Starting Point (25 page)

“We did say we were in no hurry, Mom.”

“You just need to look,” she replied, shaking her head. “I get drink. Who want one?”

I shook my head. “No thanks. I’m fine. Yumi, you can bring all the wedding stuff over here,” I said. “I’ll look through it with you.”

She walked over to me and gently tapped my face. “One of my boys loves me.”

I laughed, Kira sighed and Sal shook his head.

“Look,” Claude called out. “He sat down!”

We all looked out into the yard, and sure enough, Oscar was now sitting down in front of Claude. Sal snorted, then signed, “Poor dog probably just got sick of standing up.”

* * * *

Before dinner, I took Claude back to the FC. We collected Ruby, and I took them to what would now be their new place with Gina. I only stayed for a few minutes, not wanting to overstep any boundaries, but wanting to know they’d be okay. It wasn’t easy to just leave them there, but it was better than leaving them on the streets.

Having Kira and Oscar at home was a good distraction. It gave me less time to think about the two kids who were spending their first night in a new place.

“Matt,” Kira said, kissing the side of my head. “I’m sure they’re okay.”

There was no point in trying to act like I didn’t know what he was talking about. “I know,” I sighed, resigned.

I was leaning against him as we sat on the sofa, and Oscar was dozing on the rug. Considering everything we’d been through—everything I put us through—somehow life had turned out okay.

I had Kira. He was my absolute rock, and I would be grateful for him, every day for the rest of my life.

“Talk to me,” he urged, tightening his arms around me.

“After everything I’ve done, all the pain I caused, I still have you,” I said. “I have you, and my job, and a house and some money saved. I mean, it’s not perfect, but life’s pretty damn good, yeah?”

“Yeah. It is.”

“What did they do?” I asked. “What did Claude and Ruby do to deserve the life they’ve got?”

“Matt, they didn’t
do
anything—”

“That’s my point,” I said, leaning up and looking at him. “It’s not fair. They’re just kids, they had no say in what happened to them. They didn’t choose their lives to be like that. They’re just trying to survive.”

Kira rubbed my arm and waited for me to continue.

“I don’t know,” I said, running my hand through my hair. “I fuck everything up and hurt a lot of people, and I still have everything I could want. Those kids never did anything wrong,
anything
, and they have nothing.”

“Matt, you can’t blame yourself for that.”

“I don’t blame myself,” I assured him. “But there’s no…” I searched for the right word. “Karma. There’s no karma.”

Kira laughed quietly, and pulled me back against him. “Oh, Matt,” he sighed. “You’re their karma.” He pressed his lips to my temple. “To each of those kids, you’re a whole lot of light in a pretty dark world.”

I wasn’t too sure about how much credence I gave to
that
, but Kira gave me a squeeze. A comfortable silence fell over us while we watched the TV, when a foul stench assaulted my nose. I almost gagged. “Jesus. Was that you?”

Kira sat up, pushing me off him. “It was you! Fucking hell, Matt. What did you eat today?”

Then Oscar yawned and stretched out on the rug on the floor, looking rather pleased with himself.

“Ugh, take him outside,” I whined. I ran to the bathroom and grabbed the air freshener, spraying it continuously as I walked back to the living room. Looking through the kitchen to the back door, I could see Kira. He was waiting for Oscar to do his business, and laughing at me while I fumigated the living room.

“He’s
your
dog when he farts like that,” I grumbled at him. “Not mine.”

Kira snorted out a laugh. “I think you can stop spraying that now.”

“I can still smell it.”

“Yeah, but now the house smells like some flowery shit
and
dog fart.”

I stopped spraying and read the label on the spray can. “It’s ocean breeze.”

“Okay, so it’s ocean breeze and dog fart.”

“Man, that stunk,” I said. “Whatever he ate, he’s never eating again.”

Kira brought Oscar back inside. The dog padded over to me, tail wagging with bright, happy eyes. I crouched down and gave him a pat. “Oscar, we have a rule in this house,” I said seriously. “Under no circumstances, ever, should an ass smell like that.”

* * * *

I was at the gym early the next day. We’d taken Oscar with us on our early morning jog. We’d taken him for a walk last night too, to give the house time to de-smell, so he was getting familiar with the leash. This morning, we jogged slow with him, making sure he didn’t freaked out.

