Chapter Text
She stole inside in the dead of a stormy night, when the wind howled and the rain poured hard and heavy enough to fog up either end of the street. Any creak or thump would be brushed off by even the most paranoid of fathers, else they drive themselves mad stomping outside to berate the trees that scraped the windows, or the thunder that rolled in the distance. There was a heavy quality to the storm that muffled everything else.
It was all intentional on Vanessa’s part. She hadn’t exactly summoned a change in weather, but she’d been waiting for the perfect circumstances to eclipse: a summer storm, and Michael’s eighteenth birthday. The timing wasn’t quite perfect – she’d waited a few days for the worst of the weather to really kick in – but the moment had come, and she was going to seize it before she lost her courage. Armed with a ladder she’d stolen from the next town over’s hardware store, which she still found miraculous that she was able to do in the first place, Vanessa managed to set it gently against the side of the house, creep up, and slide Michael’s window open. Rain blew in as she hiked a leg up and clambered over the ledge. With shaking hands, she shut the window, took a deep breath, and turned to face her goal.
Michael was fast asleep in bed, curled up on his side with little more than the top of his head poking out from under his blankets. He was so still and quiet that Vanessa stood petrified for a long moment, fearing something unlikely but not out of the realm of possibility, before she forced herself to go to his side.
“Michael,” she whispered. She shook his shoulder gently. “Michael, wake up.”
He stirred; the pattern of his deep breathing changed. One hand came up to rub his eyes.
“Michael,” Vanessa repeated. Again, she shook his shoulder, but this time he gasped awake and jolted away from her as if burned. He pulled the blankets close to his chest, blinking furiously at her as his eyes adjusted.
She was shocked by how gaunt his face looked. It must have been a trick of the low lighting, because the baby brother that she’d left almost three years ago had been thin, yes, but he’d still been round-cheeked in a way she hadn’t been able to picture him growing out of. Guilt gnawned at her – three years – but she was more used to the feeling than most girls her age.
“Nessa?” Michael croaked.
“It’s me. It’s okay, everything’s okay.” Vanessa put her hands up as she perched at the edge of his bed.
He rubbed more at his eyes. “I told you to go away.”
“What?”
“I saw you all the time, but you weren’t really here. Dad said– he said I was making it all up, because you’re never coming back. So leave me alone.”
Her heart sank. “No, Michael, I’m here. I’m back, and I’m getting you out of here.” She urged him to sit up. “Come on. I’m not kidding.”
Once he was up – he grew so tall in the time she was gone, how did that happen? – he was no less groggy, but his sleepiness made him almost pliant as she urged him to put on warm layers, to start filling a backpack with his things, to be quiet and quick. It was mostly clothes that he stuffed into the old school bag he unearthed from the closet, but when she offered up the empty backpack she’d brought for this very purpose, he hobbled about to add a handful of frivolous non-necessities; the Game Boy Uncle Henry gave him for one of his birthdays, a sketchbook and tin of his favorite pens, the worn old plush Spring Bonnie he’d had for going on fifteen years. When he topped off his own backpack with it, he shot Vanessa a frightened look, as if she might reprimand him. It wasn’t something she had even considered, but she knew well who would.
As she fluffed up his blankets and positioned his pillows to give the illusion that, at first glance, at least, he was still sleeping, Michael tugged at her sleeve.
“All of my shoes are downstairs,” he whispered, and Vanessa froze.
She couldn’t hesitate too long. They were making good time, and she didn’t want to push their luck. To creep downstairs, no matter how carefully and quietly, would be far too big of a risk. William could be anywhere in the house. As much as she hoped he was sound asleep, there was still a chance that he was awake and moving about the house for one reason or another.
“Put on more socks,” she said decidedly. Giving up her own shoes was not an option: they were too small for him, and would only prove to be a hindrance if they had to run. “I’ll get you some new shoes later. Now, we need to go.”
Michael did as he was told. It was an easy, unquestioning obedience, the kind you could only find in teenagers who were never afforded an ounce of freedom, whose complacency had been beaten into them. He said nothing when he slung the backpack over his shoulders. When his eyes found hers in the darkness, wide and pale and determined, Vanessa swept him into a brief but tight hug that left him gasping in surprise. They could not afford hesitations, but she considered hugging her brother a necessity in that moment.
