Love Rewards The Brave Read Online Free PDF Page A

piece of “heaven”
    Jodie Lynn Cratchett
    had created.
    The house was
    too small
    too loud
    too many temptations
    for a boy like Benji.
    A boy who had spent his childhood
    watching a man use his hand for abuse.
    It came a little too naturally
    for him,
    I suppose.
    In the end
    it had really been all he had
    known.
    When someone makes you mad:
    Fight Back.
    When someone takes something you had:
    Fight Back.
    When someone treats you bad:
    Fight Back.
    And if the way he fought had been a little different
    less contact
    (the hands-on kind I hate)
    or less one-on-one,
    maybe we could have stayed.
    But, at some point, over those
    two long
    years
    in Jodie Lynn Cratchett’s
    care
    Benji broke all the the only rule.
    He was caught in a closet
    with a little boy.
    Samuel was his name.
    Great brown eyes
    that will never be the same.
     
    My life has been filled of
    Great
    Brown
    Eyes
    Now
    Blank.
     
    Benji was doing to him
    what my father
    had done to me.
    Making him sit on his knees,
    making him plead.
    For
    It
    To
    Stop.
     
     

41.
     
    Jodie Lynn Cratchett
    found them
    both.
    Both crying.
    Both scared.
    Two little boys not knowing how the world
    could be so cruel
    as to not prepare
    them for this kind of pain.
    Both broken.
    Both bending
    in two
    as they sat so confused
    about what had just happened.
     
     

42.
     
    After that Jodie Lynn Cratchett
    closed up shop.
    We were her only form of employment,
    but the kids had to go
    someplace else.
    She was “traumatized.”
    Not really understanding that
    Benji was just a kid
    confused
    a boy beaten by his dad,
    not knowing what to use
    when his fists stopped giving him the
    feeling he sought after so much abuse.
     
     

43.
     
    I ended up at Ms. Francine’s.
    A far cry from toddlers and chores.
    Benji wasn’t so lucky.
    No home would take a boy like him
    had to protect the other kids.
    So he went to a group home
    lock down
    alarm bells
    no one to hurt
    no one to hold
    him
    if he cried out at night
    from the nightmares
    that clouded his
    life-long
    fears.
     
    And Samuel?
     
    I can only pray
    to a God
    I have no faith in
    got no reason
    to believe in.
    I hold out hope
    to this day
    that he got out
    okay alive.
     
     

44.
     
    The Christmas tree gets cut down
    after many
    talks on the best
    sizeheightvariety.
    I’m mostly trying
    hard
    to
    be
    noncommittal.
    Because every time
    I seem to act
    involved
    Benji chooses that moment to
    withdraw
    himself from the
    situation
    conversation
    which makes me feel like
    I’m doing everything wrong.
    Like he needs me to stay strong.
    And to him that means
    Us against Them.
    It means walls up
    guard up
    made up
    our minds to be
    One Won.
     
    The thing is
    the real thing is
    that I like
    cutting down a tree with Margot
    and Ms. Francine.
     
    And every time I let my walls
    down
    or guard
    down,
    Benji
    thinks
    I’ve let him down.
     
     

45.
     
    “Let’s go for a walk,” I say as soon as we get back to the house.
     
    Ms. Francine’s looking
    for the decorations.
    And even though
    their tradition seems fun
    to me,
    I know Benji’s too angry
    to participate
    and not willing to fake
    his enjoyment
    any longer.
     
    The street’s empty.
    The November air
    turns my breath white
    my hands clasp tight
    ly
    to one another.
     
    “Benji, are you having a good time here? You like Ms. Francine’s?”
     
    “Yeah, she’s cool, Lou-Lou. I mean, you know, for someone getting paid to take care of you.”
     
    “Well, yeah, it’s better than Jodie’s house.”
     
    “No shit. I hated being there.”
     
    Benji speaks with such authority,
    like, over me.
    This sense of superiority.
     
     
    “Yeah, I like Ms. F a lot better. She has nice friends and seems, you know, put together. Like a grownup.”
     
    I say that because I mean it.
    Ms. F is different from anything
    I’ve ever known before.
    But saying it out loud
    makes me feel like a whore.
    You know, someone who’s been going around
    looking for the best