Surprisingly, he’d taken it all really well.

Kira had bought him a bed, and bowls and food. And a list of things we’ll more than likely never use, but he was proud of his purchases. He’d set Oscar’s bed up in the corner of the living room and we’d had to leave a light on for him. “Just in case he gets scared,” Kira had said. “And we should probably leave our door open, just in case.”

“What if he sees us…doing stuff?”

Kira had grinned and spoken against my lips, “Then we better make it doggy tonight.”

I’d considered rolling my eyes, but thought his suggestion sounded pretty damn good. And the one benefit of having a deaf dog is that he can’t hear the noises that come from our bedroom.

“Hey, man, what’s got you smilin’?” Arizona asked, snapping me from my memories. I hadn’t realised I was smiling.

“Nothing much,” I told him. “Life’s just good right now, that’s all.”

Arizona grinned a wide toothy grin. “It sure is,” he said.

“We got ourselves a dog yesterday. He’s a beauty.”

Arizona’s eyes lit up. “That’s cool.”

“How’s your growing family?”

“Oh, man. It’s so good. My girls are so beautiful.”

It was so good to see him so happy. He’d had such a hard life—he used to earn cash in underground cage fights—and here he was with a full-time job, full benefits, a wife and daughter he adored and another baby on the way. And I was proud to think I had a helping hand in that—not the wife or baby, obviously. The job, the new life.

“What the fuck are you two smilin’ at?” Boss barked at us. “We got a world of shit to do and you two are standin’ there like circus clowns.”

I burst out laughing, which just seemed to irritate Boss even more. “Oh, come on, Boss,” I said. “You love us.”

Boss pointed his pen at me then shoved it in his mouth like it was a cigar. When he realised it wasn’t, he ripped it out of his mouth and pointed it at me again. “I will beat your sorry ass.”

I looked at Arizona, and with a straight face, said, “I think he’s coming on to me.”

Arizona busted up laughing and Boss’ face was hysterical. It went a high blood pressure kind of purple and a vein pulsed down his forehead. He took two quick steps towards me, and a still-laughing Arizona pushed me towards my office.

Boss was still cursing at me as he stalked off to his office, and I was
still
laughing when Claude and Ruby came in.

“Here they are!” I said as they walked over to me. “How was your first night at Gina’s?”

“How’s Oscar?” Claude asked excitedly. “I told Ruby all about him. Why didn’t you bring him? Did you leave him at home all by his self? What if he gets scared, or lonely?”

I put my hand up, like I was directing traffic. “Stop. Oscar is just fine. Kira bought him a whole store full of chew toys and food and everything you can imagine. We took him for a run this morning and when we left for work, he was yawning on his bed.”

“Oh,” Claude said, deflated. “I was hopin’ you’d bring him.”

“I can’t bring him here.” Then I repeated my question, “So tell me, how was your first night at the house?”

“‘S’okay,” Ruby said. “Didn’t sleep much. We shared with other kids, so I put Claude in my bed so she could sleep.”

I gave Ruby a knowing smile. I felt sorry for this kid. He was trying so hard to look after his kid sister, but I was sure he was taking the steps to ensure a better life for the both of them.

“The other kids don’t like us much,” Claude said.

“I’m sure they’re just getting used to you. Give ’em a day or two and they’ll be fine. Did you have breakfast?” I asked. All I could hope for was a warm, dry bed and at least one or two meals a day for these kids.

“Yeah, toast. It was okay,” Claude said. “Gina said she gets free bread from some shop. It’s two days old, but she says when it’s toast you can’t tell.”

I would guess a local house that looks after kids with little to no funding would take whatever freebies they could get. “Go make yourself a hot chocolate, squirt. I’ll be in in a sec.”

When she’d gone through my office door, I clapped Ruby on the shoulder. “You okay? You look tired.”

“I’m okay,” he said. “Claude was all excited about your dog.”

“She named him,” I said.

Ruby smiled. “She said that.”

“How about we see Arizona and tell him nothing too extensive today, hey? Maybe just some technical stuff and then some schoolwork?”

Ruby shrugged. “I’m all right.”