Over the windowsill and back out into the pouring rain Vanessa went, this time like a fox stealing away from a rival burrow. The frigid metal of the top rung stung her fingertips as she told Michael to wait until she was on the ground, unless he could hear their father coming, in which case he should get down as fast as he could.
“You won’t fall,” she said, “but I’ll be down there to catch you, okay?” As a matter of fact, she wasn’t so sure, but she wasn’t about to tell him. His hands hadn’t stopped shaking since he’d woken up, he had no shoes, he was probably still half asleep— but there was no other option. What she did know for certain is that if he fell, she would catch him, even if it was the last thing she ever did. Her final act, then, would be to shield him and facilitate his escape. That would be enough.
She was quick and careful on her way down. Vanessa held the ladder steady as Michael extended one shaking leg, then another, then began to lower himself carefully. Metal rattled. Wind howled. From the ground, she saw his knuckles turning white each time his grip adjusted.
Faster, she urged him silently. We’re almost there. If they were discovered now, what would happen? Vanessa could picture their father appearing in Michael’s bedroom window, callous and unaffected, and pushing the ladder away from the house as calmly as one might pull into a parking spot or do the dishes. Hurting Michael meant nothing to him. If he fell – if he was pushed – Vanessa would stay and help him, because she refused to leave him behind again, and they would inevitably both be cornered. Her attempt at securing freedom would end with them both worse off.
No such thing happened. Michael reached the bottom in one piece, shivering but safe. Vanessa had to take several deep breaths before she could speak.
“I just need to collapse the ladder,” she said, still whispering, “and then my car is that way, just over a block or two.”
Michael just nodded, dazed. He swayed like a sleepwalker as she fumbled at the locks with frozen hands. There was a mechanism on either side of the rungs, midway up, that kept the ladder locked in place when used, and a rope on the backside to aid in extending and collapsing. With one lock disengaged, she propped it up with her shoulder, away from the house, and reached for the other lock with one hand and the rope with the other—
—only for the rope to shoot away from her grasping hand and the top half of the ladder to come squealing down at her, shrieking in the way only metal could. Vanessa gasped and jerked away as instinct kicked in: her mind conjured images of whirring gears and sharp spikes held back by tightly wound springs, ready to impale at a moment's notice. Without her support, the ladder fell back and scraped loudly against the siding.
A light flickered on upstairs.
Vanessa didn’t think. She grabbed Michael by the wrist and yanked him after her without looking back. Their feet pounded against the wet pavement. When he stumbled, she only pulled him upright and continued to drag him. He was injured – that much was clear in his hunched, heavy limp – but the only thing Vanessa wanted more than to stop and help him was to get him away from that house, to put him somewhere safe where he could live without having to endure the endless loop of terror and violence that their father inflicted upon him. She pushed herself to run faster, faster, heedless of the black puddles that appeared under her feet.
Just a little further, then around the corner, parked in the shadows between streetlights, sat Vanessa’s car, unlocked for fear of this very circumstance. They threw themselves inside with their soaking jackets and backpacks still on, and Michael had hardly slammed his door shut when Vanessa stepped on the gas. The engine stuttered, tires squealed, and they were off into the night.
For several minutes, the only sounds were the car humming, the rain buffeting the windows, and their short, heavy breathing. Vanessa took extra turns once they were free from the neighborhood, winding first through the city’s sparse excuse of a downtown before taking the back alley behind the strip mall; she was certainly no expert evasive driver like in the action movies she had seen growing up, but she ensured they were not being followed when they finally merged onto the highway. Michael sniffled a few times in the passenger seat.
“It’s about forty minutes to my apartment,” Vanessa said, if only to break the silence. “He doesn’t know where it is.”
“How do you know?”
