Come Out Swinging (Reach for the Moon Book 2), Sam Hall [leveled readers .TXT] 📗

“Jesus fucking Christ…” Bruce cursed, picking it up and tossing it in the rubbish before going to pick up the baby. Zack snuffled for a moment, stopping his crying for just a second, but whatever he’d hoped for when his father held him, it wasn’t what he found. The baby began to wail again.

“Jen…” Bruce said, nudging his mother, but she just rolled soggily, then fell back into her former position. “Fuck, bottles. Where the hell are the bottles?”

If that was the solution to all of this, Mason knew the answer. He walked over to the sink, piled high with dirty dishes, and Bruce’s eyes followed him.

“Fucking hell…” the man said, his mouth dropping open. He worked long hours, coming home late at night, so he obviously didn’t see the state of the place, but he did now. “Fuck… What do I…?”

Zack tried to answer him. He wanted food, warmth, to be held and to be clean, and he shouted that as best he could with the only means he had. Bruce’s eyes zipped between the mound of dirty bottles and the baby and back again several times, until finally, he strode forward, a picture of somewhat comforting resolve until… He moved in close, gesturing for Mason to take a seat before holding out the child to him.

Child Mason took baby Zack, because that’s what he did. If he said no, if he tried to stop what was happening, then what? It already felt like their lives teetered on a knife’s edge for reasons he couldn’t understand, so what would happen if he made a fuss? Bruce leant down, correcting his hold on the child. “Keep your arm up around his neck. That’s right. He’s a bit wobbly, your little brother. He can’t hold himself up just yet. He needs you for that.”

Bruce stared into Mason’s eyes. “You’re his big brother, and I need you to just hold him for a tic while I make up a bottle.” His eyes flicked to the sink. “Some bottles. After we get Zack fed, I’ll show you how to do that.” His eyes slid to Mason’s mum’s prone form. “Just in case I’m not around.”

Mason heard his step-father’s movements dimly, the heavy weight of the baby taking his entire focus, especially when the child stilled, seemingly soothed by the tight hold. Tears lit the baby’s face like tiny gems, but nothing shone brighter than his little eyes. Zack’s bore into Mason’s, the two of them just staring until Bruce broke the spell.

“You want to give him his bottle, mate?” the man asked gently, and before he could think, Mason nodded. The baby started to squirm and cry again as they worked it out together, but something rose as he got the rubber teat between his brother’s lips. He watched the little guy suck down the milk greedily, his eyes going heavily lidded.

The memory jumped forward again, showing an older Mason walking through the gate of a school with the slow, cautious steps of a new student. A teacher waved to him from beside the door, gesturing for him to come forward, but before he could get far, some older boys shouldered forward. With furtive looks over their shoulder at the teacher, the ringleader stepped forward.

“I heard your mum’s a slut.”

Mason’s hands went to fists, a rage kept down for too long rising in an instant, a snarl forming on his lips. The boys had hit pay dirt, and they snickered in response, right up until he launched himself at them. He swung out wildly, crazily, just feeling the need to kill, kill, kill! He was a can of cola shaken over and over, and these boys were dumb enough to pop him open. One of them went slamming back onto the pavement with a satisfying thud, followed by the lightning fast whip of his fists. People screamed, shouted, cried out, but he kept on hitting, right up until a strong hand grabbed the back of his shirt and hauled him backward, still snarling like his beast.

Or at least that’s what they said.

“Your son acted like a wild animal!” the affronted staff said in a quiet, still room, all lined up behind a table, Mason, Bruce, and Zack on the other side.

“Completely unprovoked?” Bruce repeated their words, his suspicion obvious. We didn’t get to hear their answer, the memory skipping to a tired-looking Bruce, soothing an unsettled Zack with pats on his bottom.

“Well, if you’re gonna get into fights,” Bruce said, “I better make sure you know what you’re doing.”

The memory shifted now to an old boxing bag set up to swing from a tree in the caravan park, the local kids clustered around to see Bruce stripped down to the waist, showing Mason how to fight.

I watched him grow, from a little stripling of a kid, barely able to shift the bag, to taller, harder, meaner, making the bag dance as he shuffled around it. Kids wanted to have a go too, but not for long and not while he trained. There was something now to the way Mase walked that stopped that. People pulled away, gave him a wide berth, muttered things once he went past, but not while he was within earshot. But that all changed when Zack went to school.

He took his little brother up to the preschool gate, saw the teacher with the mumsy frock and the bright smile wave to them, an echo of his own first meeting, but that wasn’t what had the hair on the back of his neck standing up on end. It was the kids from the primary school, the older kids, looking over the fence, clustered in a group, their collective gaze and their pointing fingers making it clear what had their attention. Mason stared, his eyes boring into each and every one of them until the teacher bustled over.

“Hello, you must be Zachary!”

Mase’s focus was swiftly drawn away, his hand going to Zack’s shoulder, pushing him forward a little.

“I’m Zack,