The Lost Boy

Michael yelling about my presence in
his
home. I knew that having me as a foster child had been Joanne’s idea because, as she had told me, she was lonely and could not have any children. Whenever Joanne and Michael fought, thoughts of Mother and Father raced through my head. I fully realized I was not in any physical danger, but I stayed huddled against the far corner of my room with a blanket over my head. Once, a few days before school started, their yelling became so extreme that the windows to my bedroom would shake.
    The next morning I tried to talk to Joanne, who seemed to be on the verge of a collapse. I stayed by the side of the couch the entire day, watching her clutch her wedding picture to her chest as she slowly rocked back and forth in the chair. As quietly as I could, I tiptoed to my room and packed my clothes into my weathered brown paper bag. At that moment I knew it was only a matter of time before I would be moving on.
    My problems with the Nullses evaporated my first day at Parkside Junior High School. I sat tall and proud at the big round table in my homeroom class. I smiled at the other boys who openly joked with me. One of them, Stephen, nudged me, claiming that a girl from the other table kept looking at me. “So?” I asked. “What’s the big deal?”
    “If you like a girl, you call ‘em a
horror, “
Stephen explained.
    I tilted my head to one side. While I thought about the word Stephen wanted me to say, the other boys nodded with approval. After extensive coaching from my new friends, I tried to be cool as I bent over to the girl and whispered, “You’re the best-looking
horror
I’ve ever seen.”
    The entire room, which had been rumbling with noise, suddenly became quiet as a church. Every head swung toward me. The girls at the table clamped their hands to their mouths. I swallowed hard, knowing I had screwed up – again.
    When class ended, the entire room full of kids fought for the door. The moment I stepped outside, the sun seemed to disappear. I gazed straight up and stared into the face of the most gigantic eighth-grader I had ever seen. “What’d you call my sister?” he sneered.
    I swallowed hard again. I tried to think of something clever to say. Instead I told him the truth. “A
horror, “
I whimpered. A second later warm blood gushed from my nose. The eighth-grader’s fist was so fast that I didn’t see it coming.
    “
What
did you call her?” he repeated.
    I closed my eyes before giving him the same answer.
    Smash.
    After six blows to my face, I realized I shouldn’t say the word
horror
because it meant something very bad. I apologized to the gorilla-sized kid, who struck me again and bellowed, “Don’t you ever, ever, call my sister a
whore
again!”
    That afternoon at Joanne’s home, I stayed in my room as I tried to fix the frames of my bent glasses. I didn’t seem to notice that Joanne stayed inside her room as well. As the days passed, I so desperately wanted to ask her and Michael what a “whore” was, but I knew by the way they acted toward each other that I’d be better off keeping my problems to myself.
    A couple of weeks later, returning from school, I found Joanne with her head buried in her hands. I rushed up to her. She whimpered that she and Michael were getting a divorce. My head began to throb. I sat by her feet as she informed me that Michael had been having an
affair
with another woman. I nodded as Joanne wept, but I didn’t know what she really meant. I knew better than to ask.
    I held her until she cried herself to sleep. I felt proud. For the first time in my life,
I
had been there for someone. I turned off the living-room lamp and covered Joanne with a blanket before I checked my belongings in my grocery bag one last time. I lay on my bed, knowing deep in my heart that I had somehow been one of the reasons for the Nullses’ divorce. Two days later I turned my head away from Joanne, who wept from her porch as Gordon eased his Chevy Nova down the street.
    I dug into my pant pocket and pulled out a crumbled piece of paper containing the addresses and phone numbers of all my former foster homes. Borrowing one of Gordon’s pens, I drew a line through Joanne and Michael Nulls. I didn’t feel any remorse. I knew that if I thought about my feelings toward Joanne Nulls, Alice Turnbough or Lilian Catanze, I would break down and cry. I felt I was beyond that. Carefully I folded my address sheet and stuffed the paper back into my