Vanessa glanced sideways at him. “Because I’ve made sure of it. I’ve changed my last name and moved twice in the last year. And no one’s been following us.” It wasn’t the lighting in his room that made him look sickly, she decided. When she briefly turned one of the overhead lights on with the excuse of looking for a tissue, his face illuminated to reveal shadowed eyes and hollow cheeks and a split lip. There was a bruise at the corner of his brow, too, almost hidden by lank, greasy hair. He looked like– like a hostage, or some sort of prisoner of war.
“How bad did it get after I left?” she asked before she could stop herself. They both flinched.
Michael drew his knees to his chest and turned away from her. “It doesn’t matter. You don’t want to know, anyway.”
“Of course I do!”
“Why, you need something else to feel bad about?” he hissed over his shoulder, venomous. “Need to know exactly how much of a hero you’re being? Too bad. It doesn’t matter.”
But it does, she wanted to say. It mattered because she wanted to help him. It mattered because he was her brother and she loved him. When he hurt, she wanted to know how to fix it.
She let it lay. Michael leaned his head against the window and closed his eyes.
Bit by bit, Vanessa found herself soothed by the endless pattering rain and the methodical squeaking of the windshield wipers. For the first time all night, she was able to breathe easily, without fear freezing her heart. The immediate threat was over. She could finally go home and sleep with the knowledge that Michael was safe under her (rented) roof, and she could take care of him, and… Ah, there was the issue of employment. Vanessa was run physically and emotionally ragged between her two jobs already; usually the only thing that got her through the long work week was that she was doing this all so she could afford to support Michael, whenever she was able to get him. Her motivation would be the same, now, with the future tense stripped from it. Present and urgent. Maybe, she figured, he would be able to find some part time work. It would be good for him. Keep him busy, give him a reason to be out and about.
Give him more opportunities to be found.
Vanessa adjusted her sweaty grip on the steering wheel. There was no need to think like that. She had to cut it off now. If she let herself, she would start to spiral, imagining cops at her door and her fathers smug face and being separated from Michael, again, but for no greater purpose this time. Thunder rolled in the distance.
The shitty three-story apartment complex Vanessa called home sat midway down one of the few hills in town, meaning her first floor unit was essentially half underground. It had peeling siding and cheap windows that had to be sealed with duct tape in the winter. What could best be described as a concrete trench had been dug on one side to give her a window that sunlight only managed to reach once in a blue moon. Her upstairs neighbors, to her best estimations, liked to coat their hands in butter and juggle bowling balls in the middle of the night, and the ones in the unit next to hers, who she shared a wall with, were a couple who fought at all hours of the day. Washing anything at all was a pain; there was no in-unit laundry, the shower was prone to turning suddenly freezing, and she’d stopped using the dishwasher after finding mold in it. The parking, at least, was convenient and free.
Michael had fallen into a doze on the highway. When she roused him, he blinked groggily at her before his eyes widened.
“Holy shit,” he said. “That wasn’t a dream.” His eyes grew wider still, and the corners of his mouth turned down.
Vanessa rushed out to open his door and coax him inside before he could freak out. “It’s alright,” she murmured, taking his cold hands. He still had his backpack on. “Let’s get inside, get you into something warm, okay?”
He rose from the car with no small amount of difficulty, and doubled over, groaning, as soon as he tried to stand on his own. When Vanessa rushed to support him, Michael tried to bat her away but let her wrap an arm around his shoulders when he sagged against the slick car and almost sank to the pavement. Like the world’s most inefficient three-legged race, they hobbled together to Vanessa’s doorstep. Michael slumped further against her in the mere seconds it took for her to unlock the front door.
Inside, they staggered down the short, narrow hall, past the bathroom and Vanessa’s sparse bedroom. Michael wrenched away as soon as he saw her living room couch – ancient, picked up for free off the street in the nearby college town – and dropped his backpack with a dull splat before collapsing onto it. His breathing was heavy again.
Vanessa scooped the backpack hesitantly from the floor, then reconsidered and set the one she carried beside it. She wanted nothing more than to reach out to him. He was in pain, with a hand pressed to his ribs, and surely, surely, there was something she could do to help.
“What did he do to you?” It was the wrong thing to ask, and she knew it, but, once again, it slipped out before she could help it.
