Refugee (a Petekey story)

Chapter six

A/N Hey peoples and non-peoples. You can have this long overdue- slightly- longer- than- normal chapter today. Please try not to kill me for not uploading regularly, and I will try my hardest to upload the next part soon.

 Also. I did change the tags on this because pikey is a slur and a derogatory term that I will no longer be using. So yeah. Enjoy.

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 For days after his conversation with Patrick, Pete was haunted with different thoughts and ideas. The words Patrick spoke to him on their walk home never left his mind, twisting and turning in his brain like a snake.

The other boys in the apartment had noticed this change in him, too. He was more prone to blanking out now than ever before, losing his grip on the world around him and falling into the trap of his own mind. But instead of asking about his troubles, they simply ignored his blank gaze and focused on the things that they needed to do. By now, Pete had learned that it was not about how the rest of the world sees you, but whether or not you have the ability to change it, no matter what it may be.

It had been slightly more than two weeks since he had been found outside Mikey's apartment and taken in, and Pete was beginning to get into the swing of things. Life in general had finally began to slow down, both in work and dealing with moving into the apartment, much to his relief. So much, in fact, that when drama struck again, Pete definitely was not ready for it.

"Pete?" It was an ordinary day in the cafe, normal and calm. The stream of customers was finally slowing down, and most of the other staff members were relaxing in the staff room. As the newbie and therefore the person everyone gave their work to, Pete was busy cleaning up the tables when the more- than- slightly recognizable voice called out to him from one of the only  occupied tables.

"Mom." Pete's throat closed up suddenly, trapping the words he was trying to expel. Just when things were beginning to look alright for him, something (or someone, in this case), had to come into the picture and ruin things again.

"Oh Pete, Sweetie." His mom had on a face of pity, full of sadness and grief. His dad, however, remained stoic and calm, refusing to be moved by the fact that his son was working in the cafe he was currently eating at.

"Mom, what are you doing here?" The words came out wrong, wrong, wrong. Pete felt like someone was choking him, their hand firmly on his throat, preventing him from speech. The words he forced out were unkind and brutal, not at all showing what he was trying to express. Yes, he was angry that he was thrown out. But this was his family, the people that did their best to raise him for seventeen years and this encounter was turning out just plain wrong.

"We're eating." His dad had caught onto his mistaken tone, taking his words as insulting and derogatory. Pete had never been really as close to his dad as his mom, but this form of 'hello' seemed like just another thing going wrong in this strange game of family.

"We didn't expect to find you here." At least his mom was making an attempt to be kind. She was doing her best to make things right between them, or as right as they could be. For a moment, Pete felt like he owed his life to her, for at least trying, It was hard, to stand there and talk to his parents, and his mother trying to fix things made the atmosphere lighter.

"Well you did." The minute the words left his mouth, he felt awful all over again. His parents were here, sitting in this lonely bench in the corner of the cafe he had been working at for about two weeks. And he knew it was only two weeks, and that two weeks was not a very long period of time. Heck, he had been at music camps and sport camps for a longer period of time than these measly two weeks. But its one thing to be away from home doing something you enjoy. It's another to be away from home because you were forced out with no idea if you were ever allowed and welcomed back inside.