WHO: Kaden and Tragos WHEN: Sunday night WHERE: The Hole WHAT: $$$ ??? WARNINGS: None
Kaden sat on the edge of his bed and wondered about the phrase 'reeling in disbelief'. Reeling was what fishing lines did, right? Reel ‘em in, boys? Did it mean like, he’d caught some disbelief out fishing on the ocean of life and he’d reeled it in and it was now flapping about on the deck of his boat, way too slippery and lively to control? Smashing up his steering wheel, if that's what you called the big wheel on boats? Smashing up all his sails and shit.
Somehow this thought was easier to get his head around than the figures on his screen.
He heard Tragos get home and call out, but Kaden had let the room around him go dark as he stared at his phone, so it didn’t look like anyone else was home, and Tragos hadn’t come looking. Now there were sounds of pans in the kitchen and Kaden kept telling himself to get up and go out there, and then kept waiting, and it got a little darker, and he still hadn’t moved.
The smell got him eventually though, the rich aroma of cooking steak. Tragos looked over his shoulder toward the movement, the crease in his eyebrows asked ‘you were home?’ as Kaden slouched forward and sat down at the tiny kitchen table (which held part of an engine on a towel filthy with oil) and didn’t say anything, for a while.
The sound of frying stopped after a few more moments, and Tragos walked over with his plate and a fork and stood in front of Kaden. “S’going on?” he asked, spearing the steak while using his teeth to rip off a piece.
Kaden jiggled his legs up and down and then unlocked his iPhone and held it up for Tragos to see the account balance on the screen. Frowning and chewing, Tragos left the fork sticking out of the meat and took the phone with his other hand, staring at the screen for several long moments before he swallowed his mouthful. “What the hell?”
“It’s from Aphrodite,” Kaden said faintly. “I was - they were never gonna let me stay with all the debt, never… So I told her, I didn’t even think – and then this happened.”
Tragos shook his head, and didn’t stop. “What does she want for it?”
“Nothing… nothing, I asked. She said nothing. It’s a gift. Tragos – we can pay all the debt with this – we can stay here – we can-”
“Shh shut up,” Tragos shook his head, needing to think. He took another bite of the steak and put the plate down at the edge of the bench, only taking his eyes off the number on the screen to look at Kaden for a moment.
Sometimes in the course of his work for Ares he came across sums of money like this, but there’d never been any ownership of that money. This was a whole bunch of numbers in Kaden’s bank account. “This can’t be legit,” he said, refusing to get ahead of himself. “It’s some computer trick. She’s done – something.”
“She’s saved our asses is what she’s done,” Kaden said, and Tragos did not reply because they’d both heard a rumble of bass as Cy pulled up into the driveway. The brothers looked at each other as Tragos slipped the iPhone back to Kaden and picked his steak back up. “Go grab my coat,” he said, not rushing his food but not wasting any time either. “We’re going for a drive.”
Tragos’ car parted the floodwaters as he drove out of the Hole, Kaden quiet in the seat beside him. Kaden flicked his eyes to Hecate’s shrine, too hard to see in the dark, too hard to see from the road, but he knew it was there. He didn't even know how to think about Hecate right now. She seemed like more of a goddess than the others, he could sometimes feel a sort of presence at the shrine but compared to Aphrodite she was way more of a phantom kinda goddess. Aphrodite was so present, filling up his bank account and offering more, wanting his happiness, sharing her address. Peitho… also sharing her address.
Peitho calling him beautiful boy. Aphrodite calling him little love. Hecate not calling him anything at all.
“It’s so much money, Kaden,” Tragos said.
Kaden rubbed his arm awkwardly. “Yeah,” he said faintly.
“Too much money to just give away.”
“Yeah.”
“You know no one gives away that much for free.”
