FIGHT (4 page)

“Okay, I’ll go, and you don’t have to worry about me ever coming back.  But I want the same from you.  Don’t you ever, don’t you dare ever step foot in my home again.  Because if you do, I’ll catch you next time.  I’ve installed security cameras that you’ll never find, I’ve got a new alarm system, and my neighbors have all seen pictures of you.  You’ll never get away with this again.”  She wondered how he’d gotten away with it this time. 
How the hell do you kill a dog in a high-rise without someone noticing its cries of pain?

With great relief, Bruce closed their home’s heavy oak door as she left.  He always answered when he heard a visitor.  Mormons, girl scouts, didn’t matter.  If someone knocked, he answered.  Even suspecting a confrontational visit such as this one hadn’t changed him. 
Frightened people don’t answer their doors and pretend not to be home, and I’m no frightened person.
  He would’ve answered his door even if Sara had dispatched an angry boyfriend to confront him.  But he had to admit, it was nice to finally close his door.

“It’s over, Martha.  August will live with someone else now.”

“You don’t know that.  We don’t know that.  It may be over insofar as Sara’s concerned, but she’s just one social worker among many in this city.  We can work around her.  It’ll take time, and we might have to work with a new adoption agency, but that’s what our lawyer’s for.  We need to talk to him.  He’ll believe us when we tell him that you didn’t do anything to her home.  He’ll figure something out.”

“No, Martha, it’s truly over.  I don’t have the energy to fight two battles at once.  I’m spreading myself thin trying to prosecute Gabriel Adelaide.  I don’t have the strength to wrestle with social services too. I…” he stopped.  The urge hit him.  The urge to instantly relieve himself hit him on the spot, midsentence.  Bruce’s ulcerative colitis was an inflammatory bowel disease worsened by stress, and the encounter with Sara had been very stressful.  He barely made it to the toilet on time.  On the john and relieved that he hadn’t soiled himself, he thought,
Maybe it’s for the best.  I do have shitty health.  Haha!
He weakly smiled. 
Let the kid live with someone younger, someone healthier.
 

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D.A. Investigated for Home Invasion.  The headline was the story.  Gina Ringer read the article in the metro section, after being alerted to it by her husband of thirty-three years, Bill.  She read it with the same disapproving silence that Bill had read it with.  It was that lawyer guy who was trying to adopt August.  He’d gone crazy when he found out that the adoption had fallen through.  He’d broken into Sara’s home, and he’d made quite a mess.  It didn’t matter that the
Boston Times
also said that the investigation was still underway and that no one had been arrested yet.  That lawyer guy was already guilty in their eyes.  They knew Sara, because they were August’s current foster parents.  They’d never liked the idea of August leaving their home, and so they’d never liked the Hudsons.  As a foster child, August netted them $500 a month, and there weren’t many sources of income as effortless as babysitting a child too scared to move.  Sara, ever the optimist, had been wrong to tell Bruce that it would take a lot of get-up-and-go to watch August.

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Two weeks later, on the day Gabe’s trial concluded…

August was in bed at 6 in the evening.  He was always eager to go to bed early, despite needing hours to fall asleep.  His self-imposed 6 o’clock bedtime and his extreme shyness meant that he needed little supervision.  The kid barely played.  And when he did, it was with great concern.  He colored, but he was scared while coloring.  He watched TV, but he was scared while watching.  Most of his time passed with constant fear.  No matter what he did, petting the Ringers’ calico cat, tying his shoes, picking his nose, he stayed scared.  He kept waiting for a drunk to kick the front door down and find him.  He jumped at every noise, and he never got used to anything.  He couldn’t calm down, he struggled to sleep, and he never relaxed.  He took a dose of Adavan that most adults would’ve found potent, and he still couldn’t relax.

Clutching Zoggy, his green zebra, August talked to God, as he lay staring at his bedroom’s ceiling. 
God
, he prayed,
don’t let it be tonight.  Don’t let it happen tonight. 
It didn’t matter that he’d seen his father die.  He was still scared that his father would bolt into his bedroom to kill the last Middleton left. 
I’ll be a good boy
.
  I’ll do better at kindergarten next time. 
He knew that repeating kindergarten wasn’t normal, and he felt stupid, but trying harder seemed like all he had to bargain with for God’s protection. 
If you don’t let anyone get me tonight, I’ll be sooooo good tomorrow.  I promise.  And Zoggy
says that he loves you, God.  Zoggy says that he loves you this much.
(He stretched his arms out to their greatest length, holding his stuffed animal in his right hand.)
And Zoggy misses mommy-in-heaven, and Zoggy loves mommy-in-heaven.  Tell mommy-in-heaven Zoggy loves her.
 

In the midst of his fear, a warm feeling told him God liked his prayer.

God and Zoggy kept August company.  They were the kind of friends he liked. They were quiet, and they didn’t scare him.  They also didn’t laugh at him for having to repeat kindergarten.  God and Zoggy knew about mommy-in-heaven, and they didn’t mind.  They never made fun of him for not having parents, unlike some of his classmates.  God and Zoggy would be with him regardless of which home he went to next.  They’d been with him before he lived with the Ringers, and they went everywhere with him.  To school, to counseling with his therapist, and on any errands Gina included him on. 

