“He’s going to be wary for a long while. And it’s completely understandable after what he’s been through. That’s the idea you’re going to have to get used to. You won’t measure success overnight or in a matter of weeks or months. There will be setbacks you have to deal with. This is a slow process. You won’t see it until you look back in six months or a year or more and see how far he’s come. How far you’ve all come. So if you still want to do this, that’s the goal you need to set for yourselves.”
Now, Russ nodded. “It’s all going to take time.”
“We’ll do our best, Russ. That’s all we can do.”
An hour and a half later, they stood in the store looking at refurbished, older-generation phones. They’d already picked out a refurbished, sturdy laptop. Austin seemed bewildered by the whole thing.
“So, you obviously had a phone before,” Russ said to Austin. “What did you use it for?”
He shrugged. “Mostly for texting my foster mom to let her know when I’d be home or whatever. And for talking to Kellie sometimes.”
“Okay, so here are the rules,” Russ said as he gestured with the phone in his hand. “Screen protector and case on at all times. Be very careful with it. If you break it, it may be a while before we replace it. We want you to have something nice, but we expect you to take care of it.”
Austin blinked. “Yeah, okay.”
“We’re trusting you to be responsible,” Stephen said. “This is your opportunity to show us you can handle it.”
“Ugh, I won’t break it, okay? I’m not an idiot.”
“Hey, stuff happens,” Russ said. “In fact, I broke my phone when Stephen I first officially met.”
Stephen let out a little groan. “Sure, tell Austin what a jerk I was that day.”
Austin gave them a curious glance. “What do you mean?”
Russ bit back a smile at the subtle way he’d steered the conversation so Austin could get to know them better and establish a rapport. Clever, very clever, Stephen.
“Well, one morning when I went into the office, I was reading emails on my phone while I took the stairs,” he explained. “I wasn’t paying attention to where I was going and I slipped on a puddle of spilled coffee. When I fell, I twisted my ankle, hit my head, and broke my phone. Stephen came to my rescue.”
“He makes it sound romantic,” Stephen said. “It would have been a whole lot more so if I hadn’t been the one to spill the coffee in the first place.”
“I don’t know, I still think it was pretty romantic,” Russ said. “He used his jacket as a pillow and fussed over me until the ambulance arrived.”
“I didn’t fuss over you.”
“You totally fussed over me,” Russ said with a laugh. “Seriously.”
“Fine, I fussed,” Stephen said. “I felt guilty.”
“So he met me at the hospital, and took me home to take care of me.” Russ gave Stephen a little smile.
“He hates being taken care of,” Stephen said to Austin.
“I’m getting better!” Russ protested. He turned back to Austin. “The point is, sometimes accidents happen. And sometimes accidents do have a good outcome. But I should have been more careful. If I’d been paying more attention, I wouldn’t have given myself a concussion, sprained ankle, and a busted phone.”
“Yeah, I’ll be careful.” Austin rolled his eyes. “Can we eat now?”
“Sure.”
“What do you like to eat?” Stephen asked.
Austin shrugged. “I dunno. Whatever.”
“Pizza?”
“Yeah, I like pizza.” There was a glimmer of excitement in Austin’s eyes that disappeared almost immediately. “But I don’t really care.”
“We want you to have some say in your life, Austin,” Russ said softly. “Obviously, there are times we’re going to make rules—and they are all going to be with your health and safety in mind—but we want you to feel like you get some input into things too. We don’t just want to make every single decision about your life without your say. We want to sit down and talk about things, all three of us and come to a decision that makes sense to all of us.”
“Yeah, okay. So pizza?”
Russ smiled. “Sure, pizza sounds great.”
“What made you decide to want to do this, anyway?” Austin asked around a mouthful of cheese and tomato sauce, half an hour later.
“Be foster parents?” Stephen asked.
Austin nodded.
“Well, volunteering at Open Doors made us realize how much we have to be grateful for and how much more we could be doing to help out,” Stephen said. “We have a wonderful life together and we want to share it with a kid who needs it.”
“But why me?”
“Truthfully, we were planning to do it anyway,” Russ said. “But when we found out you needed a home, we wanted to make sure you could stay with us, so we hurried along the process as quickly as possible.” He didn’t want Austin to think he wasn’t specifically wanted, though he didn’t want to misrepresent how it had all happened either. The last thing this kid needed was to be lied to.
“We do have a little bit of experience,” Stephen said. “Our friend Evan was twenty when he got kicked out of his house. We gave him a place to stay for a while.”
“You might know him,” Russ offered. “He volunteers at Open Doors, too.”
“I dunno.”
“His name is Evan Harris. He goes with his boyfriend, Jeremy Lewis. They’re usually there on Sundays, I think.”
“Yeah, I don’t go on Sundays. The Nashes made me go grocery shopping with them.” He looked between them. “Are you going to make me go too?”
Russ glanced over at Stephen, then shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess it’ll depend on how our schedules work out and if you decide to do any activities outside school. We don’t want to make too many rules until we figure out how we all fit into each other’s lives.”
“Is there anything you want us to know about what you’d like?” Stephen asked.
