Date: Sat, 13 Oct 2001 23:40:13 -0400 From: Tom Cup <tom_cup@hotmail.com> Subject: Kevin - Series Chapter 20 The Lion of Bolognia -- Kevin Part 2 by Tom Cup Copyright 2000, 2001 by the Paratwa Partnership: A Colorado Corporation. All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic or mechanical, except in the case of reviews, without written permission from the Paratwa Partnership, Inc, 354 Plateau Drive, Florissant, CO 80816 This is a fictional story involving youth/youth or adult/youth sexual relationships. If this type of material offends you, please do not read any further. This material is intended for mature adult audiences. Names, characters, locations and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. ************************************************************************ This story is part of the Tom Cup Library Please visit the member's area of the Tom Cup Library for Chapter 10 of The Lion of Bolognia (Kevin Chapter 24); Chapter 27 of "Calvin"; Chapter 12 of "Angel"; "David's Christmas Present" (Revised with new additions and chapters by Tom Cup); Chapters 6 of "A Place Called Home"; Chapter 2 of "In Memory of Steve". Also available Tommy -- The Return -- Chapter 2, "Stephen Miller's Journal" Chapter 1; "The Day My Life Began" and many more series and short stories! Once again, thank you for your support, and as always, your e-mail is much appreciated. ************************************************************************ To support this and other stories by Tom Cup, join the Tom Cup Library at: http://tomcup.iscool.net *********************************************************************** Kevin Part 3 Aftermath Chapter 2 Family Reunion >From the "Biography of The Lion of Bolognia": It was William clearing his throat that woke me from my daydreaming. I liked William. Ever since that day, when he helped me to pick out the correct clothing, the day that he told me that it was a pleasure to serve a "well mannered gentlemen" like me -- gentlemen like me! What a laugh. I was an ignorant street kid. Abused and rescued, I tried to make the best of what life gave. That wasn't a trick every street kid knew. Make the best of what you got, that's my motto. -- William was a hundred times more refined than me and yet he treated me like I was noble born. I have to laugh. William was a prince among men. I was lucky. That's all. You can size my life up to being lucky. I was lucky that it was Tony that picked me up that night, so long ago. I was lucky Antonio and Marie loved me. I was lucky that William loved me too. "You have a message sir." "Message?" "Yes, sir. I thought you should be made aware immediately." I didn't bother to close the book I was supposedly reading. I rolled over on my back and gazed at William. He had a crooked smile that he reserved for me. A smile that said, I was amusing him once again. I stared in mock boredom at the ceiling. "Tell the Queen that I am far to busy to entertain visitors on such short notice." "Very well sir, should she inquire, I will be most firm on the matter." "Very good, and please make my excuses to the Vatican. I cannot bear men in robes." "Consider it done sir. However, the matter at hand does require your attention." I looked at William. He wasn't smiling anymore. He wanted my attention. I sat up crossed legged facing him. He breathed a sigh. Now I was sure. What he was about to tell me was important, important for me to hear and important for him to tell. "It's your mother sir. She is out of rehabilitation." "Big deal." "She wishes to see you." ***** Being a full time drunk and drug addict isn't easy. It takes dedication and sacrifice. Most people don't realize that fact. It takes determination: A focus that most people don't have. Every fiber of your being has to be dedicated to the cause of being high. Barb Greer had made an art of it. A woman with six children -- one legally adopted by someone else and living out of state, and five in foster care -- and she wasn't really sure who any of their father's were. She had suspicions. But when it came right down to it, she wasn't positive she knew. This was the fact that stunned her in rehab. The point at which she realized how lost she was to her drug addiction. She realized that she might never see her children again. The police report, medical examination, and caseworker's reports were read to her. She had to tell them -- the doctors, caseworkers, nurses, judges, everyone that asked -- in her own words what those reports meant, what had happened to her kids. She had to confess that it was her fault that they were malnourished, abused, and living in third world squalor. And she admitted it. In the beginning, because she knew it was what the talking heads wanted to hear. But Kevin's words came back to her, "You didn't care enough to want to know." And the look in his eyes when he said that, his whole demeanor said, he loathed her. She knew he was telling the truth, showing and saying