by Tash McAdam
As he pushes his body through a series of punches that X demonstrates for them, Jason zones out. He finds himself remembering his dad teaching him how to throw a punch. He was around six years old. His dad took Jason’s small hand in his larger one and folded it into a fist. Talked him through the bits to hit. If you have to hit someone. If they make you. The places that will make them stop hitting you. Throat, eyes, solar plexus, nose. Stuff that crushes or breaks.
“Focus, kid.” X kicks Jason on the side of the knee, opening his stance up a little more. Jason shakes his head, willing himself to just be here, in the moment.
Sweat drips in his eyes, stinging. It feels better than crying.
Chapter Four
“Jason, get in here.” Ron, the care worker, leans his skinny body out of the office.
Shit.
“Got another call from the school today.” Ron sits down in an old wooden chair as Jason walks into the office.
Even if he’d wanted to, Jason can’t smile at Ron or try to come up with some charming excuse. Not when Ron has told him over and over that Becca died of an overdose. Told him that the police have looked into it and what they say must be right. Not when Ron has never once asked Jason why his nose was bloody or his shirt sleeve was ripped.
Ron tries, Jason knows. Ron has fourteen kids to look after. There’s not enough money, time or space for any of them. Jason usually cuts him a lot of slack for missing the obvious.
“Yeah?” he manages not to add, So what?
“You’re skipping.” Ron sounds a thousand years old.
“Obviously,” Jason replies. He places his hands on the wall behind him, digging his nails into the plaster.
“If you skip, you’ll get suspended,” Ron points out, like this isn’t the fifteenth time they’ve had this conversation.
“Yeah. And then I won’t have to go to school.” Jason doesn’t understand why they think this is a bad thing.
“You’ll end up in an alternative school if you keep going this way.”
Jason shrugs like he always does. What does it matter if they send him off to a school for losers and gang kids? He’s not exactly going to get a shot college.
Ron sighs and rubs his big nose. “Group starts in ten. You be there.” The or else hangs in the room for a minute. Jason’s not sure what the punishment for missing it would be, but he doesn’t want to change homes again. At least here he knows who to avoid and how to make sure they leave him alone. For the most part.
“Okay.” He slips out of the room before Ron can say anything else.
The shower’s being used, so Jason yanks off his T-shirt and wipes himself with it. He probably smells like sweat and old socks, but who cares? Group sucks, and Jason’s not going to pretty himself up for it. He probably won’t even talk. Yeah, that’ll piss Ron off. If he doesn’t even say anything. They can make his body be there, but they can’t make him talk.
Cheered by the thought of annoying everyone with silence, he changes quickly. Then he runs down the stairs, leaving his sweaty kit on the floor of his room. The only reason he’s got his own room is that if any of the other kids see him naked, his secret will be out. But the other kids think it’s special treatment for no reason. It made them hate him right from the start.
Group is held in the living area. When Jason enters, Ron is fighting with one of the Owen twins over the Xbox control. The room is packed full of grouchy, moody teens.
Derek is on the single unbroken armchair, while his crew fills out the beat-up old couch. Two beanbags hold five teens between them, sprawled out and comfortable with each other.
Jason heads for the space between the bookshelf and the corner of the room. He leans against the wall, deliberately choosing something to think about. Winning the lottery, he decides. Finding a scratcher on the street, unused. Not too much money—don’t get greedy. Enough to start a life when he ages out. Maybe a hundred grand. Yeah. That sounds perfect.
It works for the first twenty minutes. Ron asks everyone to share a good thing that has happened to them this week. Jason stays quiet, which gets a raised eyebrow, but Ron doesn’t press. Maybe he understands that nothing good happens to Jason anymore. Although that’s not strictly true.
If Ron had insisted, Jason would have said boxing. He could have said that he had a good time being in a space that smells like old sweat and shoes. That being in a place where everyone saw him as a man felt right. That beating up on an old bag, where the only thing he has to do is try, felt good.