“Not really.”
“Well, if you think of anything, I want you to let us know.”
“Um, okay.”
They were all silent a few minutes as they enjoyed their food.
“I want to see Kellie,” Austin suddenly burst out.
They exchanged glances again. “Of course,” Russ said. “Do you mean keep seeing her at the center?”
“Yeah, I mean, I can still go there, right?”
“Of course you can,” Russ said, surprised. “We promised you that you could. Stephen and I are going to keep volunteering there, so you can always come with us when we do. And we can figure out other times for you to go if you want. It’ll be a little harder for you to get there on your own because the Nashes place was in walking distance and we’re not as close. But if you ask, we will do what we can to make that happen.”
“Okay.”
“Does Kellie have a phone?” he asked.
“Yeah. But sometimes she doesn’t have money for it. It’s pay as you go and …”
And eating is probably way more important than paying for phone data and minutes, Russ finished in his head. That poor girl.
“Maybe there’s a way we can set it up so she always has some minutes on it,” he offered. “I want you to be able to get ahold of her when you need to.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, we could probably do a pre-paid phone card or something. We’ll look into it. Your relationship with your sister is important.” Russ finished a bite of his Greek salad. “I get it. I have a sister too.”
Austin just looked at him.
“Addison is younger though. She’s a nurse here in Atlanta. She’s one of the people who got approved to keep an eye on you if we have to go out or whatever, so you’ll meet her soon enough.”
“Ugh, I still have to have babysitters?”
“Yeah, it’s a DCFS rule,” Russ said. “I know it’s annoying but we need to follow them so we don’t jeopardize you staying with
us.” At Austin’s age, Russ had been home alone, cooking dinner and cleaning the house. But he could understand why they had extra rules for kids who had been through traumatic or neglectful situations. Or both.
“Besides,” Stephen said. “Addie is fun and closer to your age. I’m sure you won’t mind hanging out with her.”
Austin rolled his eyes like he didn’t quite believe that.
“Evan and Jeremy are approved for that too,” Russ said. “They’re great guys. You’ll like them.”
“We thought maybe we’d have them over some time to meet you,” Stephen said.
“What, so you can show off how nice you are for taking in a foster kid?”
There was a surprising amount of venom in Austin’s voice and Russ wondered if he was speaking from a past experience.
“No,” Russ said carefully. “So you can make sure you feel comfortable with them before we leave you with them for any amount of time.”
“Oh.”
“Evan and Jeremy are like family to us,” Stephen said. “I don’t have any siblings and my parents are dead.”
“And my mom walked out on our family when I was a kid. My dad is great; you’ll meet him sometime too, but he’s near Macon.”
Austin blinked at him. “Your mom just left you?”
“She did,” Russ said. “Walked out one day and left my newborn sister crying in her crib. She was a pretty shitty mom.” He winced, wondering if he should have sworn. Was that bad parenting? “Uh, crappy.”
Austin snorted. “Yeah, like I’ve never heard anyone swear before.”
“I’m sure you have,” Stephen said. “And we’re not going to forbid you from ever doing it. But you do need to understand when it’s acceptable and when it isn’t.”
“I’m not stupid.” His tone was scathing. “I know I’ll get in trouble at school if I do it in class. And if your mom left your baby sister, she was way more than crappy.”
“True,” Russ agreed. “Look, my point is, I’m not going to pretend like I know what it’s like to deal with the kind of stuff you’ve had to manage. Stephen won’t either. But we do want you know that we’ve had to deal with some pretty awful things in our lives too. So, we can kinda empathize. If you ever do want to talk to us, we’ll be here to listen. We might not fully understand, but we’ll always hear you out.”
“Yeah, okay.”
Ugh. Russ couldn’t get a read on Austin at all. Had he taken them seriously, or was he just blowing them off? Only time would tell.
After dinner, they walked back to the car. “Would you like to go to Piedmont Park?” Russ asked. “I thought maybe we could go for a walk, then grab ice cream to celebrate your first day with us.”
Austin shot him a skeptical look. “I guess.”
“If you don’t want to, we don’t have to,” Russ said hastily.
“Can we just go back to your place so I can finish unpacking?”
“Sure,” Stephen said. “If that’s what you’d prefer.”
Russ felt a bit disappointed, but he put a smile on his face. “No problem. We can go straight home.”
The minute they arrived, Austin kicked off his shoes, then hesitated in the hallway. “Can I go to my room and get my stuff set up now?”
They exchanged glances. “Of course.” Russ handed the laptop and phone packages to him. “Let us know if you need any help with that,” he called after Austin’s retreating form.
“I’ve got it.” And then he was gone.
“God, I wish I had a better idea of how to read him,” Russ said with a sigh as he put Austin’s shoes in the closet. They were going to have to talk about things like that at some point, but Russ didn’t want to overwhelm him with a bunch of rules right off the bat. His entire world had been uprooted.
“I think that’s going to be one of our biggest challenges,” Stephen said. He skimmed a hand along Russ’s back and Russ leaned into the touch gratefully. “He’s closed off—understandably—and it’s going to take a while for him to feel safe enough to open up.”