Also keeping August company that night, though no one knew it, was a nondescript sedan with Luke Espinoza inside, parked across the street and five houses down from the Ringers’ house.  Luke’s last assignment had been murdering Mulberry and Bronston to ensure their continued silence at Gabe’s trial, and tonight he was on a strange mission.  This was a first in his career.  He was supposed to find out what August wanted to play with and get it for him.  Why, he had no clue. In his many years as an associate, a guy officially employed by a Family, he’d never been charged with toy shopping for an orphan.  It made no damn sense.
What kinda cash could be involved in this operation?
he wondered.  As Luke sat with a cigarette in his lips, he retrieved a pair of Nikon binoculars from the glove compartment and used both hands to hone in on the Ringers’ place.  His binoculars were no use.  He’d hoped to find toys in the front yard so he could figure out what occupied the kid’s spare time.  That would’ve made things easy.  Spotting an old rusty bike leaning against the house would mean that he should buy the kid a new shiny bike.  Seeing a twelve foot trampoline in the backyard would mean that he should buy the kid a twenty foot one.  Figuring out what the kid wanted would’ve been a hell of a lot easier if he could’ve done it from his car.  With no clues in sight, he got out of his car, tossed his cigarette, crossed the street, and rang the Ringers’ bell.

“Who do you think that is?” Gina asked a snoring Bill, as he snoozed on the recliner in front of the 6 o’clock news.

She decided against answering the door.  Whoever was there would eventually leave.  But the doorbell was quickly followed by knocking, loud and impatient.  This annoyed her, as she was trying to catch the day’s top stories.  She tried once again to ignore the beckoning call of an overly zealous solicitor.  She chose to act as if no one was home, not caring that the TV’s noise and the Corolla parked in their driveway told a different story.  Sipping raspberry tea, her eyes widened as the doorbell started again, accompanied by even louder knocking and what sounded like shoes kicking the door’s bottom.  Disturbed, she set her tea on the coffee table and rose to answer the door.

“Alright!” she yelled, momentarily waking Bill.  “I’m coming already.”

“Good evening, ma’am.  I’m here to inform you that your household has been randomly selected to receive free toys from Kid’s Center,” Luke began, after the door swung open.

She eyed this stranger who’d nearly beaten down her door with a disapproving look. 
In addition to being rude
, she judged,
he also smells like smoke.
             

“We don’t have any kids, so off you go!”

“Well, ma’am,” Luke interrupted, catching the closing door with his foot, “I’m sure you know some kid who would enjoy a new toy.  Maybe a kid at church?  Or one in the neighborhood?  Or, say, a foster kid?”

“I just told you, we ain’t got no kids, and we don’t know any either.  Whatever you’re selling, we ain’t interested.”

“I ain’t sellin’ nothing.” 
Why’s she making this difficult?
 
I know there’s a kid in her life.  For God’s sake
, he thought,
I even know the kid’s name.
  “All I’m here to do is ask what free toys your kid wants from Kid’s Center.  Your household is the grand prize winner in our most recent contest, and your kid can have a ton of free stuff.  We’ll even deliver it for free.  All you have to do is tell us what toys to bring.”

Before she could lie again about not having any kids in her household, Luke reached into the pocket of his black sport coat and drew out an unlabeled white envelope, handing it to her.  She narrowed her eyes towards the outstretched hand offering her the envelope. 
Maybe if I take this flyer, or whatever’s in this envelope, this salesman will be content and hit the road
.  Tearing it open with a nonchalant sigh, her lack of interest evaporated when she saw what was stuffed inside.  Ten crisp $100 bills greeted her, with Benjamin Franklin’s sly look asking
Weren’t expecting me, were you? 
She counted the bills and then recounted them.  The guy had just handed her a thousand bucks for no apparent reason.

“Now will you tell me what the kid wants to play with?” Luke asked.

“What’s going on here?”

“Like I said, your household has been selected to receive free toys from Kid’s Central.  I mean, Kid’s Center.  All we need to know is what shit, I mean, stuff you want us to bring.”

Curious, August shyly peeked around the hallway corner, making his blonde hair and wide eyes visible to Luke.  August had heard the doorbell and the knocking, and he’d been paying attention to the conversation from his open bedroom door.  He didn’t like talking to strangers: he didn’t even like seeing them. Still, free toys sounded intriguing, and he thought Zoggy might like a friend.  A stuffed lion perhaps.  He summoned all the courage he could find and made his silent presence known to the man at the door, by quickly waving a timid arm in a “hello.”  He maintained his position of mostly hiding behind the corner, sporting a one piece pajama outfit that covered him from his shoulders to his feet with cats and dogs.  His blonde hair had a tussled bed look from resting on his pillow.  Luke, relieved to see evidence of a kid in this home, raised an eyebrow in August’s direction.  The killer and the kid made eye contact.  Seeing the man at the doorway looking beyond her, Gina turned and saw August.  She didn’t attempt to explain the discrepancy of August’s appearance in a childless home. 