what he thought of her. That's why it hurt. He was telling the truth. So as she stood before the judge and confessed, and asked forgiveness and a chance to make it right, Barbara Greer cried honestly. She didn't blame her addiction. She blamed herself. I fucked up, your honor. It was me. And she cried. She told the judge about Kevin. She told her how she had thrown him out, in the cold -- it didn't matter that it was her worthless, absentee boyfriend that really threw Kevin out, while she was high on coke and booze to the point of being comatose. She wouldn't give herself that out. If she hadn't been dope up, if she had been taking care of her children like a mother should, none of it would have happened -- She told the judge about the last words that she heard her son speak, her first born said that she didn't care enough to know. But she did care. I do care. Please, I have to show my family I care. She got seven years probation: two years in a halfway house, mandatory drug and alcohol testing, AA meetings, stress management classes, therapy, child rearing classes, supervised visitation -- "Miss just one visit, one therapy session, one anything, for none court approve activity," the judge said, "and forget about happy reunions. The only reunion you'll get at that point is with the remainder of your sentence. Do I make myself clear?" She was very clear. Barb understood clearly -- and she was ordered to find and maintain a job. She accepted all the terms of the agreement. She was released from drug rehab by the court, returned only to gather her few possessions, and settled into the halfway house. The counselor warned that she shouldn't expect too much. Raising her goals to unattainable heights was one of the patterns in her behavior that led to drug use. She would reach so high that, when she failed, the pain would be so unbearable that she needed the drugs to cover the pain. It didn't matter anymore, to her though, she had no choice, she had to reconcile to her children, to Kevin, because if she didn't she would go mad. That was what she feared now. It wasn't going back to jail, or dying of an overdose, that mattered to her. She couldn't bear his words, repeating, over and over again, echoing in her head, drumming on and on, splitting her mind in two: "You didn't care enough to want to know." ***** Richy walked up the steps toward the two large glass-swinging doors. He paused briefly to look back at the social worker. He hadn't wanted her to walk him up the stairs, and into the room, like some pussy kid that was scared of his own shadow. He wasn't scared; he just didn't want to see her. He hated her. The court was making him see her and that really pissed him off. He thought of making a dash for it; just take off running right then and there. Leave it all behind: his foster parents, foster brothers (Mark and Craig), everything, even Kevin. Kevin ... Kevin promised that he would see him again. Kevin had gotten out. Kevin had a real mother and father. Kevin didn't have to see the bitch waiting for him in Court Appointed Visitation. He should just run. Get away... now. Run or go in the building, cause if you stand there any longer, Miss Social Worker will get out of the car and walk you to the appointment. -- He really missed Kevin. -- He pushed the door and went inside. Richy was led into a room that was twenty by eighteen feet. There were three chairs in the quasi-circle. By the suit, the one woman was wearing, he knew she was the supervisor -- court appointed watcher. It was the second woman he stared at. She sat nervously fiddling with here McDonald's uniform. He thought that he had the wrong room. He backed away to look at the number on the door. 203. It was the right room. He stared at the woman again. She did look familiar. The supervisor looked up and saw him. "Richard Greer?" He looked at her and back at the other woman. The woman looked up. She looked familiar but he couldn't quite place her. Like someone you meet on a crowded street, whose face is so familiar that you can almost say their name, but you don't really know them. Like dreaming of an adventure with your best friend, calling his name a million time in the dream, then waking up, you can't member the name of the person in the dream, (no name you think of sounds right), you never had a friend that looked remotely like the person in the dream, and you would never do such outlandish things! But somehow it seems real, familiar. "Richard Bernard Greer?" the supervisor said. "Hi Richy," Barb said. "Why don't you sit down," the supervisor said. "I don't want to sit. I don't want to be here." "Richard..." the supervisor said. "Don't call me that!" "He likes to be called Richy," Barb offered. "How do you know what I like?" he fired. "Well...at home we always called you Richy...I...." "At home? At home?! At home we got the shit kicked out of us if we said we had to pee at the wrong time!" Barb began to cry. Rich, as he liked to be