Break Me (Brayshaw High) - Meagan Brandy Page 0,97
Zoey decides she’s ready to play at the playground, so we head for the center of the place, where a large open playzone is. The entire park is animal themed. The slide is the giraffe bent to eat, the spinning saucer in the center a turtle’s shell, and monkey bars that are, well, not monkeys, but designed to look like bamboo and straw and have little stone monkeys at the edges. Zoey, though, she went down each slide exactly one time, and has been sitting in front of the garden, watching the groundskeepers as they plant a brand-new row not far from where she is, Victoria at her back, running her fingers through her hair. Neither of them have yet to look away.
His smile grows wide at that, a softness in his eyes that’s new to me.
It’s calm and gentle. I’d like to see it more often.
“Maddoc’s Uncle D, I’m Uncle Bro, RaeRae is... well, RaeRae.” He chuckles. “She picked up on my nickname for Raven and it stuck.”
I grin, look to Victoria and Zoey again and chance asking, “And her mom, she calls her Rora?”
The gentleness is gone in a flash, and his eyes snap to mine. They’re guarded and unsure, but then he blinks, his features smooth and he makes a decision.
Whatever it was though, he isn’t forced to share it. Captain comes out of nowhere and does first.
“Victoria isn’t her birth mother,” he shares as he watches them, a tenderness in his tone that can’t be described it’s so raw. So real.
Royce clamps a hand on his shoulder and walks away, but I keep my focus on Captain.
Not her birth mother?
“Her mom is gone, not dead, but she might as well be. She never wanted Zoey, and maybe one day I think she’ll regret her choices. It will be too late when or if she does.” His eyes flick to mine and back.
“Zoey is too much like us, loyal to a fault. Honest. She doesn’t realize it yet because she’s not around anyone to hear the word mom, we have no mothers, but she’ll see it soon, with Raven, and then who knows what will follow. But it’s just a word.” He shakes his head fiercely. “That girl right there.” He speaks of Victoria. “She’s the reason Zoey was born.”
I expect him to stop there, but Captain opens himself up a little more.
“It doesn’t matter what she calls her, what that little girl feels is the love of a mother. Victoria is her mother, in every way that counts, and more.” Captain looks my way.
The corner of my mouth lifts, and my nostrils flare so I don’t tear up in front of him. “She’s very lucky.”
“I’m lucky,” he replies instantly. “We’re lucky. She’s just a child, getting what every child should. There should be no luck in that.” The despondency in his tone is easily deciphered.
“And yet places like Brayshaw, and the Brayshaw group home exists. Because even though no child should be raised in hate or anger or pain... we are.” I don’t realize I was whispering until the last word leaves and I force a laugh.
I stand, but Captain doesn’t let me pass. I look up and he gives a small smile.
“You’ve been through some shit, more than I know, but you’re not hardened or bitter.” He shakes his head, true, honest perplexity clear in his tone. “How?”
“If you’re worried your little girl will grow and—”
“I’m not,” he cuts me off. “I know she’ll be okay, better than. I want to know about you. How are you... you? Caring and gentle. Good.”
My lips pinch into a tight smile as my shoulders lift and hold. “I had a brother who loved me, who I loved back. He told me our life was not what life was about, that we’d have more. I don’t think he believed it, but I believed him, and when things were dark, his words gave me light,” I share.
“That’s not all,” he guesses.
I hesitate at first, and then decide I want to share. He cares enough to ask, so that’s something.
“It would have been easy to fall into the ugly surrounding us, and sometimes it took a lot of self-convincing to remember my brother’s promises, but living with what we did, it made the world around me so much clearer. It only took one glance or one nervous conversation of no importance with kids at