She thundered at August, “Well, what do you want?  Huh? Speak up!  Don’t keep the man waiting.”

Hugging Zoggy tight to his whole body (the stuffed animal was nearly as big as he was), August mumbled something into Zoggy’s head that neither Gina nor Luke could make out. 

“August, we haven’t got all day!  Stop hiding in the hallway and tell the man what toys you want,” Gina ordered, putting the cash back in the envelope and stuffing it into her pants pocket.  If she had to put up with more clutter in August’s room to keep the thousand bucks, then he could have as many free toys as he wanted. 

Seeing that he was trying her patience and not wanting to anger her, August walked into full view of both adults and spoke in the tiniest of voices:

“Can I have a lion, please?”

“A lion!  Geez, kid, I can’t do that.  I’m here to bring you toys, not animals,” Luke guffawed. 

“He means a stuffed animal lion,” Gina corrected him, rolling her eyes.  “Guess you ain’t never had kids before.”

“Oh, gotcha.”  Luke admitted to himself that engaging kids wasn’t one of his strengths.  Killing their parents?  Yes.  Knowing what toys they wanted?  Absolutely not.  “Fine,” he went on, “what else do you want?”

“Make it quick, August!” Gina snapped.

“I don’t know… Could I have a fire truck too?  That’s all, please,” he said, finishing quickly so Gina couldn’t snap at him again.

“He means a toy fire…”

“Yeah, yeah, I got it this time,” Luke interrupted.  “Is that it?  That’s not a lot.  I was expecting you to have a list longer than my Malibu.  You want anything else?”

August shook his head no.  A lion and a fire truck were enough.  For a kid who rarely played, getting two new toys was better than winning the lottery.  It was almost too good to be true.  And it made up for the fact that Sara had forgotten to bring him the blocks that she’d promised. 

“Alright, give me twenty minutes, and I’ll be back with the stuff.” 

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Bruce didn’t want to call Sara.  He cringed at the thought of contacting someone who’d told him to stay away.  But if Gabe was up to something and August was involved, he had no choice.  After all, she was August’s social worker, and maybe she could clue him in on some recent events in August’s life.  
Maybe she knows what Gabe meant about getting me my boy
.  Besides, it was only fair that he bring her up to speed about a criminal’s interest in an orphan under her jurisdiction.  Plus, if he was lucky, maybe she’d come to believe that it was the mob that had broken into her home. 
If, that is, she believes anything I say at this point.
 

He cringed again at the thought of calling her, but concern for August’s safety required that he work with the chain of command to keep the little guy safe.  Thinking about calling Sara stressed him out.  His nerves began to buzz, and his stomach suddenly felt unsettled. 
Oh, no.  Dear, God, no
.  The stress activated his colitis.  Bruce, driving back from Stop and Go with his beer and pot pie, didn’t make it to the toilet this time.  He would toss out this pair of pants and boxers.  And Febreeze his Volvo.

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Conversation and knowing laughter wafted through the air, along with the smell of fresh pasta.  The usual faces were here, Gabe, his uncles Ronald and Michael, and a half dozen top associates.   The meeting was on.  Gabe was seated at the end of a restaurant table, facing the front entrance.  He was the first to see Luke Espinoza enter Gialovi’s Italian Eatery in a renovated part of Southie.  As Luke pulled up a chair at the Adelaides’ table, he changed the topic from Gabe’s acquittal to his most recent errand.

“I got the kid two toys.  A lion and a fire truck.”

“That’s all?” Gabe asked. 

“That’s all he wanted.  Seriously.  I asked if he wanted something else, and he said no.  So that’s all he got.”

A silent table of professional thieves chewed in anticipation of Gabe making something significant out of this news.  But his only response was:       

“What did the kid do then?” 

“Jesus, Gabe, how the hell would I know?  I just dropped the shit off and left.  I didn’t know I was supposed to make nicey nice and play with him.  The kid doesn’t say much, and it’s hard to tell what he does.  He took the stuff to his room when I brought it in, and I never saw him after that.  By the way, what’s up with this kid shit, Gabe?”

Indeed, what was up with this kid shit?  Ronald and Michael Adelaide wanted to know that as well.  The entire Family had heard of Gabe’s insistence on buying toys for a foster kid, and word had spread that Gabe had ordered the kid’s social worker’s condo trashed with a message that appeared to assist the Family’s nemesis, Bruce Hudson, in his adoption efforts.  What, pray tell, was Gabe doing messing around with the D.A.’s adoption of this kid?  All eyes focused on Gabe, awaiting the details of some rational scheme.

“I’m bored.  What can I say?  It’s not like there’s a lot going down in Southie these days.”

Surely there’s more to it than this,
everyone collectively thought.  When Gabe saw that his response was met with confused stares, he knew he had to say more: