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The kid was going to be the death of him.
Reuben knew he was going to lose his mind sooner or later. Probably sooner.
Rusty proved to be wild and reckless, not to mention stubbornly allergic to even the most basic rules Reuben tried to set.
He had just spent forty minutes explaining why Rusty couldn't disappear for twelve hours without telling anyone where he was going. It was a perfectly reasonable rule. But Rusty just rolled his eyes and crossed his arms mulishly, and argued and talked back. Reuben pinched the bridge of his nose, trying to ward off the Rusty-sized headache.
Across the room Danny was reading a newspaper and pretending not to listen. The coward.
"You need to tell somebody where you're going."
"No, I don’t."
"Rusty--"
"No."
"You could get hurt."
"I didn't."
"You could get arrested."
"I wasn't."
"You could--"
"I'm fine."
Reuben threw his hands in the air. "Why do I bother?"
Rusty smirked triumphantly.
Danny turned a page. "Hey."
Rusty immediately looked over. "Yeah?"
Danny didn't even lower the newspaper. "Next time leave a note, ok? That way I know if I can eat the whole pizza or have to wait to share it with you."
"Oh. Ok."
Reuben blinked. "What?"
Rusty shrugged. "Sure."
"Sure?"
"Yeah."
"You just spent forty minutes arguing with me."
"That was different."
"It was literally the same thing."
Rusty frowned. "No, it wasn't."
Danny kept reading, hiding a smile behind the paper. The traitor.
*****
It kept happening. Reuben would establish a rule. Rusty would fight him like a feral cat. Then Danny would casually suggest the exact same thing. And suddenly it became acceptable.
Case in point: eating habits.
Or more accurately, Rusty's refusal to eat anything healthy.
Reuben was beginning to suspect the kid survived entirely on coffee, fast food, and spite. "You need real food."
"I eat real food."
"Greasy cheeseburgers and Twinkies are not real food!"
"Of course they are!"
"You can't live like that."
"Wanna bet?"
Danny wandered into the kitchen, looked at Rusty, then at Reuben, then at the untouched bowl of fruit salad. "Huh."
"Huh what?" Rusty asked.
Danny opened the refrigerator. "Just keep in mind, if you're planning on hustling pool later, low blood sugar makes your tells obvious."
Rusty froze. "Really?"
"Yep."
"Oh." Rusty immediately picked up his fork and began to shovel fruit salad into his mouth.
Reuben just stared while Danny walked away.
*****
Another time Rusty came home with a black eye.
Reuben nearly had a heart attack. "What happened?"
"Nothing."
"That is clearly something."
Rusty shrugged. "A guy got mad."
Reuben gestured wildly. "A guy got mad?" he echoed in disbelief.
Rusty shrugged again. "Yeah."
"And?"
"And now I have a black eye."
Reuben was trying very hard not to start shouting. "You need to stop getting into fights."
"I didn't start it."
"I don't care who started it. It takes two to finish it." Reuben pointed sternly. “No more physical fights, do you understand me?”
Rusty looked unimpressed. "I handled it."
Danny looked up from the book he was reading. "You know what?"
Rusty turned around immediately. "What?"
Danny pointed at the bruise. "Can't win every fight. But if you get your face rearranged constantly, people will stop trusting you."
"What?"
"You won’t be able to get close enough to a mark if you look like trouble."
That got Rusty’s attention. Danny returned to his book. The conversation was over.
A week later Reuben noticed Rusty walking away from a confrontation instead of escalating it.
*****
A couple of days later, Reuben cornered Danny after he had successfully argued Rusty into going to bed before midnight for a change.
“I know what you’re doing,” Reuben said accusingly.
Danny arched one elegant eyebrow.
“You’re undermining my authority.”
Danny actually chortled at that. “Your authority?”
“I’m doing everything exactly the same.” Reuben gestured vaguely with his cigar. “Same rules, same expectations. When I took you in, it worked like a charm. Why isn’t it working now?”
“Well, I was a lot more well behaved and well adjusted.”
This time, Reuben chortled. He shook his head. “He’s so...stubborn and recalcitrant.”
Danny glanced upstairs, where Rusty was very loudly getting ready for bed. His expression softened, just a little. "Nobody ever explained things to him."
Reuben fell silent. Because that was probably true.
"People told him what to do," Danny continued. "People yelled. People hit. So when somebody says 'because I said so,' he pushes back."
Reuben thought about this for a long moment. "Ok. But he listens when you say it."
Danny smiled. "Yeah, well. I don't."
Reuben frowned. After a few seconds, it hit him like an epiphany. Because Danny really didn't. He never told Rusty what to do. He just quietly arranged things so Rusty would decide to do it himself. And somehow it worked. Because Danny wasn’t teaching Rusty the rules - he was teaching him the consequences. Danny taught him how people worked, how trust worked, how reputation worked. Danny taught him how to survive without constantly being in survival mode.
“He’s learning the rules,” Danny said. “I’m just being the fun, easygoing parent right now. Call it the Ocean's Educational Program.” He flashed a grin and then laughed at Reuben’s horrified look. The idea of them coparenting the wildcat upstairs seemed to disturb him on a deep level. “Once he accepts the rules, you can start enforcing them.”
Reuben still looked unconvinced, but it wouldn’t be the first time that Danny was wise beyond his years. Upstairs, something crashed. Reuben closed his eyes, and sighed. "Easygoing parent, huh? When he burns the house down, you're the one explaining it to the insurance company."
THE END