Yesterday's Gone: Season Three (THE POST-APOCALYPTIC SERIAL THRILLER)
something about the lost boy in himself connected with the broken kid inside Boricio.
The boy’s mother had died, and his stepfather, Joe, had been thrown in jail for 14 counts of being a monster. Boricio was sent to live with his aunt in New York. He stayed with her for a short while, but ended up being nothing but trouble. He was suspended from school twice before finally getting expelled for creating a cardboard gambling shack in the park across the street from the school. Boricio’s fledgling, but already thriving, business catered to anyone K-5 willing to pay for a play, but also to any passerby in the park. Authorities confiscated $211 from Boricio when they broke up the game and took him into custody.
Boricio was passed from home to broken home, until he became a file on Sissy’s desk. She said that Boricio was the scariest and most fascinating kid she had ever seen. Will thought she was grossly understating both.
Boricio was highly verbal with off-the-charts intelligence. But he needed roots and stability, someone to encourage him, tell him how good he was so that he would learn to slay the demons that would otherwise eat him alive.
Boricio was placed with a family, and Will was content to let the boy fade from his thoughts. Then, on a lark, Will did a background check on Tom Chambers, the patriarch of Boricio’s new family. Will didn’t like what he saw, so he dug deeper. The next layer of dirt had Will tailing Chambers for two weeks straight until the monster killed again. Or almost killed until Will caught him in the act.
Boricio lived with Will from then forward, even though Sissy never did.
Will managed to pull Boricio from the depths of darkness, and spared no expense in finding him the finest therapists, teachers, and support systems. Will was there for Boricio every day, teaching him to channel his anger, or at least bury it in a safe place.
Then, a couple of years ago, Boricio and Will were kicking back some beers watching a baseball game when a news story flashed on the TV: A family visiting New York died in a freak car accident, killing everyone, including the cabbie, except for six-year-old Luca Harding.
The boy had miraculously survived the crash, though he shouldn’t have, and no one could explain why he had. He was found 50 feet from the crash site, without a bruise on his body. Just one paper cut, barely visible on his pinky.
Boricio felt drawn to the boy in the hospital, like sun to morning.
Luca lay in the hospital for two weeks, comatose, off the front page for 11 days and under the fold for 13, before Boricio finally decided to have Will call someone at the hospital to get him permission. He wanted to sit a spell inside the child’s room, though he didn’t know why. When Will insisted he needed a reason before he could make the call, Boricio said, “Instinct is the nose of the mind, Dad,” then added, “Just make something up. Please!”
Will did, then the two of them went to the hospital together. Boricio sat in the boy’s room for 15 minutes of nothing, then stood to leave, not quite sure how he should be feeling. He was one step toward the door when the monitor beside Luca switched rhythm and the boy slowly opened his eyes.
Boricio had wanted a son forever, to help him heal from the thousand lashes across the broken body of his childhood. Will had never considered adopting another child, but Boricio wasn’t ready to be a custodian on his own, not without a wife, and Will couldn’t bear to refuse Boricio when he had the chance to finally close the painful loop. So he adopted Luca, though it was as much to help Boricio as it was to help Luca recover.
Will shook his head, staring at Barry’s email, wondering what life would have been like if he had met someone when he was younger, or maybe taken a chance on love. Perhaps, Will figured, fate hadn’t meant for him to fall in love. Fortunately, fate had allowed him to find the love of family, and not a day went by that Will regretted adopting either Boricio or Luca.
Will leaned back, then lightly shifted left to right in bed before leaning forward to read Barry’s email again.
“Hey there Will. Would love to get to know you better. Had a great time at dinner, but I feel like there’s so much more Will to see. And I’d love to see it! So take a chance. Call me. Or hit reply. :)”
Will deleted the email.
**
Will fell asleep and was woken just a few hours later by the shrill sound of his house
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