called, was confused. He clearly recognized the woman to be his mother. But it wasn't his mother. First, his mother would rather die than get a real job. Second, his mother would kill someone before wearing -- Even as a joke, at Halloween, let alone being seen in public in -- a McDonald's uniform. And third, and most important, your honor, his mother did not cry. She made other's cry but his mother did not cry! He didn't know who this woman was but it was not his mother. "Perhaps we can start over?" the supervisor said, "What would you like to be called?" "Rich." "OK, Rich. You win. You made your mother cry. We now know the parameters of this meeting. You're pissed and your mother is sorry. That's great. I like it. Nothing like consistency to keep a girl going." Rich pulled his eyes away from the tearful spectacle he once called his mother and focus on the supervisor. His eyes said nothing, unless you think a cold stare of murder is something. Rich hated what he felt. Hate. He hurt so bad that the list of things he hated was growing faster than the number of things he loved. He hated his anger. He hated being in a foster home. He hated not seeing his brothers and sisters. He hated being away from Kevin. He hated his mother. And he hated social workers that think they got it figured out in the first two seconds they meet you. "I don't know why ya'll think the pissed off kid -- slash -- weepy-eyed, sorry-souled mother routine is new. Both of you need to grow up or at the very least entertain me. I got to sit here and watch for the next forty-five minutes!" Rich laughed. The bitch had a point. He didn't want to be there and she sure as shit probably didn't want to be there. It was honest and Rich couldn't help liking honest people. It was why, even as he stood debating, whether or not he would come to the meeting, he knew he would. He had promised Miss Social Worker that, if she let him go alone, he would go to the meeting. He was honest. If he promised, he would do it. "So are we going to have time or what?" Rich smiled. Barb relaxed also. She couldn't believe how weak and venerable she felt. The supervisor must have sensed her anxiety because she held Barb's hand. Barb couldn't look up at Rich. She didn't want to see the hatred in his eyes that she had seen in Kevin's. She knew it was there. She could hear it in his voice. He was the one they said was in the worst condition when they found the children -- when Kevin had lead them to the children, when Kevin had saved the children from their own mother -- both physically and emotionally. Rich hated her. And yet there seemed to be a chance, this woman had made him laugh, and smile. There was more to her son than hate. There is more to me than drugs and booze. "You're right Rich," Barb said, "I don't know what you like. I don't know who you are. I gave birth to you and that's all. I haven't been a mother to you... to none of you. I beat you and abused you. And I let other people abuse you. I'm sorry.... I know I don't have the right to ask you to forgive me..." "You're right about that." "But that's what I am asking. Not that exactly... but for a chance. A chance to be better, to make it up to you. And then, if I do better, then maybe you can forgive me. That's all I got to say." "Rich," the supervisor said, "is there anything you would like to say to your mother?" Rich thought to say that he didn't want to see or speak to her again. He wanted to be cruel and call her the degrading names that she had called him, and allowed him to be called. He wanted her to feel the pain that he felt. In the end, he couldn't do it. As much as he hated the thought of this meeting, Rich just couldn't hurt her. He wasn't that kind of boy. Some would have thought him a pussy for being that way. He didn't care. He could be strong but he wasn't cruel. He was like Kevin. That was good enough for him. "I really don't want to be here. I mean, I didn't want to come. I'm not promising anything but I'll try." "What do you mean... could you explain so we have a clearer understanding of what you mean?" the supervisor asked. Barb nodded. "I hate you OK? I mean, I am really mad at you. The things you did, and the things you let Chuck do to us, I am really mad at you." Barb nodded again and began to cry. She listened now as Rich recounted the story of Kevin's birthday party. He told her of his fear, waking tied and gagged. How he was relieved to tears and sobs, when Kevin woke up, he wasn't dead. And then of being taken away, not knowing if he would ever see his brother again -- the brother that got away from her, started a new life of his own, and then offered to give it up to save his little brother. Kevin the one Barb had let Chuck throw out in the cold like an unwanted stray kitten. -- She listened as he told her what Chuck planned to do that night and how Kevin's dad had saved Kevin. And Barb cried and repeated the only words that made sense to her: Sorry... sorry... sorry....