After everyone except Jason has shared a good thing, Ron asks them to share a challenge. The usual “I did this hard piece of homework” or “I resisted the urge to” blah, blah and blah is boring. Jason completely zones out until he’s surprised out of his thoughts by Derek’s voice.
“I figured out who murdered Jason’s slutty sister.” Derek’s stupid toad face spreads in an ugly grin. He’s daring Jason to do something. Knowing he won’t. Knowing that he’s bigger, stronger and more dangerous than Jason. Everything Jason isn’t.
To his own surprise, Jason discovers he doesn’t care. Anger fills him, and suddenly he’s twenty feet tall and made of rock. He’s going to smash Derek’s evil face in. He throws himself out of his corner, kicking off the wall. The force slams him into Derek, knocking him right out of the armchair. Jason lands on top of him.
Around him the group bursts out in yells. Hands grab him, trying to pull him away or push him forward. Under Jason’s knees, Derek’s big chest fills with air. Jason swings for his face like he’s chopping wood, pow, pow, pow. His knuckles sting and split, but he can barely feel it. Then Derek’s fist explodes into his side. He feels that.
He’s thrown a few feet across the room, into the bookshelf. It shudders and drops a bunch of old paperbacks on top of him. Derek looms over him and lifts his leg. Jason tries to squirm away but gets a sneaker to the jaw. Pain bursts through his face, and his vision blurs.
Chapter Five
They have to drag Derek off Jason. It takes Ron plus two of the bigger boys. Jason’s whole body is screaming from the kicking and stomping before they manage it.
Ron calls an ambulance, because Jason can’t even sit up. His head feels like a rotten watermelon that’s about to burst open.
It’s not as bad as it could have been. Four stitches in his eyebrow, bruised ribs. Bruised everywhere. If Jason had been born with a dick, he’d probably have needed surgery. As it is, he just has a huge purple bruise spreading up the front of his thigh to his stomach. He doesn’t tell the doctor he’s injured there, barely even lets them look at his ribs. The pressure of eyes on him, seeing him as female, catching themselves on his pronouns. It all sucks worse than the pain. He gets some pretty good pills for it though. Ron holds on to them for him, which is just as well. They’ll go missing from his room within hours if he tries to keep them there.
Healing sucks. Ron makes him go to school the next day. His head hurts so much he feels sick. Ron drives up to the gates and takes him into the office. They have a brief and awful meeting with his vice-principal. Then Jason gets to spend the rest of the day being stared at by kids in the corridor. The black eye is more a black half face, true. But really, do they need to look quite that much?
He’s definitely too sore to exercise, but he walks over to the gym after school gets out anyway. Sunny, Preet and Lucky are all sitting on the raised concrete entrance, feet dangling over the edge.
“Ho, shit, man. What happened to your face?” Lucky says, clearly torn between impressed and disbelieving.
“Fight,” Jason replies shortly.
Lucky slips down from the platform and approaches, wrinkling his face in wonder. “Whoa.”
“Did you win?” Preet asks, staying put on the ledge even though Sunny drops down to join Lucky in looking at Jason’s damage.
“What does it look like? Jeez, get off, dude.” Jason ducks away from Sunny’s attempt to move his chin to inspect the bruises more closely.
He can’t see properly o
ut of his left eye, so hands on his shirt warn him too late. Lucky is behind him, pulling his shirt up, looking for bruises. Panic chokes him. Jason reacts without thinking, flinging his elbow back. It connects hard, and there’s a second thud a moment later.
Jason spins around, panting. His heart is pounding. He hates people touching him at the best of times. Right now, bruised and in pain? Shit.
Lucky’s looking up at him from the ground with a dizzy, confused expression. “Why did you hit me? And why are you wearing a bra?”
Jason almost laughs. To his horror, tears sting his eyes instead. He tries to reply, to make up some lie about it being a bandage for his ribs. Instead a sob bursts out of him. Suddenly he’s just outright crying. It hurts. It hurts his face and his chest and his bruised fists. He can barely see through the salty tears. A soft touch on his shoulder makes him flinch.