“Nothing I wasn’t dealing with fine on my own before you made me sprint two blocks in the middle of the night,” he spat. “I told you, it doesn’t matter.”
She bristled. Anger rose in her chest, all hot and bitter, the kind that swelled until it frightened her. He should be relieved— happy, even! Instead, Michael made it sound like she had done him some sort of huge disservice. Like she had interrupted his perfect night to steal him away from his doting father and make him run laps in the rain for the sake of it. As if.
Vanessa waited to speak until her heart no longer pounded in her ears. When she could look at him without wanting to punch the wall, she said shortly, “Change into something dry. That’s the bathroom, that’s my bedroom if you need to borrow anything. You can take my bed. I work early, so I won’t be here when you wake up. Oh, there’s a toothbrush on the counter in the bathroom for you.”
He muttered something that might have been thank you or fuck you, and they left each other to their own devices in stony silence. Michael pilfered her room for a pair of sweatpants while Vanessa put together a small lunch for herself. Vanessa moved her alarm clock to the coffee table while Michael changed in the bathroom. They danced around each other without speaking until, separately, they settled down to trade their restless pacing for fitful dreams.
Sleep was almost impossible for Vanessa, knowing that she would be back on her feet in a matter of hours. She rolled over on the couch, then rolled back, then kicked at her blanket until her socked feet were free. Really, there were definitely things she would be better off doing than trying and failing to sleep. The local laundromat was open 24/7. She could dry Michael’s soaking clothes and do the laundry she’d been putting off, and maybe sit down and read while she was waiting; she was so preoccupied with planning her rescue mission that it had been a minute since she’d been able to focus enough to read. Wouldn’t that be nice? A date with a book on a rainy night…
By the time the sun came up, Vanessa was already out the door. Her zombie-like trance didn’t allow her much room for thinking, but she was at least able to leave a note for Michael and make sure he was sleeping soundly.
Left for work. My shift is over at 3:30, so I’ll be back around 4. Help yourself to whatever food you can find (I’ll go grocery shopping on Monday) and please call me if you need anything. I have a first aid kit under the bathroom sink if you need it.
—Nessa :)
She left her work’s phone number at the bottom and taped it to the wall across from her door. That would have to do it. There wasn’t really anything else she could have done, she told herself as she drove, without waking him up.
In the early morning light, Vanessa’s anger at her brother felt meaningless. She wasn’t doing this for the sake of gratitude, or for any sort of reward; she did it because she loved him, no matter how hard their father tried to beat the love out of them, no matter how badly Michael pretended he succeeded. This was not something he owed her for. If he wanted to be difficult about it, fine. Her love had no conditions.
But her day to day happiness most certainly did. Vanessa clocked in five minutes late because she almost fell asleep in the parking lot and spent five more minutes being berated for it by the manager who kept them purposefully understaffed. (The manager who, by his own admission, hired exclusively young women who he thought would bring in more tips.) After that she had to put on the stupid apron that always smelled like steamed milk and get ready to spend the day being berated by customers, most of whom refused to hide how they looked down on her, for minimum wage. It was not what she would call a career, nor was it a job she held because it was particularly fun or fulfilling. The money wasn’t great, either, but in combination with her work at the restaurant, it was enough.
How pathetic, she always thought when the shifts got too strenuous, that this was how she was spending her early twenties: breaking her back working overtime at a cafe on weekdays and a restaurant on weekends, desperately lonely, terrified of being found by her father. For a girl who graduated valedictorian, she was the picture of wasted potential.
Vanessa tried not to let herself become resentful. One of the regulars – who she and her fellow baristas called Creepy Barney – wouldn’t stop flirting with her, so she poured him decaf shots when no one else was looking. When she remembered that tomorrow was Saturday, meaning she opened here again and closed at the restaurant, she tried to envision how much she would make in tips, and how that could be spent on, potentially, two pairs of new shoes for Michael— and, if it was really busy, she could justify buying herself wine that wasn’t bottom shelf. Unlikely, that last bit, but fun to fantasize.