“I don’t want you burning out. It’s okay to have a low-key day every now and then. Not every day has to be full on and you’re exhausted, Rube. I don’t want you thinking it’s all too hard. It’s not too hard, okay? We’ll just do something less physical today, that’s all.”

Ruby nodded. I was pretty sure he would have agreed if I’d just told him I wanted him to hit the cross-trainer for four hours straight. This kid was tough and he held his cards close to his chest. I just didn’t want him to think what we were doing here, with his training and schoolwork, was too hard and a life running drugs was easier.

I spent a few hours at work then headed for my appointment with Tamara. I told her about Oscar, and when I mentioned that he was deaf, I expected a barrage of questions and psycho-babble about me needing to rescue and fix everything, but she never did. She just smiled. I told her we’d found some accommodation for Claude and Ruby, and how I hoped it would be a permanent thing.

It was a fairly pleasant session with Tamara, which was a nice change. I didn’t feel like I was being crucified for every little decision, and it was actually productive. I wanted to tell her I thought maybe I was ready to cut back on our sessions to once a week, but it was something I wanted to talk to Kira about first.

I wanted his opinion, and what he felt in his heart.
I
felt like I was ready, but maybe those around me thought differently. I didn’t want to go making decisions that affected us without his input. That was a mistake I’d never make again.

I cabbed it back to the FC in time for my afternoon sessions with the kids. It was a good turnout—twelve kids in all. Kira got there when we were about half way through, and he quickly stepped in to help me teach the kids. We were almost done, when a familiar, but unexpected face came in.

Father Michael.

He scanned the open floor area of the gym, and when he spotted me and the kids in the far corner, he smiled. He stood against the wall near my office door and watched us go through movements and exercises with the kids. When we wrapped the lesson up, he came straight over and shook my hand. “Sorry I didn’t get back to you sooner. I only arrived back today and got your message.”

“Everything okay?” I asked.

“Oh sure,” he said. “I often head over to Saint Xavier’s and help out. We all do our part.”

“We do,” I agreed.

“You’re running a good little class here,” he said. “The kids seem to love it.”

“They do,” I said. “I’m proud of these kids. It’s not easy for some, but they still keep turning up.”

Kira put some floor mats up against the wall. “Kira, I’d like you to meet Father Michael. He’s the pastor I told you about at the church down the road.”

Kira smiled and shook his hand. “Nice to meet you.”

“Father Michael, this is Kira. He’s my boyf—” I stopped short and corrected myself. “He’s my fiancé.”

The pastor was surprised, but then he smiled. “Nice to meet you too.”

Kira shot me a quick glance, probably for admitting we were gay to a pastor. “Matt’s told me that you offered to help with advice.”

Father Michael smiled. “Yes, but looking at the good work he does here, I doubt there’s much he could learn from me.”

“Well, I dunno about that,” I said. “I’m just giving these kids something to look forward to, and hopefully teaching them a few things as well.”

Father Michael rocked back and forth on his toes and looked around the gym. He seemed uncomfortable.

“Look,” I said. “I hope I’ve not offended you, but I won’t lie. And I won’t deny who I am, or what Kira means to me, so—”

Father Michael smiled and put his hand on my arm. “I’m certainly not offended. God’s house has many rooms, my friend. We’re all welcome.”

His response surprised me. I’d expected to be on the defensive. “Oh.”

He laughed. “No, I was just looking around. This really is a great facility you have here. And all these kids,” he said, nodding to the remaining few, “you teach them?”

“Yep. Fitness and health. I run through some self-defence, a bit of boxing, but it’s mostly for fitness. I also teach about drug awareness. I’ve had clinic nurses and health professionals come in and talk to them and show them pictures of what drugs do to their bodies. I’ve got my first lot of kids lined up with the local community college and have four of them getting their high school diplomas. We’ve combined school and MMA classes so the next step will be, when they’re old enough, scholarships for college.”

Just then, Ruby and Claude came over. “Here’s my star. Rueben here is gonna blitz them, in the classroom and in the cage. You’ll be on the UFC list soon, won’t ya, Ruby.”

The kid gave me a half smile, and Claude looked up to her big brother with pure admiration. “We’re headin’ off,” Ruby said. “Gina’s got a curfew, apparently.” He rolled his eyes.

“Need a lift?” Kira asked.

“Nah. We’re good. See ya’s tomorrow.”