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JUSTIN

 

I got home to see the kid who wanders to my house, at my steps. I didn’t say anything, just opened the door and let him in. I found him one night when I was walking out of work, he was hiding next to one of the grates to keep warm. He ran fast when I asked if he needed help. The next few days I started leaving food, the way you do when you want to earn the trust of an animal, I hated referring to it that way, but he was almost wild the first time I finally cornered him. I asked a cop who work the beat around my business to let me know if he saw the kid, but not to try to catch him. The cop called to tell me the kid was putting on the coat that I left there, so I went out the back way while the cop waited in the front. The kid practically kicked and screamed, saying he wouldn’t go back to his parents. When I tried to tell him we just wanted to help, he kicked me for all my help. Only a few days later, the kid walks in with the coat on, telling me if I gave him a job, he’d do anything I wanted him to. I let him be a runner for lunch and breakfast, because there wasn’t anything I could legally hire a thirteen year old to do. He followed me home one day when I took the bus, and now comes by each day, saying I need a keeper since I’m an idiot. It didn’t matter to me, because he tended to just get clean and eat whatever I left in the refrigerator and forgot. Maybe it was wanting to hear noise in my house that made me ask him his name after all this time.

 

“Hunter or James, most people just call me boy.” He tells me, cleaning up the plate I left in the sink.

 

I didn’t say anything because the kid saw helping out around the house as his way of paying for his keep. I told the maid to leave things so Hunter didn’t take off. Winter was coming and I didn’t want him on the streets when there were four rooms he could stay in. I planned to see what it would take to be able to be his guardian, because he needed to get an education. He grew on me when he didn’t ask me questions about anything other than if I was planning on wasting food. I handed him the food I picked up and grabbed a beer, before sitting down so he could eat. He didn’t want to talk, but he also seemed to want the company.

 

“You were later than usual.” He tells me, eating.

 

“I hung out with someone, then stopped to get food.” I tell him.

 

“I was going to ask if I could sleep here tonight.” He tells me.

 

“It’s fine, but maybe I should give you a key so you don’t have to wait for me to come home.” I tells him.

 

“You’re really stupid for an orphan, I could rob you and fuck up your house while you're not here.” He tells me.

 

“Why go through all the trouble of cleaning it then, and why do you think I’m an orphan?” I ask.

 

“I don’t like disorder and you don’t have any pictures on your walls and no one comes here. I sometimes walk around here when you’re not home, and like I said no one ever comes here.” He tells me.

 

“I don’t have anyone I trust to come in this part of my life.” I tell him.

 

“Why offer me a key, if you don’t trust people?” He asks.

 

“You could keep people from showing up, because other than the maid, you’re it.” I tell him.

 

“I at least have friends, they might not be the kind of friends most people would want, but we take care of each other. Why don’t you go out and meet someone other than a street kid?” He asks.

 

“You don’t demand things the way others would. We seem to get along without having to talk about anything either of us doesn’t want too. Stay tonight, and I’ll leave you a key, take it or leave it on the counter, your choice.” I tell him.

 

I went to bed, thinking it’s really because the only difference between us was he knew his parents, and lived the life I refused. I went to see where he came from and the mother was passed out in a lawn chair, drunk and stoned, she didn’t even notice when I walked into her place and looked around. There was nothing that said the kid lived there. I wanted him to have the chance to make a future, but I was starting to see public school might not be the way to go. I could ask around to see if there was someone qualified to teach him. I guess my heart is in here somewhere, not that my assistant thinks so.

 

I got to my bedroom and started the shower, before grabbing a towel. When I turned, I swore for a second I saw a guy naked under the shower. Shaking my head at most likely hallucinating after being up all day, or maybe regretting leaving the guy standing on the street. I let it go and headed to bed, since I was meeting with a guy who wanted me publish his book.

 

When I got in Marty had my coffee, still hot, waiting, and my calendar in his hand.

 

“Instead of picking up tricks, why not give a shot at a relationship?” He asks me, it's weird how he always knows everything.

 

“I don't do relationships, people expect to talk.” I tell him, once again.

 

“At least meet someone older than your ward.” He tells me, shaking his head.

 

“Hunter knows his place in my life, do you?” I glared, not that Marty cared.

 

“Cynthia and I are tired of you calling like we don’t have anything to do but cater to your wishes.” He  tells me.

 

“Then find a job that doesn't include being expected to do yours. Which would be to get…”

 

“Ben Bruckner to your office, at least learn their names.” He complains.

 

“Why? When I'm not interested in anything most people offer.” I tell him waiting.

 

Marty leads Ben in, and I was impressed with the body, but had a feeling this was another rejection letter waiting when I saw he had his huge manuscript in his hand. People who read, don't read tomes unless it's historical fact, and I was told this was a fiction.

 

“Why come to me?” I ask.

 

“My boyfriend said you were willing to give unpublished authors a chance. He read it, telling me it needed to be published.” He tells me.

 

“What does your boyfriend do?” I ask, wondering why he based his opinion on his boyfriend who probably didn't want to tell him it sucked.

 

“He's an architect.” He tells me, happily.

 

I almost said if he was building a house, the boyfriend's opinion was great, but I reined in my inner asshole. “Give me a short summary.” I tell him, because people who think they have a best seller will go on and on.

 

“It's about two men who come back after death, they are always meant to find each other.” He tells me.

 

“Rewinds are done a lot, how's yours better?” I ask, ready to tell him no.

 

“They have to remember each other, and get things right to be together.” He tells me.

 

“I’ll read through it, but I'm almost ready to say no. Hopefully I'm wrong.” I tell him, letting him hand it to me.