Kaden shrugged, looking down at the back of his phone, resting on his leg. Maybe. Maybe one day Aphrodite would ask something from him. But (he told himself) he’d braced himself already for that. He’d braced himself for something like… undress for me. He’d made that decision on his own and if it had gone that way – if it still went that way… then yeah okay he’d totally braced and it wasn’t like Aphrodite was an eyesore or anything. If it happened it happened and it was his decision and it was fine.
“Whatever she asks-" he said, in a way that made Tragos sick, "–it’ll be better than the shit you do for Ares.”
Tragos shook his head. It wasn’t a disagreement, but it was a very firm statement that he was not going to argue, but only because he was right and nothing was worse than some goddess turning Kaden into a child prostitute.
“With this kind of money,” Tragos said, once he'd got his voice and his thoughts back under control instead of succumbing to the urge to punch something. “You could be out of the Hole for good. Fuck Barak, we could get you into some fancy ass boarding school – you could transfer over the summer or some shit –“
“They’re not gonna let me stay here till the summer,” Kaden said. “They’re gonna try take me away, like, now.”
Tragos was quiet, another two blocks.
“What if – we let Cy have some of this. Not all. Just a bit. Enough to pay an installment of hospital shit, just enough to keep the debtors off him, right? Then we keep the rest of it aside and look for places you could go, outta here.”
“Away from you,” Kaden said hollowly.
“Away from everything, K. Outta the Hole, outta all of it.”
Kaden thought of his mantra. Three more months then three more years then out. What if somehow he did end up at a boarding school for next term? Then that was only three more months of this school. Boarding school was better than a group home.
Three more months then out?
Yeah he’d always, always looked forward to moving out of home but… when he was eighteen or something, you know? He didn’t want to leave Tragos yet. What if he was across the country at boarding school and Marcie rang up and said Tragos had been hit in the head and this time she wasn’t sure he was gonna wake up?
“You should come too,” he heard himself say.
Tragos exhaled out his nose, an instant dismissal.
“Why not,” Kaden said, still staring at the back of his phone and definitely not at his brother. “There’s enough money for school fees and a place to live, least for a bit.”
“Yeah, for you,” Tragos said firmly, shooting him a look.
Kaden swallowed tightly. If it had been Barak or Cy, he wouldn’t have dared say anything. He’d let his throat close up like it wanted to and stay shut up. He knew the end of a conversation when he heard one.
He knew it, and ignored it completely. “I bet Marcie-”
“I’m fucking serious-”
“-Would be on my side,” Kaden finished unrepentant.
“I’m on your side.”
“No, I’m on your side!” Kaden finally rose his voice. “And you’re not on my side because if you were you’d be on your side and you’d at least say you’d think about it instead of dismissing it straight away!”
“… What?” Tragos shook his head, and Kaden threw his hands up into the air like Tragos had just made his point for him.
“See? You’ve been smacked in the head one too many times already to even understand English anymore,” he said, slumping back into his seat. He heard Tragos sigh and the sounds of the engine, the passing traffic, the city coming to life the further they got away from the Hole, all of it filtered in as the boys felt back into silence.
"Fucking hell, look." Eventually Tragos broke the silence. “There’s no point in any of this if we can’t actually get you into some school,” he said. “Lemme figure that shit out, first. Alright?”
Kaden knew the end of a conversation when he heard one, and this time, he let it end. For now. This wasn’t over. He nodded, and rubbed the end of his nose with his hand and said, “Wanna get thickshakes?”
It wasn’t till they were almost home again that Kaden thought – look how motherfucking fast I dismissed the idea of using the money to help Barak out like I said I would.
Selfish little shit he heard Barak’s voice in his head. After everything I’ve done for you! You selfish. Little. Shit.
Kaden's stomach squirmed, the guilt in his stomach deep and poisonous. You can’t even talk anymore! Kaden shouted inside his head. Shut up, shut up!
But Barak just laughed, clear as if he was sitting in the back of the car, heavy hand on Kaden’s shoulder. Selfish he repeated again. Selfish. Little. Shit.