“I know.” Russ pondered the way the day had gone. “Did we go overboard buying him new things? Do you think it seemed like we were trying to buy his love or something?”
“No, I don’t think so,” Stephen said. “I think he just doesn’t have a read on us anymore than we have on him. It’s going to take time for all of us to get to know each other. Small, incremental steps, remember?”
“Right.” That was going to be a struggle for him.
“And look, he was polite,” Stephen said. “Well behaved. I think we need to count our blessings where we can find them.”
“I’m sure you’re right.” Russ sighed heavily. “What do we do now?”
“Well, make ourselves available for him to talk to if he needs us. I have some work I should catch up on anyway.”
“Yeah, me too.”
“Then we do some work, and if Austin needs anything we’ll be there to help,” Stephen said simply.
Of course, that was easier said than done.
TWELVE
The next week was a little surreal as they all tried to settle into their new routine. Austin remained quiet. He seemed accommodating enough. He got up in the mornings without complaint, ate the breakfast they put in front of him, and did what he was supposed to. But he acted wary and skittish. That was to be expected, of course, but Russ hated how apathetic he seemed. It was a little like having a quiet robot living with them. Not at all what he’d expected from a thirteen-year-old. He’d expected noise and anger and drama.
“Are there any extracurricular activities you’re interested in?” Russ asked one night at dinner.
“Not really. And they’re all pretty much too late to join this year anyway.” He gave a listless shrug. “May I be excused?”
“Please stay until we finish this conversation,” Stephen said. Austin froze and sank back in his chair.
“Maybe we could look into something for you for the summer?” Russ suggested encouragingly. “You said you kinda like soccer, right?”
“Yeah, I guess.”
“What else are you interested in? You mentioned graphic novels.”
“Yeah, I get them from the school library to read,” he muttered.
“You don’t have to do something if you aren’t interested,” Stephen said. “And remember, this is all dependent on how you do in school. Your grades are rough, Austin. I won’t sugarcoat it. When we enrolled you in the new school, they said there’s a real possibility you’ll have to do summer school.”
“Ugh.” Austin made a face. “That’s stupid. I don’t want to do summer school.”
“Then fix it,” Stephen said. Though the words were blunt, his expression and tone were kind. “We will help in any way we can. That’s why you’re doing the tutoring after school.” Russ was grateful for the after-school program the school offered. In addition to giving Austin a safe place to be for a few hours, they offered him remedial help to get caught up in his classes.
“It’s just stupid,” Austin repeated. “None of it makes sense to me.”
“Well, keep at the tutoring for a few more weeks and if it still isn’t helping, we’ll figure out something else. But you need to do your part of it, okay?”
“Yeah, okay. Can I go now?”
“Sure,” Russ said with a sigh. “Please clear the table and put the dishes in the dishwasher before you go to your room though.”
“I was going to.” Austin shot him a look like he was offended that Russ would imply otherwise.
“I just don’t know what to do to get him interested in something,” Russ said later after Austin had gone to his bedroom. He’d turned down their offer to watch a movie or TV together. He more or less lived in his room except for meals and school.
“He may need to feel more comfortable before he opens up to us about his interests,” Stephen pointed out.
“That’s true.” Russ considered the idea. “You know, I know the foster care manual and all of the books we
read said this was perfectly normal behavior, but I really expected that we’d run into behavioral issues like him being angry or refusing to follow the rules. The slightly annoyed compliance is harder for me to understand. It’s like he’s offended we would ever think he might misbehave.”
“It’s just a different coping mechanism,” Stephen said.
“I know. I just don’t know how to deal with it.”
“That’s probably because you’re someone who is more likely to get angry or refuse to follow the rules if they don’t make sense to you,” Stephen said, a gently teasing note to his voice.
“Yeah, true.” Russ considered the idea. “I talked back to my dad a lot when I was Austin’s age.”
“Were you angry with Alan about your mom leaving?”
“Hmm. I’ve never really thought about it before. No, I don’t think I was. I didn’t blame him. I was mad at her, so kinda mad at the world in general for a while but things settled down eventually. I got over it, I suppose. What about you?”
Stephen chuckled but a sad look crossed his face. “No, being angry and talking back wasn’t really an option for me growing up. I was expected to do as I was told. My father was the ultimate authority in the family and there was no questioning things.”
“Not that I want Austin to just rebel for the sake of rebelling, but how do we make him feel safe enough to express himself? At the center, he was kinda angry and defiant, but now he’s so withdrawn. He just kind of … is here but he doesn’t engage much other than to seem annoyed about things.”
“Give him time.”
The first glimmer of life Russ saw from Austin was when he asked him if he wanted to go to the center that second week. “Want to come with me to Open Doors?” he asked over his shoulder as he scrambled some eggs one morning before work. Austin was slumped on a stool on the other side of the island, looking half-asleep. He straightened and his eyes widened.
“Tonight?”
“Yep. I’ll be working at the sign-in desk there.”
“Yeah, I’ll go,” he said eagerly. There had been too much to do last week for them to make it. “I want to see Kellie.”
Full Balance (The Peachtree Series Book 3) Page 15