 

“I guess I should admit that I really cowrote this with a friend, he came to me with it the idea but let me take poetic license with most of it.” He tells me.

 

“Why didn’t he write it himself?” I ask, trying to figure out why I care.

 

“He likes to joke he lived it, and it wasn’t the fairy tale I would write.” He tells me, shaking my hand and leaving.

 

Marty came in, acting excited about the book. “At least read it, it could be the next best seller.” He shoves it in front of me when I tried to throw it in a pile.

 

“It sounds like romantic drivel.” I tell him.

 

“It won’t melt your cold dead heart, just skip the parts that make you want to puke.” He tells me.

 

“Have you read this or something?” I ask.

 

“No, I just think you should.” He tells me, putting it back in front of me when I pushed it aside

 

I read the title ‘Living For You’ deciding Ben needed help on naming his book, and flipped to the first page. It wasn’t something that would have people excited, a death scene to begin. I closed it, but Marty stuck his head in the door, so to avoid him watching me all day, I kept going.

 

BRIAN

 

Mel was sitting at my desk when I walked in, she and her girlfriend wanted to adopt a child. She kept pestering me to go with her, since I told her I wanted a child. I couldn’t tell her I wanted my son and daughter, since she’d start worrying about my mental wellbeing.

 

“Why not come with and meet some of the kids. It would at least give them attention, the foster parents can’t.” Mel begs me.

 

“Why aren’t you and Maryanne not going the pregnancy route?” I ask.

 

“Neither of us have the time with our careers to spend nine months being pregnant.” she tells me.

 

“So you think an instant kid will be easier?” I ask.

 

“Just get off your ass and help me decide if this is the way we should do this.” She tells me, dragging me out of work.

 

I let her drive, while I looked up the directions. The house we pulled up to looked like a daycare, because kids were all over the yard. “Do they all live here?” I ask.

 

“No. We chose here because Linda, who fosters the kids, really cares that they have as normal life as they can while they live with her. She makes sure they meet other kids in the neighborhood.” She tells me, as we walk through the five kids playing in the front.

 

Mel greeted the woman holding a toddler in her arms, and I knew Gus the minute I saw him.

 

“Come in, Jenny’s waiting for you.” Linda tells her.

 

“I could hold him for you.” I tell Linda.

 

“Gussy, you think you’ll not cry?” She asks him, Gus held out his arms to me. “That’s different, normally he throws a fit when anyone touches him.” She tells me.

 

“Brian loves children, I’ve been trying to convince him to adopt, but he seems to think he should have one of his own.” Mel tells her.

 

“I wouldn’t mind adoption.” I tell Linda.

 

“It takes forever if you want a baby, but ones Gus’s age are less desirable to people because they think babies are easier. If you really want to adopt, give kids like Gus a chance to grow up in a loving home.” Linda tells me.

 

I had to leave him, not wanting to, but understanding they wouldn’t just hand Gus over to me. Mel took me to the agency her and Maryanne were using and I started the process, I almost laughed at the background check that wouldn’t be a problem with the family I now had. I took Mel to celebrate a step towards the life I’d spent years waiting for. We were seated in the deli, and there was Justin, eating while reading a book. Once again Justin and Gus are with me on the same day. I went over and sat down, leaving Mel to tell Maryanne everything Jenny did today.

 

“Is it that interesting?” I ask, when he didn’t even look up at me.

 

“I’m not really sure… Oh hi. Brian, right?” He asks.

 

“And you are?” I ask, when he turns the page.

 

“Justin. Sorry I’m trying to get through this.” He tells me, ignoring me.

 

“Why not finish your lunch, since that’s why you came here.” I tell him.

 

“I came here because Marty is being a pain in the ass about this author.” He tells me.

 

“What do you do?” I ask.

 

“Ruin peoples lives when I don’t publish their books.” He tells me.

 

“You really didn’t like Ian’s book?” I ask.

 

“Ian? I thought it was Evan or Eddy, well something like that. Not that I care, when what he wrote was guaranteed not to sell more than the one book his boyfriend would buy.” He snickers.

 

“I would, I’m sure. It could take care of the wobbly leg of my dad’s recliner.” I tell him.

 

“I thought coffee table, but recliner works too.” He tells me. “I don’t get some of the characters in this.” He mumbles.

 

“What’s wrong with them?” I ask, when I see what he’s reading.

 

“He has this guy, who gets this almost childish nickname, thinking his best friend loves him. He spends half the book being told over and over that the best friend doesn’t want him. Yet instead of moving on and meeting someone who might want him, he lives for some childhood promise that they’ll be friends, as if it meant more. It’s like he’s never going to get it.” He tells me, not knowing how true it is.

 

“Some people can’t see past what they want to happen.” I tell him.

 

“I guess, but there should be a point where the guy grows up. The main character waiting five years to tell his soul mate he loved him, wouldn’t inspire me if I was the soul mate. Not that I would fall for that shit.” He tells me.

 

“So if I said, I love you Justin, after just meeting you, you would find that more believable?” I ask him.

 

“Sure, right after I check to see if you’d lost your mind. You don’t fall in love with the first guy you fuck, unless you’re a naive kid.” He tells me.

 

“I think love happens when it does.” I tell him.

 

“Interesting, but it’s all bullshit.” He tells me, getting up to leave.

 

I grabbed his hand before he could go. “Have dinner with me, I feel like celebrating tonight.” I tell him.

 

“I don’t date, I fuck.” He whispers in my ear.

 

“Then come over and have a drink, then we’ll go from there. I wouldn’t mind one last night of mindless sex before I adopt my son.” I tell him.

 

He debated, before telling me to meet him at Babylon. “If I’m not busy, then maybe you’ll get lucky.” He tells me.

 

 

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