(She tried not to let herself think about Uncle Henry and the way he’d been consumed by liquor after Charlotte’s death. How drinking to cope turned into something he couldn’t get through the day without. It made him dull and vacant and messy and erratic in a way that frightened her, and it got worse, and worse, until her father had to take him to the hospital. The whole time, he swore up and down that he didn’t have a problem.)
On her break, she sat on the curb out back next to the dumpster, shivering, and watched the meadowlarks search for worms. What was once an abandoned parking lot had been long since overrun by tall grass and spiky shrugs, which birds flocked to after rain passed through and the earth under the cracked pavement grew soggy. Vanessa propped her head up in her hand and inhaled deeply. Petrichor was a vocabulary term she’d learned once upon a time; she could smell it now, earthy and fresh, below the acrid tang of her coworker’s cigarette. Caroline offered her one, but Vanessa turned her down, and her allotted fifteen minutes were over by the time she changed her mind.
Her manager kept her five minutes longer than she was scheduled, which, while annoying, was expected. She clocked out, hung that gross apron, and finally let her hair down. At the very least, it felt good to be done for the day. She swiped her free drink for the day – plain iced coffee that she could save in the fridge – and decided that now was a good time to swing by the gas station convenience store across the street. Michael would need something easy for dinner tomorrow, since she wouldn’t be home until very late, and she could go for an energy drink.
She frequented it enough to be chatty with most of the employees, but she brightened considerably when she spotted Mike through the windows, looking scruffier than usual with his eyes half shut and his head propped up in his hand. Vanessa didn’t know him, not really, but they made small talk often enough since they were often at each others’ work. He was her age, working instead of pursuing higher education, and he had recently become the primary caregiver for his very young sister. He was nice, too, in a simple way that made sense to her. His kindness came without expecting anything back. Sometimes he slipped an extra pack of gum into her bag, or “accidentally” gave her a couple extra quarters when he handed over her change. When she asked if it would get him in trouble, he waved her off and joked about how he’d probably be fired soon enough anyway, in a tense way that told her to leave the matter be.
Vanessa couldn’t quite place it, but he seemed a lot like her. Worn to the bone and working hard for someone else’s sake.
He jerked upright when the bell rang to announce her entrance. “Hey, Vanessa,” he greeted, doing a decent job at pretending he hadn’t just been half-asleep on the job.
“Hey.” The store was small enough for them to chat easily as she wandered. “Been quiet in here today?”
Mike snorted. “What gave you that impression?”
“All the customers raided us instead.” She inspected rows of instant noodles. “Plus, I saw you sleeping.”
“I wasn’t sleeping!” he protested immediately. His voice cracked.
“Oh, I’m sure.” Vanessa selected something relatively simple in terms of ingredients, then paused and grabbed a spicy version of the same thing. She picked her favorite energy drink and set her selections on Mike’s counter.
“You doing anything fun this weekend? I’m – you’ll never guess – working.” Mike rolled his eyes as he scanned and fiddled with the register. “My boss threatens to fire me every day and then begs me to take extra hours. I mean, I’ll take ‘em, but I’m not happy about it.”
“God, I know. I’m…” She hesitated. Paranoia, almost comforting in its familiarity, washed over her. “I’ve got family visiting,” she said vaguely. “My brother.”
Mike took it in stride. “Cool. Older or younger?”
“Younger, but only by a few years. He just turned eighteen.”
“Hey, good for him. He can vote now, really make a difference and all that.” They laughed together as Mike handed over her purchases. Then, he said something that threw her completely off guard: “Tell him I said hi.”
Tell him I said hi. That meant they were friends, right? Mike considered himself Vanessa’s friend, or at least close enough to be someone she mentioned in passing.
She fought back a stupid smile. “Yeah. I– I will. See you around?”
“They’ve got me here literally all weekend.”
They waved goodbye, and Vanessa managed to contain her smile all the way to the car. That was permission if she’d ever heard it. Friends! Her and Mike were friends! She hadn’t really had friends since high school – and she did miss them, Natasha and Delilah and Katie and Josh, the ones who had helped her feel as normal as she ever could – so the prospect thrilled her more than it probably should.
She was in a much better mood when she returned home than when she left it. As much as she hated it, she had to begrudgingly admit that talking to people could, sometimes, be revitalizing.
