RED PARALLEL

Chapter 58: Fatherly Sin

Who knows what time it was. Five? Six? Not that it mattered, because time didn't matter. At least not the present time. What mattered was the past, and that was unprecedented. Traviz had never heard a series of stories so carefully in his whole life. Usually, he'd start sleeping in the first ten minutes, or attempting to escape, or making constant interruptions in order to change the subject, or simply spacing out. But now things were different.

"No waaaay! Freal?"

"Yep. Cobe's my brother," Nate confessed.

Nate was G.Klo's first adoptive kid. Cobe's younger brother, Nate had spent his first thirteen years of life gaining money on the streets, at traffic signs, selling toys and gums or whatever he thought it was worth selling, and coming back home with the product of his full-day effort. Cobe looked for real jobs in restaurants, shops, supermarkets, but wouldn't settle in any of them. And once he did, he'd spent most savings on drinks and stupid things. Nate, despite the young age, would calculate the savings, organize their budgets in the best way he could, gather cheap food supplies and hygiene stuff. He'd also cook and do laundry. Everything to compensate for his brother's inconsequential acts.

They lived in the suburbs of St.Vicent's metropolitan area, distant from most commercial spots, so Nate would walk miles and miles to gather money downtown. It'd take hours. He'd climb buses and travel unsafely, yet determined to accomplish his quantity goal. He wouldn't come back home until he got the right money. He tried to find jobs in the shops and various places as well, but people would always suspect he was some burglar, just by being a skinny black kid.

"That sucked," Nate said. "I was so mad I thought about hitting that woman right on her face."

"I'd do that..." Traviz mused.

"You're white, it'd be different. The woman would adopt ya, for sure."

"Just 'cause I'm white?"

"Yes."

One day, Cobe didn't come back home. Nate was worried. What had happened to him? Did he get in some trouble? Nate would cry inside their improvised tent, imagining the worst-case scenarios. But he didn't imagine enough. Cobe came back home with a bag full of money, wearing expensive clothes, and also a smile on his face.

"He be sayin' "I got the money, lil' bro. We gon get rich. It's dope stuff. I found a new momma for us, trust me. She damn rich.""

"It was Gretta?"

"Yep. So I was like "what do you mean, 'dope'?". Then he said it was drug stuff."

"Then what did you do?"

"I kicked him out." Nate looked down, taking some dirt off his pants. "I never got to know my fucking parents. All because of that drug shit. So I freaked out, like, I went mad. Damn mad."

Traviz could easily imagine Nate yelling at the top of his lungs.

So instead of apologizing and doing the right thing, Cobe didn't hesitate and left Nate. That was too much. Nate spent a full week refusing to eat, wishing he could die because that just wasn't fair... Now he was alone.

Just like me...

"Like, I even missed him pissing me off, ya know..." Nate threw a glance at Traviz and chuckled. "It's funny..."

Then, he finally got a job. At a music shop. There were tapes, discs, LPs, books, magazines. The man had immediately received the kid. "You look like a smart kid. You like books?"

"And I was like, 'I don't know how to read'."

"You didn't? You didn't go to school?"

"Nope. But the man was nice. He be sayin' 'Nah, it's fine.'. And he gave me a book." Nate stared at Traviz, raising one eyebrow. "Some red book."