Here is Home • The Pack

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-One

This is all Jerome's fault, Lachlan thinks. Jerome stopped to look at Preston unconscious in the grass and decided to take him home. Now Preston is a bipolar queer, that's what two years in their house will do to an innocent kid apparently. He wanted to be lawyer. He wanted out of this neighborhood. Preston deserved so much better than his life with a thug who barely had time to take care of his own kid let alone supporting five more people and his boyfriend. Somehow they make it work.

Preston's still in bed, doing his whole I'm-stuck-in-bed shtick. His meds went all screwy a couple of weeks back, and now the trials have brought out a resurgence of depression that's left Preston all but completely bedridden. Lachlan doesn't really get it, doesn't think he ever will, really. The whole mental illness thing's always kind of just flown by him, but it doesn't matter whether he understands it or not. Preston's sick, so Lachlan needs to take care of him. That's all there is to it. All Lachlan wants to do is watch Preston all day, but no, he's a dad and he has to do dad shit. He doesn't hold out much hope that he'll be anything other than a complete fuck-up at it. Still, a fuck-up probably better than whatever the hell Nick was, so he'll take it.

• •

It's noon and Lachlan is ready to shoot himself with his gun and set the remains on fire. In the past three hours Ruby has managed to climb onto the stove, find a switchblade that Rob left on the couch, mistaken a bottle of vodka for milk, and almost stabbed him with the kitchen knife that Jerome had left on the table twice. She's Lachlan's kid alright, for fuck's sake. Lachlan has since gone out of his way to kid-proof every surface within her reach.

He's left Ruby in the living room, strapped to the couch like she's in a fucking roller coaster, and left the TV on while he excavates the fridge for something to cobble together for lunch. So far he has some old tomatos, a chicken drumstick, and a couple of spices. Not much to work with, but enough to make an old recipe.

He's jolted out of his thoughts by Ruby's shriek. His first thought is that someone's died, but no one's around to scream. His second thought is that he's been right about his house being haunted all along. His third thought is what the fuck that's Ruby.

Yup, that's his kid alright, screeching like Christ has come to earth early and landed in the fucking living room.

What the fuck was supposed to happen while watching TV?

He bolts to the living room, and watches Ruby bawl as some old movie about dinosaurs plays. He squints at the screen. Jeez, the fucking movie had come out when he was a kid, what was the network thinking?

"Hey," he hisses, hoisting Ruby into his arms. "You're gonna wake Preston up."

Ruby looks at him with wide eyes and shrieks, "Oh no! Preston w-w-will hate me!" He slowly starts bouncing her and bringing back some nice and quiet. It settles the stomach, his mother used to say, her eyes bright with joy as she cradled Jerome.

When he's sure Ruby's not about to start bringing the house down with her vocal chords again, he settles her back into her chair, smirking as Ruby smiles happily and wriggles to get comfortable.

The room's still dark when he walks in, the curtains drawn tight to block any sunlight, which has the bonus effect of making his room look like something out of a shitty TV-drama. He focuses in on the swathe of blankets on his bed, and the huddled figure nestled inside them. The third time Preston had gone into this depression shit, he'd gone over to Goodwill and taken all the blankets he could find, dumping them on the bed for Preston to wriggle into like a fucking earthworm. He keeps them under the bed when Preston comes out of it, just in case.