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It had been an accident.
“It was an accident, he didn’t mean it”
“Yeah I’d bet,” the older man stood in front of him arms crossed, grimaced and worried expression clear on his face. “just how the bruises on your side were caused by accidents too.”
“I bumped my side into a table! That has nothing to do with this!” Race could see his arms gesturing in front of him, yet oddly, he couldn’t feel anything but numb.
It had been a mistake, he was sure of it. Liam wasn’t perfect, but no one was. Everyone lost themselves sometimes, everyone got mad. Everyone. It surely had to be a mistake. Or he surely hadn’t meant it.
“He’s hurting you kid,” Race went to object but, as always, Jack easily cut him off, “I can see it. I see the limps, I see the flinches, I see the pain... Kid, I-“
He cut himself off again raking his fingers through this bed head. Race had shown up without warning, resulting in unknowingly waking him.
It wasn’t the first time he had ran away from Liam, not by a long shot. It was, however, the first time it had been this bad. The result of why he had fled to Jack’s house rather than the diner.
Sparing a glance at his brother he saw him, eyes closed, breathing shakily. He couldn’t bear to see him so distressed, so he opted for averting his gaze to the floor.
“I can’t stand to see you hurt kid. Liam he’s, he’s hurting you. And you’re lying about it,” Jack put two fingers under Race’s chin and gently lifted his gaze up. “You promised.”
They had been 9 and 12 at the time.
It wasn’t the first time Race had been hit by a foster parent, not by a long shot. It had, however, been the first time Jack hadn’t been there to stop them from continuing further. Race had accidentally dropped a plate he had been washing, and the owner didn’t appreciate that.
It was the first time he had ever run from a home.
“Are you crazy kid?! Walking by yourself at 2 in the morning in Brooklyn! You got a death wish?”
“I’m fine. I know this place like the back of my hand”
Jack knew that this little boy in front of him might have known the streets even better than he had, yet that didn’t stop him from worrying.
“So what? Bet there are thousands of creeps who are ten times stronger than you”
“So?”
That pulled a scoff out of Jack. “So, you’re gonna get kidnapped and sold or,” Jack didn’t want to think what might’ve happened if he didn’t find the kid sooner. He still continued though, needing the boy to understand the severity his actions could’ve cost. “Or worse. You could be dead right now, mangled up.” Jack cut in front of the boy’s path to stop him from walking.
The kid had tears streaming down his face, Jack’s softened a bit. This little boy looked in levels of pain he should never have had to experience. “I know you know better Racer. You could’ve been dead.”
“Well maybe that would’ve been better!”
Jack’s heart broke at those words. Race didn’t deserve to be thinking like that, he should be a normal 9 year old. One that got happy whenever they got a new toy. One that actually got new toys.
He knelt down in front of the kid.
“Hey,” Race didn’t look at him, but Jack kept his voice firm nonetheless. “Don’t say that kid, you are so loved. Albert loves you, Crutchie loves you, and even though you’re a pain in my butt, I love you.”
The younger boy let out a small giggle and lifted his head at those words, “I know that, it’s just...”
“Just...”
“I don’t wanna feel the pain anymore Jackie. They... they keep hitting me. I want it to stop”
Jack felt tears at the corners of his eyes at that. “I know kid, I know. And we can’t change them, but we can try to be good and on our best behavior so we don’t give them a reason to hit us.”
Race’s gaze went back to the floor as he looked more disappointed than before. “I’m not a good kid?”
Realization came to Jack as he found the boy had misinterpreted his words. “No, no, that’s not what I meant. You are. The best Racer. They just can’t see that”
“I don’t deserve to be hit?”
Jack wrapped his arms around the kid. “No kid, not at all.”
“I’m sorry Jackie, I know I shouldn’t’ve run.”
“No, you shouldn’t have. But Racer, listen to me. You can’t run from them, you can’t show them it gets to you. If... if the system ever separates us, you can’t let them break you okay? You gotta be strong, like a rock.” Jack easily recited the words he had heard from his own hero.
“But...”
“Yeah kid?”
“It hurts”
Jack found he couldn’t say anything to that and simply held the sobbing boy tighter in his arms.
It wasn’t until the walk back to the group home that Jack spoke up.
“Kid, promise you’ll always tell me if someones hurting you? I don’t want to see you like that again”
“I promise Jackie.”
“Kid.”
Jack’s voice brought Race back to reality.
“You remember that?”
Of course he remembered, it had been the first, and only, promise he intended to keep. It had also been the first and only he had broken.
“Kid... talk to me”
The words were out before he could give any thought to them, “It was an accident.”
He wasn’t so sure anymore.
Jack’s expression, once calm, morphed back to anger. “You’re hurt Racer! And you’re not gonna get any better staying with him”
Logically, Race knew he was right. He knew he would break staying with him, but he couldn’t leave, he loved him. He was nothing without Liam.
He loved him.
“I can’t stay here”
Race made his way around Jack to the shoe rack at the entrance of the house.
“Tony! Don’t let him get to you. You need to get out of there.”
Race knew that someone was talking to him, speaking words, but he couldn’t hear past his own thoughts. It wasn’t until there was a sudden contact on his arm, making made him yelp, that he saw Jack again, properly saw him. Jack had his hands up in surrendering gesture.
He felt his heart break. He couldn’t scare Jack anymore.
“I’m sorry Jack. I need to leave.”
“How many times are you gonna let him break you before you walk away?”
Halfway through the door, Race froze. Not turning to face Jack, he spoke, “He didn’t break me. He’s never broken me.”
Jack scoffed at the statement. “He’s broken you more times, and more ways than you can admit... So how many more until you come to your senses?”
Race didn’t answer, he ran.
It was all too much. Talking about Liam, the hits, the touches, the pain.
Jack’s disappointment.
He wasn’t so focused on it at the time, but thinking back he recognized it all. The worry, the frustration, the sadness, the disbelief.
At what, is what Race had yet to figure out.
What happened was an accident. Liam was just angry when he’d thrown the beer bottle, he was just out of it when he broke the door trying to pull Race into bed. He just wasn’t himself then. But he still loved Race, and Race still loved him.
He was sure of it.
It had all been an accident, it had to have been.
He didn’t know what he would do if it wasn’t.