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“What happened?” Jackson asks Stiles when he gets home. Jackson had been in a very important meeting for an hour, and it wasn’t until he left that he could read his husband’s text:
Kyle got in trouble at school. We need to talk to him.
“He got into a fight.”
“A fight? With who?” Jackson frowns.
“Some classmate—the teacher stopped them in time, and it didn’t get out of hand.”
“Great. Just great. First, he skips school, then he steals a phone. Now this. Don’t you feel like it’s pointless talking to him?” Jackson asks.
Stiles snorts. “I know how you feel, but he’s barely started at this school. The whole situation is new to him. I’m sure he just needs time, and the other kid hit him too . . . I’m sure he’s not innocent. We should know what happened before judging Kyle, don’t you think?”
“Yeah, let’s talk to him.” Jackson nods. “Where is he?”
“In the kitchen.”
********
They find him at the kitchen table having some milk with the Oreos jar in front of him, and they each take a seat on either side of Kyle.
Kyle sighs, shakes his head, and proceeds to eat one more cookie while avoiding their eyes.
Stiles grabs a cookie too, and Jackson looks at him in that ‘what are you doing?’ kind of way.
“It’s just a cookie, okay? I’m hungry . . .” Jackson simply rolls his eyes. “But yes, that’s not . . . Kyle, we need to talk to you.” Stiles takes a bite.
“Yes,” Jackson nods.
“Yeah? What did I do now?” Kyle asks, raising his eyebrows.
“You know.” Stiles waves his left arm. “Remember that kid you hit today?”
“That . . ." Kyle shakes his head. "Okay, yeah, I remember. And I remember that he hit me too.”
“We were told that you started it—Is that true?” Stiles asks.
“Mrs. Stewart doesn’t like me! Of course she would say that.”
Jackson looks at Stiles briefly before speaking: “But you hit this kid, didn’t you?”
“Yes, but he hit me too. It was mutual. Besides, he deserved it.” Kyles says matter-of-factly.
“You’re lucky the teacher separated you two and that you just got a warning. The last thing you need is a suspension to add to your record,” Jackson says.
Stiles shakes his head. “Okay, what the hell happened exactly?”
“I’m surprised she didn’t tell you,” Kyle takes another sip of milk.
“She said you insulted each other and something about your backpack? It sounded like she didn’t have much time to find out what happened because you had a test to do and time was running out. That was why she preferred not to inform the principal . . . since she wanted you to finish the test. At least, that’s what I understood.”
“David ruined my backpack. That’s what happened.”
Jackson frowns. “Ruined? Ruined how?”
“He wrote 'loser' on it. . . with spray paint. Fucking pink spray paint. It’s not like you can go and just wash it away. He knew what he was doing!”
“He what?” Stiles frowns.
“Loser. He called me a loser. That’s what happened.”
Stiles and Jackson look at each other. They know what the other one is thinking. Even if they’ve been through this stuff before, it doesn’t make it any easier. At least this time everybody kept their bones intact. They’re going to take that as a considerable improvement.
“Okay," Stiles nods. "We get why you got upset, but hitting this kid doesn’t solve anything. You should have told the teacher—”
“Sure, like she—”
“— and us” Jackson adds. “If anything like that happens again, you tell us, and we’ll do something about it.”
“Yeah, after the phone incident and everything; the last thing you need is to get into a fight,” Stiles waves his right arm as he tries to get his point across.
“We’ve dealt with bullies before, you know?” Jackson says.
“Yes, we’ve got practice, unfortunately. And believe it or not, when I was at school, I wasn’t the most popular kid,” Stiles continues.
“Really?” Kyle raises his eyebrows. “Yes, that’s hard to believe . . .” irony all over his voice.
“Don’t be a smartass, okay? At the risk of sounding profound, I must tell you that I know how it feels when somebody picks on you. . . . And if you let them see that it affects you, you’re only making it worse.”
“We just don’t want you to get in trouble, okay? Which you seem to keep doing, despite all our efforts,” Jackson says.
“Yes, and it’s just a backpack. You know we’ll get you another one, right? It’s not a big deal,” Stiles shrugs.
“But you shouldn’t have to do it. That’s the one I liked . . .” Kyle says, becoming increasingly agitated. “Besides, it wasn’t exactly cheap.”
