muscle and testosterone. The urge is to say something crazy to make them all get that perplexed hysterical expression, but I then think of how serious they all seem and suddenly it’s tough to swallow the food in my mouth.
They care about me and that causes my system to glitch. I’m unworthy of all this emotion. I gently place my fork on the table, use the napkin to wipe my mouth then tell them the truth, “Yes, I would quit.”
Harvard gave me their card. Doesn’t mean they want me, but it could mean somebody else would. It means I might have a say in my destiny.
“But the amount of money I need to take care of my grandmother isn’t pocket change and can’t be made working at McDonald’s. I need cash and a lot of it.”
I don’t miss the long look Isaiah and Logan share and I really hate being on the outside of long glances. “Just spit it out.”
Logan leans to the left, pulls out the envelop Chris handed Logan when we stepped out of the bedroom this morning and tucks it under my plate. “This is yours.”
I go numb and it’s a cold numb. My pride bristles and my back straightens. I have a pretty good idea what’s in that envelope and it causes the muscles near the corner of my eye to twitch. “What is that?”
“My pay.” Logan pops a strawberry into his mouth. “For the past few days.”
“And mine,” adds West.
“And mine,” says Isaiah and then they all go down the line...Noah, Chris, and Ryan.
“But you need that money.” I’m looking at Noah and he drinks from his glass of water.
“You need it more.” His eyes ask me to not say anything else. To not mention that this money was supposed to be for an engagement ring for Echo. That he wanted to ask her to marry him before she left to go study in Colorado for the year.
All of them are careful not to watch me as they continue to eat. My head feels funny. Tingly. Like I’m experiencing a stroke. Linus’s voice, my father’s voice, the two of them scream at me to throw the money back at them—that they are searching to own me, to use me, but then my soul just hurts.
Hurts so much that my lips turn down and my fingers shake. Logan told me that he loved me, told me that he’d seen enough of what love wasn’t that he could figure out what love was.
I also know a lot of what love isn’t, and I know too well what being used is like. Being used is dirty and manipulative and creates this layer of shame that can never be washed away, but love...my eyes burn and I briefly close them...love must be the opposite.
Love must be this: six boys who a lot of people threw away. Six boys who society said were one thing and they turned out to be something else...something more...something better. Six boys who have hopes and dreams and fears...and all of those things they keep hidden deep in their souls along with their hurts because society says they aren’t allowed to feel.
Six boys who set out to make money for varying reasons. Six boys who sweat and bled and endured blisters and pain. Heat causing them to tire. A sun that was relentless and unmerciful. Six boys that at the end of the week are quiet as they hand all their money to me.
Love—it isn’t meant to hurt my pride, it’s meant to heal. Each of these boys are loving me and if I don’t accept this money, I’m not loving them back.
“But you don’t even know me.” I don’t know who I am myself.
“You make Junior smile,” says Chris.
“And talk,” adds Ryan. “Didn’t know he had this much of a vocabulary.”
Logan flips Ryan off and the two laugh.
“You helped me.” West balls up his napkin and tosses it on the table. “When dad kicked me out, you helped.”
I nod at him, he nods back and I realize that West will always be around. Even after he graduates from college. Even when he moves away from mixed martial arts fighting. Even when he’s all respectable with a wife and a home and lots of money—West will always be my family.
Family. My heart leaps and twists. I meet Isaiah and Noah’s eyes and immediately glance away. When I first met them they were lanky boys who hadn’t grown into their own skin yet. Foster kids that