“It’s okay.” Sunny sounds calm and not at all embarrassed or angry that Jason is weeping, unable to stop. “It’s not a bra, Lucky. It’s a binder. Jase, it’s okay, bro. Don’t worry about it.”
The simple acceptance in Sunny’s voice makes Jason cry harder. The “bro” says Sunny knows but hasn’t changed his mind about maybe being friends. The relief Jason feels makes his whole body shake. Sunny just pats him on the shoulder again and waits for him to stop.
“What…?” Lucky says, confused.
“Shut up, Lucky.” Preet jumps down from the railing. “Let’s blow off training, guys. Get some ice cream.”
“Uncle Jay’ll kill me,” Sunny moans. Then he starts walking back toward the main street. Jason follows. Behind them, Jason can hear Preet hissing at Lucky. Lucky keeps trying to reply, but she talks right over him every time.
They end up in McDonald’s, having milkshakes and fries. Lucky dips his fries in the ice cream, which grosses out Jason enough that he finally stops shaking. He starts to feel more like himself again.
“Our cousin’s non-binary trans,” Sunny informs them while Jason’s got his mouth full and can’t reply immediately. “My uncle kicked them out, but we still see them sometimes. We’ve met some of their friends. Their boyfriend is a trans guy. So, like, we get it. It’s cool. You do you. No big.”
No big. Jason laughs and accidentally snorts ice cream up his nose. It’s freezing. And it feels like getting punched in the face all over again.
“Shit, that hurts so much, oh my god,” he gasps.
Everyone at the table cracks up laughing. But it’s not mean laughter. It’s something bigger and warmer than that. Preet’s jammed into the booth next to him, and she leans her knee against his. That’s warm too. Warm and solid and real.
The last person to touch Jason in a way that wasn’t violent was Becca. With Preet’s knee pressed into his leg, watching Sunny stealing Lucky’s fries, Jason forgets to be sad, or angry. Instead, he just is.
Chapter Six
It’s three weeks before Jason’s able to box again. He spends those afternoons—after attending school like a good little boy—on the benches, watching. Sometimes he teases the others in the group as they learn the basic stance and punches. They even get to actually face off against each other a bit.
Even without the training the others are getting right now, Jason thinks he’s still the best fighter of the bunch. At least he doesn’t have to pay while he’s on the bench. He was able to get four hundred dollars using Becca’s ATM card. It makes uncomfortable lumps in his shoes, but he doesn’t know where else to keep it.
The only good thing about Jason being bruised to hell and back is that Derek got kicked out of the group home. Even though Jason started the fight, Derek got in trouble with his social worker, and now he’s been bounced somewhere else.
When his bruises have healed, Jason can’t wait to get back to the gym. Excited to be fighting today, he whistles as he ducks into the small changing room. He kicks his sneakers off. He shoves them into the bag with his water bottle and clean shirt.
“Yo, good to see you back, kid,” X says as he pulls his shirt off, exposing a strong, hairless chest. He’s covered in thick black tattoos. “We got a tournament coming up next month. Figured you might want to take a shot at the Fish division. That’s the new trainees. Anyone who hasn’t competed before.”
“Uh, maybe,” Jason replies, grabbing his bag and heading back to the gym. He always changes into gear he can box in before he comes to the gym. One black T-shirt looks much like the next, after all. He still feels uncomfortable being in the changing room with someone else.
“You should think about it,” X calls after him. “You got quick fists and the temper for it.” He sounds a bit like he’s laughing.
Jason takes it easy, but he’s still dripping sweat and aching by the time the hour is up. Near the end of the training session the more experienced boxers start coming in. They stand by the walls and stretch. They also yell tips and curses at the teenagers working on the bags or each other.
It’s easy to notice that Jason gets more compliments than insults. By the time his group is let off the mats a ball of pride is sitting in his chest, glowing. Instead of going straight out the door, he goes into the office. Little Jay’s in there, doing some paperwork. He grins at Jason when he enters.
“Big Jay,” Little Jay says and points finger guns at Jason.
“I, uh, was wondering about the tournament thing,” Jason says. “What do I have to do?”