“I’m back,” Vanessa announced as she locked the door behind her and toed her shoes off. That the only reply was silence did not disturb her: what did was finding her brother on the kitchen floor with his back against the cabinets, fingers curled in his hair. He was crying, all short, sharp sobs like he couldn’t catch his breath.
Her bag was abandoned before she could process what she was seeing. Instinct drove her to his side: he was hurt, he was bleeding, Dad got to him again, he must have. She had to do something.
“Michael?” Vanessa’s hands flitted over his shoulders, wanting to comfort but afraid to startle him. “Hey, hey– What happened? Are you hurt?”
When she touched his arm, as light as she could, he jerked away and dug his fingers harder into his scalp. “He’s here! I– I keep hearing him! I hear him calling for me outside, and then he bangs on the door, and s-sometimes he’s in the hall, but then he’s gone. I don’t– I don’t know— The door’s always locked when I check, and so are the w-windows, but—”
A cold pit opened up in Vanessa’s stomach. “Slow down.” There was no need for clarification. Who he was had never been more obvious. Desperate to stay calm in spite of the roaring in her ears, she asked slowly, “The door stayed locked all day, but you heard him inside?”
“Yes!” he sobbed. “He’s so angry, he’s going to kill me, he’s really gonna do it—”
“I need you to breathe.” Vanessa held her hands out for him to take. He was uncomfortably close to hyperventilating. “He’s not here. Michael, please, let me help you.”
He smacked her hands away and pressed himself back into the cabinets. “No! Whenever you try to help, you only make things worse. I shouldn’t have left!” He repeated it to himself, over and over and over: I shouldn’t have left, I shouldn’t have left, I shouldn’t have left, I shouldn't have left—
The accusation cut deeper than Vanessa ever could have prepared herself for.
In lieu of replying, or simply sitting, frozen, and revealing that it took the wind out of her, she fetched him a blanket from the couch and wrapped it around his shoulders. She fetched a glass of water and set it at his feet. She sat close enough for him to reach, but far enough to stay out of his personal space.
I wish I knew how to help you, Vanessa thought. I wish I’d helped you sooner. I wish he’d never hurt you. I should’ve sheltered you with my own body each time.
Vanessa waited. As his desperate heaving died down to shallow wheezing, she wondered if this was something he dealt with often. Michael had always been a strange kid, not unlike Charlotte, who saw things that weren’t there, heard things that no one else could hear. Their father had always ignored it, to Vanessa’s knowledge, but she worried that it would escalate, or prove indicative of a larger problem. This must have been the escalation: Michael, left alone, hallucinating to the point of fearing for his life.
She nudged the glass of water toward him, but Michael shook his head. “My stomach hurts,” he muttered.
“You didn’t tell me what happened,” Vanessa said tentatively.
“Dad kicked the shit outta me. Surprise, surprise.”
“What?” She leapt up to get him an ice pack— a bag of frozen peas wrapped in a dish towel. “Are your ribs– are they broken? Just bruised?”
He snorted. “How would I be able to tell?”
“If you heard them crack, or—”
“Sorry I wasn’t paying attention to the sounds my ribs were making when I thought I was finally being beaten to death,” he snapped, and Vanessa wanted to cry. “What, do you want me to report the number of kicks, too? Want to know about the bookend he hit me with?” He jabbed a finger at the bruise marring his brow.
Vanessa did cry, then. She couldn’t help it. As she knelt at his side and handed him the ice pack, she whispered, “I’m so sorry.”
Michael took it and slipped it under his hoodie. All of his energy, all the fear and adrenaline, had vanished, melted away and replaced with exhaustion. “I probably deserved it, anyway.”
“Absolutely not.” Vanessa rose again. “Come on. You’re on bedrest until you can move without making that face.”
“I’m not making a face,” Michael protested, but when Vanessa helped him up his expression contorted in the exact way she meant: brow furrowed, nostrils flared, jaw tight. In pain and expecting more. He let himself be corralled to the couch, and didn’t stop making that face until he was settled on the couch and propped up with pillows.
