“I know,” I whispered back, turning to face him.

He pointed to his own chest. “But this is just a bag of bones.” He pointed to me then flattened his palm over my heart. “This. This is my life. YOU are my life. You and Bo.”

I looked up at him as tears formed in my eyes. I held his face in my hands and lightly kissed his lips. “And you and Bo are mine.”

“Why?” he asked. I searched his eyes and there was no sarcasm, no waiting to drop the punch-line on me. It was an honest question.

“Because, Samuel Clearwater. You’re everything.” I mimicked his own movements by rubbing my thumb against his cheek. “Because you are the light in all of my dark,” I said, reciting a line from the letter he’d written me.

Preppy pulled me close, resting his head against mine.

I didn’t even realize I was crying until Preppy leaned in and surprised me by licking a tear off my cheek. “What?” he asked, with a wicked smile. “You licked my tears, it’s only fair that I lick yours.”

I never thought I could love anyone as much as I loved Samuel Clearwater. But as we laughed together, our voices were carried off with the breeze high above Logan’s Beach, and we held onto one another like we were never letting go.

We never did.

CHAPTER TEN

Preppy

We’d talked and lingered on the water tower for hours. The sun was just starting to rise when I helped Dre get dressed and we headed for home.

We weren’t even halfway up the porch when Kevin swung open the door looking frazzled.

“What’s going on?” I asked, ascending the steps. I squeezed Dre’s hand, sensing that whatever news Kevin was about to deliver wasn’t going to be good.

“Bo!” Kevin shouted. His eyes bulged from his head. “He’s gone!”

****

Kevin ran to all the neighbors’ houses while Dre frantically searched the house again from top to bottom. I ran straight for the woods. When I saw the train coming down the tracks a million scenarios of what could have happened to him ran through my mind. What if he was hurt? What if someone was hurting him? I picked up a rock and chucked it onto the track screaming, “Booooooo!” over and over again at the top of my lungs as the train passed.

I was about to turn back to the house and check the woods one more time when there was a tug on the back of my shirt. I spun around to find Bo looking up at me with a worried look on his face. “Bo!” I screamed, raising my hands in the air in a mock hallelujah.

Bo cowered and my celebration ended.

I knelt down and pulled his hands away from his face. “I’m never going to hit you, Bo. You don’t have to worry about that, okay?”

Bo nodded as I pulled him into me and wrapped him in a hug.

“But you can’t run off like this. Never again, okay? Mommy’s really, really worried about you and she’s going crazy right now. What were you doing out here all by yourself?” I asked.

I pulled back and Bo signed. Follow me.

“Where?” I asked.

Follow me. Please.

He didn’t wait for an answer, just tugged on my hand and dragged me a few feet into the woods where the brush was so thick I couldn’t see more than a foot in front of me. Bo maneuvered through it with ease like he’d done it a thousand times.

He probably has.

Just as I was about to tell him that a hike in the woods probably wasn’t the best idea while Dre was probably going ape shit back at the house, Bo pushed back a curtain of branches over a huge tree stump in the ground with a big hole on the side where the wood had rotted out. Bo climbed through and waved for me to follow. I crouched down and crawled on the leaves following him into a five by five space in the trunk. Inside of it was a dirty Dallas Cowboys blanket. Coloring books that were stained and looked as if they’d been retrieved from the trash along with broken crayons.

“This is where you were?” I asked but it wasn’t really a question. I was sure that’s where Bo had run off to and where he’d probably ran off to for years when he was being abused by his cunt of a mother and the step daddy I wished was still alive so I could put another bullet in him and kill him all over again.

Yes.

I looked around at the little fort he’d created and my heart sank. I tried not to let it show on my face that I was breaking down inside, but when I saw the little pile of weapons stacked along the wall beside his blanket I damn near lost it. Butter knives, one half of a pair of scissors, a small gardening shovel, and a hand axe were stacked neatly. Nobody defended him, so Bo had decided he needed to defend himself.

“Bo,” I said, picking up the axe and inspecting it. “This place is a cool fort. Is this where you came when you lived with your old mommy? When you wanted to feel safe?”

Yes.

“You’re so super smart for making all this. You’re like a super hero and this is your lair. Move over batman,” I said. Bo smiled brightly. I cleared my throat. “But, buddy, do you understand that you live with Mommy and me now? You don’t need to come here anymore. You certainly don’t need this,” I said, setting down the axe, which had a surprisingly sharp blade.

Bo stared at me without saying or signing a thing. He hung his head and his shoulders drooped.

“I was just like you when I was a kid. Do you know that when I was your age that I had the same thing? A special place to go when things at home weren’t so good?”

Bo perked up.

“I mean, it wasn’t as cool as this. Just an abandoned dog house behind our trailer, but I did the same thing as you. I kept things in there I could use to hurt anyone who tried to hurt me because I didn’t have anyone to do that for me,” I started. “But you know what? You do have people who would protect you no matter what. You have Mommy and you have me. And nobody will ever hurt you. I would NEVER let anyone hurt you. Do you understand that, Bo?”

I saw Bo thinking and remembered how I felt at his age. Alone and abandoned. How I would feel if I suddenly found myself with a family who actually gave a shit and then I realized something. “Are you afraid that Mommy and Daddy will leave you or make you leave?”

Bo reluctantly nodded.

“Well, let me tell you something. This thing here?” I asked, motioning between Bo and me. “It’s permanent. Even if you wanted to you can’t change it. You’re my son. And in our family a son is a permanent thing. Forever and ever you’ll be stuck with us. We’ll always be here for you. Your place is with us.”