Little Jay gives him a long look. “You’re not hurting anymore?”
“Not really.” This isn’t exactly true. Especially his jaw. It’s still bruised. The light blows and padded gloves today stung a lot more than they should have.
“All right. I’ll let X know. See you tomorrow. Ice your face.” He smirks.
Jason does ice his face. He ices it while he pulls Becca’s boxes out from under his bed. Other people have obviously gone through them—the curse of not having locks on the door—but there is nothing missing. Jason has the contents memorized. And no one’s bothered taking the book from where Jason left it, in plain view on his bedside table. Jason often has books, library books mostly. Not even Derek has ever stolen or trashed those.
The photo of the gym, carefully flattened, is on top. Jason takes it out and looks at it, as he does almost every night. Then he pulls out the clippings one by one. There are eighteen of them. Eighteen girls, the youngest fifteen years old, the oldest twenty-seven. All missing. Never found. All of them last seen somewhere in East Van.
Jason has memorized their names too. But he goes back over them one more time. He wants to learn more. Tomorrow, in social studies, they have a block in the computer lab. For research. But Jason’s not going to be working on his history project.
Chapter Seven
True to form, the social studies teacher, Mr. Murti, doesn’t even check to make sure they’re on task. Jason picks a computer in the front. It’s near the teacher, which means no one else will sit next to him. The other students haven’t figured out that the front is the safest spot. If Mr. Murti ever does get up to check on them, Jason’s will be the last computer he passes on his way back to the desk. Plenty of time to switch browser windows.
Jason puts two Chrome windows next to each other. He pulls up a time line of global trans rights on one side. His history project is about human rights in the twenty-first century. He has enough info to convince anyone he’s been doing research.
His other window is private, for his other research. He googles the name of each girl in turn and makes notes of any new information. Nothing jumps out at him, but you never know. In the cop shows they’re always collecting as much information as possible. Some small thing could turn out to be the most important clue.
Only a few of the missing girls have any details about family left behind. Most are single, young, living on the fringe. The kind of girls whose disappearance wouldn’t really be noticed. Like Becca.
Except Becca has Jason. And he misses her like he’d miss a leg. He can feel her leaning over his shoulder. Kissing the t
op of his head and telling him that just because he’s her brother now doesn’t mean he’s not still the baby.
His eyes sting. Putting his memories of Becca away, Jason finishes up his notes and shuts down his computer.
The day drags by. Jason skips gym class, which he’s been doing since third grade. Everyone has pretty much given up on trying to make him go. He eats his lunch, alone, on the mostly empty D-block corridor near the metal shops. Somehow he makes it through math without falling asleep.
By the time the last bell rings, Jason’s irritated and on edge. He heads to Ray’s Place early, even though drop-in doesn’t start until four. He’s there before Sunny, Preet or Lucky.
“Welcome back,” says X. He looms in the doorway to the office, smirking. “Hear you changed your mind about the fight.”
Jason shrugs and says, “Yeah. Thought I’d give it a shot.”
“Where did you learn to fight?” X pulls Jason out onto the gym floor. Grabs the bag right out of Jason’s hand. It takes effort for Jason to let the bag go, not to challenge X—he knows that would be a stupid idea. X throws the bag against the wall and it thuds onto a bench. Then he turns to Jason and squares off, raising his fists.
Jason does the same thing. They don’t have gloves or helmets or gum shields. “Around,” he replies to X’s question, closing his guard up so his elbows are close to his body.
The truth is, his dad gave him his only training back when Jason first started getting pushed around in school for being weird. For insisting he was a boy despite all the kids who pulled his pants down trying to prove otherwise. And there were a lot of kids trying to pull his pants down. His dad, an ex-military man, taught him to stop them. So, yeah, Jason knows the basics and puts in the time to build good muscles. His dad always said he had the raw talent of a fighter. Quick reactions and the ability to shake off a fair amount of pain. The day he broke Marc Denman’s nose was the first day his dad ever called him son. Jason grins at the memory—just a twitch of the lip.