“Kyle, listen to me . . . we’ll find another one that you like. I’m sure—.” Jackson can feel the frustration and pain coming from Kyle, and it’s worrying him. He wonders if something else happened that Kyle has concealed from them. He looks at Stiles, and his husband looks like he’s wondering the same thing.
When a few tears appear in Kyle’s eyes, their suspicions are finally confirmed.
“It sucks, okay? I don’t give a shit what they call me, but they had no right to do that! That bag was mine!” The tears start sliding down his cheeks, and Kyle tries to hide it immediately, brushing them away with his fingers.
Stiles rests his hand on Kyle’s shoulder, pressing lightly, while Jackson does the same; both quietly considering the situation. Through experience, they both know that sometimes you just have to give kids the time to let everything out.
Now that Stiles thinks about it, that backpack was the first thing they had gotten him. It was at the top of the list Kyle had written, and that was the first shop they visited the day they went to the mall. He wonders if Jackson remembers it too.
“Nobody had ever bought me one before,” Kyle says, almost at a whisper. “I wasn’t there long enough; and, when I was, they wouldn’t spend that money on me. The one I had before coming here was an old one I had stolen from my last foster family.” Kyle’s trembling tone seems to be improving and coming back to normal, but the emotion is still obvious in his voice as he remembers those days.
“Foster kids . . .” Kyle licks lips. “When they change you to another family, they put your things in a trash bag. Every time. In a trash bag, you know.” Kyle shrugs, “Like you’re trash.”
Stiles looks at Jackson, and they don’t need to say anything. He knows they're both thinking the same thing.
Both of them knew this kid was damaged . . . that he’d had a hard childhood. But they still don't know everything he has gone through. There are things they still have to learn. Stiles and Jackson wish they had all the answers. They wish that they didn’t feel so unprepared right now. There’s fear and doubts . . . and if they didn’t have one another to help face these things, they’d be much more afraid.
“I admit, I didn’t know. I had no idea that they did that,” Jackson confesses.
“Yeah, me neither,” Stiles shakes his head. “And it’s . . . it’s horrible.”
“It shouldn’t be like that.” They are children, for god’s sake. “And I’m sorry. I’m sorry you had to go through that.” Jackson's hand gently grips Kyle's shoulder.
“It sucks . . .” Stiles says. “But you’re here now, with us. You don’t have to worry about anything like that anymore.”
“Yes, whatever happens, whatever is decided — we’ll make sure you’re with good people and that you’ll take all your things with you. You’ll have your suitcase and your cool backpack . . . your books, everything. We’ll make sure that you’ll have all your stuff no matter what.”
“Yeah, and you’ll be okay and happy . . .” Stiles nods. “We wouldn’t have it any other way. We promise.”
Stiles wants to ask Kyle if he believes him; he wants to make sure that he does. But Stiles realizes that asking that isn't fair and would only make things worse. When he came out of the coma, everybody kept telling him that things would get better, that he would be okay . . . and he hated that. He hated how everyone thought he believed them, when the truth was, he was terrified and things were never okay. Not ‘soon’ anyway.
“But please, try not to get into any more trouble for a while,” Jackson insists. ”If anybody picks on you, you tell us and stay out of it.”
“Yes, fine . . .” Kyle shakes his head and sighs. “I’m not stupid. You want me to stay under the radar, got it.”
Under the radar . . .
Both Jackson and Stiles smile and look at each other for a moment. It’s kind of funny, and it’s a very Kyle thing to say. He never stops surprising them.
“We know you’re not stupid,” Stiles says, looking at Kyle.
“I’m gonna go to my room. I have homework to do, and Ilya said he wanted to teach me how to play chess later, so . . . yeah.” With that, Kyle gets up and heads towards the stairs, leaving Stiles and Jackson alone with all kinds of feelings.
On the one hand, the kid is making progress. He’s certainly more interested in school and homework than he was weeks ago, and his relationship with their children is also a little bit closer, especially with Ilya.
On the other hand, it’s obvious that Kyle still doesn’t trust them, and it’s not like they can blame him. The kid has all kinds of issues, and they aren’t sure they actually know all of them. Today just proved that once again. The reality is, they don’t know everything about him, the same way that Kyle doesn’t really know them either. There are certain wounds that only time can heal, and they know that better than anyone. But time . . . that's something that they actually do have.