You And Me - A Collection of Les Twins One Shots

Not In Our House

Roy had known the twins for about a year when his father beat him up badly enough to bruise him for an entire week. It wasn't the first time his dad had taken out his anger on him, not by a long shot, but it was the first time the twins took notice. They didn't say anything right away, but Roy saw the look they exchanged after his sweater had ridden up on his waist, giving away the blue and purple marks.

Not exactly a rare thing to see in the hood. A black eye or cracked rib was the equivalent of an untied shoelace in Sarcelles. Everyone around here had gotten beaten up at one point or another. Some in school, some at home, some by the hand of strangers, and some by the very hands that birthed them. The Bourgeois family weren't strangers to violence, either. Roy had heard stories about the twins' father and it wasn't the kind of stuff anyone ever forgot.

"You know you can come to us if you need anything." Larry approached him one afternoon after a workshop at the community hall. Roy stood huddled against the entrance of a graffiti-smeared slab. It was cold out, a slight drizzle of rain fell from the sky and painted the dirty sidewalk a dark shade. "If he hurts you again, you should tell someone."

"I didn't ask for your opinion."

"Roy—"

"Just because you don't have a father, doesn't mean you can talk shit about mine."

Roy instantly regretted his words. He knew Larry was only trying to help where everyone else looked the other way. He knew it wasn't just a meaningless offer either, but that he meant it. That Mama B. would offer him a seat at her dinner table without a second's hesitation.

"Look, he's the only family I have."

"No, he's not." Larry pulled a piece of crinkled paper and a pen from his pants before jolting a phone number and an address on it. "You got us, now. Call if you need anything."

Things went a little better for a while. His dad quit drinking for about a week or two and even managed to get a job. He worked the night shift at a nearby gas station and then lost whatever little money he earned at the slot machines in the sleazy casino on the edge of town. The next time he came home drunk was bad. Really bad. It ended with Roy on the ground, trying to breathe through a blood-clogged nose and a few cracked ribs, scared for his fucking life. He didn't know what to do or where to go. So he came knocking on the Bourgeois door in the middle of the night, shivering and barely dressed enough to cover up the bruises on his skin or the dried blood on his nose. 

Mama B. pulled him inside and he sat with tears in his eyes, staring unblinkingly at the TV as she cleaned his face with a gentle but firm grip. The twins hovered close, Larry with an expression of fury on his face and Laurent half-hidden behind Larry's back. 

Roy stayed with them for one day before his father came knocking on the Bourgeois' front door with enough force to rattle it in its hinges. 

Roy didn't know how his old man had found him so soon. Maybe someone had seen him at the Bourgeois home and told him about it, but he'd never forget the way his heart seized in his chest at the unmistakable sound of his dad's voice, harsh and angry as it cut through the night, starting an argument with the twins' mother. He wanted to be let into the house, but she refused him. Their voices grew louder and louder like a rising crescendo and Roy remembered the wide-eyed, terror-stricken expression on the twins face at the sound of his father fighting with their mom. "He's my son and I deal with him however I see fit!"

"Your son?" Mama B.'s voice came beckoning from the hallway. "You've lost the right to call him that the second you put your hands on him!" 

"That's enough! I'm not gonna let some fucking two-bit-whore—"