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Donald’s knees just gave out. If not for the seat behind him just then, he’d of surely hit the floor. As it was, he needed help from Mr. Palmer to not just get up but to stand upright, too. The judge asked him if he was all right.
“I am. I surely am. And while I messed up in letting you talk the rest of your sayings, I want you to know that I’ll work hard and not have a thing to do with the others. I’ve been thinking on all the stuff we’d been doing, like you said, with my brother in charge, and we weren’t none of us all that good. I’m going to change my ways and learn how to do something that will get me moving. And to get me a bit of pocket money so’s when I want something like some French fries or something, I can pay for them instead of trying to steal them.” The judge said that was what he wanted to talk to him about. “Good. I’m ready to listen now. I’m powerful sorry that I fell over just then. I’m gonna listen now.”
“All right. Ms. Raven is going to sponsor you with the rest of her family in getting you on the right track with a job and a place to live. I’ve been told that you cannot live on your own as you have some disabilities that will prevent you from being in a safe environment if you were to live alone. Is that right?” He said he nearly burnt down the house once because he couldn’t read the instructions on his apple pie. “Yes, that’s what I’m talking about. So you’re going to be assigned to a group home where you will not just learn a skill you can do on your own but also learn how to take care of your own needs. You will, as you said, not have any contact with your brother and sisters.”
Donald listened to the judge as much as he could. But he kept getting distracted by some of the big words he was using. Whispering in his ear, Mr. Palmer told him that he’d explain to him later what he needed to do.
Donald couldn’t help it, he felt good about things. Even knowing that he was a big dummy didn’t bother him so much because no one was making fun of him. And he was going to be away from the family. When the judge told him that he had to go back to the jail to get the paperwork taken care of, he thought he could have just sprouted wings and flown there like a bumble bee. He was so happy. Just as he was getting in the car again, the jailhouse bus pulled up, and he got to see the other three.
April—he had to keep reminding himself that he wasn’t going to call them by both their names anymore—looked just terrible. Her hair was all messy like she’d not run a good comb through it in months. Momma would have been so embarrassed at her looks and snatched her bald for going out in public that way. And she looked like she had put on some fat, too. Her jumper thingy was too tight around her belly area, and her feet were in them floppy shoes that he’d been wearing in the shower since he’d been in jail. Donald was sort of ill with the look of her feet. Like she’d been walking through food all the time and not bothered with soap and a rag.
Besty didn’t look all that much better. But her hair was combed out and pulled back in some kind of flowery thing. She didn’t have on a jumper suit but was wearing the clothes that she’d had on the day they’d been arrested. He had a thought that April couldn’t fit in her own clothing no more, so that’s why April was in the jumper thing. Not that it did her any good about what she was wearing. It was dirty and wrinkled up like she’d not even bothered with putting an iron to it.
It was his brother who looked the worst. He’d put on a lot of fat since he’d seen him last time. Not only did he have himself a wobbler of a neck, as momma would have called it, but he also had fat hands and legs. His momma would be like that at the end of a gardening day. All swelled up with her legs burning. William, too, had on a jumper thing, but the color of it, bright orange, made him look like one of the road cones that he remembered his brother running down and making them flop in the air when he’d see them. Good heavens, he thought that he might be the dumbest of them all, but he’d been taking care that he made sure that he didn’t look like the dummy he thought he was.
“Have you seen enough?” He looked over at Mr. Palmer when he asked. “I have some news for you about your family, Donald. They’re going to prison, the three of them. Since they wanted to be tried as one, they’re going to go down for the homicide of the limo driver and your mom. They’ll get life if I don’t miss my bet without any chance of parole. The other things, there were seven more murders that they’re all going to be tried for, will add additional life terms onto their sentencing that will keep them in there for the rest of their natural life. William will be tried as well for the abuse of his children.”
“He don’t have no children.” Mr. Palmer told him that he had four. And that he’d been abusing them since birth. “I didn’t know that. Are they going to be all right? I don’t want them to suffer because William wasn’t a good man.”
“They’re going to be just fine now. They’re being taken care of, thanks to Caleb and Tabby Anderson. They’ll not come here but will be living out a better life than the one that they currently have. An education, too, will be there if they wish it. You’re not to have contact with them, however. The judge thinks that it will be hard on them knowing that you’re related to them through their father.” He nodded, watching his brother fighting with the officer, trying to get him out of the bus. “Once they’re set up for a trial, if it comes to one—they want the judge to just tell them how much they’ll owe so they can kill Raven to get it all to pay the fines—then they’ll be finished being bad as William had promised him. No trial means that they’ll go straight to prison from here and not be heard from again.”
“I’m a lucky man, ain’t I, Mr. Palmer?” He said that he was very lucky. “Thank you for this. And I’ll be sure to thank Ms. Raven, too. She did me a lot of good in calling you, and I’ll never be able to repay her for this.”
“You just keep with the program, Donald, and you’ll repay her a great deal. She’s a good woman, and your mother was very lucky to have had her. Once you get to where you’re going, you keep telling yourself that. You were a lucky man, and try to help someone else out with your luck.” He asked him if that was paying it forward. “It is. You keep paying it forward, and that will be more than thanks to young Raven.”