They fought over painkillers while Vanessa searched the fridge for something to supplement their Kraft dinner. She insisted he take one, just one, and he refused until she abandoned her search – there was nothing, anyway – to stand over him with one in hand, unmoving. This, at least, was one thing that hadn’t changed: Michael would not take small, simple steps to ease his pain, but Vanessa had a stubborn streak just like he did. There weren’t many things for which Vanessa wanted to thank her father for, but she supposed that if she had to choose one, it would be her inherited stubbornness. She could stand toe to toe with her brother for as long as either of them wanted to, and then some.
But she learned, too, when not to force things. Upon moving out and living alone for the first time, she’d had to reconcile with the fact that her grip on things like health and her own body and everything, really, was tenuous at best. Life without her father’s regimented routine was much more difficult than she anticipated, but not in the ways she expected. Instead of struggling with budgeting and bills and taxes, the things she found most difficult were mundane: feeding herself, getting out of bed in the morning, sleeping through the night. A bit of a miserable existence, maybe, but Vanessa wasn’t one to back down in the face of adversity, so she held herself at a metaphorical gunpoint to get them done. They started mild – Get up and go to work, or you’ll never be able to help Michael – but inevitably spiraled, and soon reminders of her mission warped into If you don’t get out of bed right now, Michael will die. She figured it was probably a terrible way to think, but it worked.
Those were things she was able to force. Banging her head against the same issue only succeeded when it was something that wouldn’t hurt her, and food was not one of those things. She was acutely aware of how awful it was to be made to eat when the very idea of food made you miserable; inflicting that on Michael was not something she ever wanted to do, especially when it would only be repeating their father’s casual heartlessness.
They sat on the couch for dinner – macaroni and cheese with only half the packet of powdered cheese, because Michael didn’t like too much – and flipped through channels on Vanessa’s shitty secondhand television until they found something that wouldn’t bore them both to tears. She helplessly watched Michael push food around his bowl for half an hour before she spoke up. “Aren’t you hungry?”
“No.”
“Did you eat anything today?” The guilty sideways flash of his eyes was all she needed as an answer. “You need to eat something.”
He glared at her, eyes shadowed heavily in the flashing light of the TV, but scooped up one small bite and ate it with noticeably difficulty.
Better than nothing, she supposed. It had to be. She took the bowl when he pushed it away, all petulant, and covered it in plastic wrap and put it in the fridge so it wasn’t wasted. Years of experience told her he wouldn’t reheat it later, but that was fine. She could bring it to work in spaghetti-stained Tupperware.
Work— Oh, god. Vanessa remembered two important things with a start: not only was she effectively working a double tomorrow, but this had only been her first day with Michael. Already, her head was foggy and her eyelids threatened to drift shut. Exhaustion weighed her limbs down. She was supposed to do this every day for the foreseeable future? It felt, suddenly, pointless. When she sat back on the couch and the old, worn cushions cradled her, Vanessa asked herself what the end goal of all this was. Freedom, yes, but there had to be more than that; she wouldn’t consider herself free if she spent her days only scraping by, fighting for normalcy. There had to be more.
Vanessa glanced to her right. Michael looked as tired as she felt. It was easy to look at him now and see, instead, the tiny little boy she grew up with, who moved silent as a ghost and rarely spoke and hid behind that plastic Foxy mask. That boy lived in him still. It was him who stretched out his legs to rest them in Vanessa’s lap, even though it pained him, him who relaxed under her touch when she rested her hands on his shins. Everything was to secure a future for Michael.
“Hey.” During a commercial break, she tapped his knee. “I’m working extra tomorrow, and I won’t have time to come home between shifts, so I’ll be back late— after ten, probably.”
“Hm,” he said.
“I’ll leave the restaurant’s number for you if you need it, since I’ll be there starting at three. And got some noodles for you, something really simple, so you better eat, okay? Okay?” When he reluctantly muttered an agreement, she added, “And I don’t work on Monday, so I can get you some new shoes then.”
“Do you know what size shoe I wear?”
Vanessa hesitated. “No.”
Michael just snorted.
“Helpful, thanks.”
This was going to take a while to get used to.