break into a sprint. When we’re close enough to see that it is Maximus, we run faster. He’s rocking back and forth wildly, his hands covering his ears as he hums to himself. He has panic attacks from time to time, but this is the first time he’s had one without saying a word to any of us. And that isn’t like him at all.