After all the paperwork was finished up, it was nearly noon time. As he stood out in front of the jailhouse with his face up to the sun, he thought of the first thing that he was going to do. He was going to buy him his first meal out on the town. Donald made his way to the Dari Twist that was just across the road and stood in line. He was never so nervous or happy in his entire life that he was a free man and had pocket money to boot.
“Can I buy you lunch?” He hugged Ms. Raven when she spoke to him. “I just got off the phone with Mr. Palmer. He said that he saw you coming over here. Come on, we’ll have us a nice lunch, then we’ll talk.”
It was a great lunch, and he’d never been so happy for the company as he was if it was his own momma sitting with him. Ms. Raven was pretty, too. She made him feel like a real man when she asked him where he wanted to sit. He didn’t remember anybody asking him where he wanted to stand, much less sit with them.
“Here.” She handed him a big envelope and told him to go through it while she put catsup on her fries as soon as they sat down. The first thing he found was money. “That’s for you to get yourself some new clothing as well as the personal things that you need. Harlin, my husband, is going to help you with that as soon as you’re ready. Also, there is a cell phone that is yours. I want you to call me whenever you want so that if you have any questions, you can get them answered. All right?”
“Yes, ma’am.” He fingered the cell phone but put it away. “I don’t know how to use it, but it sure is pretty, don’t you think? I’ll make sure that someone teaches me so I can call you if I need you.”
“Good. That’s another thing that I wanted to tell you. Don’t be ashamed to ask for help or to tell someone that you don’t understand something. You’re going to need to learn a lot of things over the next few months, and not asking when you need help will only delay your progress.” He nodded as he bit into his hamburger. “I also wanted to tell you that so long as you are following the program, I’ll make sure you have money in your account. After you start getting paid for working, then you will be just fine.”
“Thank you for that. They said to me that I’d not be around here. Where am I going?” She told him that it was still in Ohio but about three hours from here so that he could get a fresh start.” He nodded and then remembered what she’d said to him. After telling her that he didn’t know what that meant, she smiled at him. “It means that no one will know about your family where you’re going, and that will help you with making friends. You don’t have to tell anyone anything you don’t want to. Remember that. You’re on your own, and what you tell people or not is up to you.”
“I don’t know that I want anyone to know about my family.” She said that was up to him. “You’ve been so nice to me, Ms. Raven. I know you want me to pay it forward like Mr. Palmer told me, but I want you to know that I’m going to make you proud of me from now on. I’m going to be a good man like my momma wanted me to be when I was a little kid. You won’t have no trouble with me. I promise.
“You just have a good life and be a good man, and that will make me as happy as I can be.” When Harlin showed up, he told him what was going to be going on and showed him the cell phone. He felt like a big dummy head again when he realized that the man would know he’d gotten it, but he never made him feel that way. He even showed him how to turn it on and how to dial numbers. It was the best day of his life, he thought, but he was going to try his bestest to have more of them every day, just for his momma and Ms. Raven.
~*~
Sebastian hadn’t been this tired since his first day in the service. His body ached. Once he was up in his room, of course, he couldn’t lay his head down on his pillow if he had wanted. He was, for the most part, hyped up and feeling antsy. Going to the window that showed him the backyard, he watched the night creatures that roamed the grounds. He couldn’t wait for him and Kelly to be able to sit right here and wait for them to come out. He’d make sure that not only did he know the names of the animals but that he was able to tell him what they sounded like.
Thinking about Kelly, he made his way across the room to his bedroom. The night nanny was on duty tonight so that they could both get some sleep. But after thinking of the little guy, he decided that sleep was the furthest thing from his mind. Creeping quietly down the hall so as not to disturb the household, Sebastian paused when he heard a slight whimpering sound.
Since he was new to the house, he couldn’t quite pinpoint where the noise was coming from. Cocking his head while standing outside the baby’s room, he heard it again. That’s when he realized it was coming from the end of the hall where Toby’s room was.
Running and leaping at the door, he did something that he’d not done since he’d been out of the service. Hitting the door with both feet, rolling and tumbling into the room, had him coming up on his feet quickly. Without a weapon, he wasn’t sure what he could do, but he looked around the room until he found the source of the noise.
Not seeing Toby at first, he looked at the doorway when Tucker asked where she was. It took them both a little too long to find her before he went to her. As soon as he spotted the bundle huddled tightly against the dresser that was near the window in her room, he made his way there, careful of the broken things as well as the items that were strewn across the room. Touching her shoulder had her coming up from the floor and attacking him immediately.
“I have you. Baby, I have you.” She fought him for a few more minutes until she finally went limp in his arms. Picking her up, he sat down on her bed and held her while she cried. Gut-wrenching sobs that tore at a part of him yet untouched before. Once her grandda came to her, he watched the couple in the doorway. “I have her. She must have had a bad dream.”
Ginger came into the room and started picking up the broken items Toby must have fallen into trying to get away from her night terrors. After telling her and Herman that he’d get it in the morning, he shooed them off to bed. It wasn’t long before Tucker himself sat down on the chair by the bed.
