Rack & Ruin (THIRDS 3)

“What else?”

Dex could feel his face going red. “Stuff.”

Sloane gave him a shrewd smile. “Am I going to find neon legwarmers and Richard Simmons workout videos?”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Dex scoffed. “Like I need workout videos.”

“I’m going to find something worse, aren’t I?”

“No. Maybe. I don’t know. There’s a lot of stuff down there.” “A lot” was an understatement. Dex’s basement was crammed with boxes, crates, bags, storage bins, and all manner of containers stuffed to the brim with all his old belongings. When he’d started college, he’d bought himself a house with a portion of the life insurance money from his parents’ death. In their will they’d left a note stating they didn’t want him feeling guilty about using the money. They just wanted him to be happy. The house was the second big purchase he’d made. The first being his precious car.

On moving day, he’d taken all his stuff from his adoptive dad’s house, including a load of boxes from Tony’s basement, and moved them to his new home. 80 percent of it was still in boxes in Dex’s basement. When Lou left, some items had made it out to his living room, but there really wasn’t an appropriate place for his 3-D glasses collection.

“You’re a hoarder?” Sloane gasped. “You gave me shit for being a closet geek, and you’re a closet hoarder!”

“I’m not a hoarder. I just like keeping stuff.”

“Same thing.”

“Nope.”

“How’s

it different?”

“My stuff’s cool. Like my collection of 3-D glasses and Rubik’s Cubes. I have a mint-condition Armatron. You know that was fucking mind-blowing at the time. Cael and I would spend hours—hours, on that thing just trying to pick up a fucking pencil.”

Sloane was laughing so hard by now, Dex was afraid the guy was going to hurt something.

“Laugh it up, but when my Star Wars collection pays for a retirement villa off the coast of France, we’ll see who’s laughing then.”

“What is it with you and the eighties?”

Dex shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess…. After I lost my parents, I was scared of my own shadow. For a while, I was even too scared to leave the house. When Tony left for work, I was terrified he’d get killed like my dad. I went through six babysitters. Tony was amazing though. He was patient and understanding. Then a few months later he brought home this pink little thing with big gray eyes, and he said, ‘Dex, this is your new baby brother. You need to be a brave boy because he’s gonna need you to take care of him. He’s all alone in this world.’ And I remember looking down at Cael and thinking he wasn’t alone anymore because he had me and Tony, and I was gonna be the bestest big brother ever. Then Cael spit up on me.” He chuckled at the memory. Then he thought about what came after.

“It was tough for a while. People were giving Tony shit because he adopted me, saying he only did it to get his hands on the insurance money. Bunch of assholes. Then they gave him shit for adopting a Therian, saying all kinds of crap, like he had an agenda or something. Cael and I were little kids. We’d lost our families, and the only one who gave a shit was Tony. They kept coming to his house, checking up on us, like they might catch him out, find us tied up in the basement or beaten.” He balled his fists on his legs, feeling his anger boiling up inside. Back then he’d been too small to understand why it was such a big deal. Why everyone was always on their case. Sloane’s hand on his shoulder snapped him out of it.

“Hey, it’s okay.”

“Sorry. It still pisses me off. It all came to a head when some dickbag news reporter showed up at my school trying to talk to me. He started asking me if Tony ever hit me or touched me where he shouldn’t. I ran, and the bastard ran after me. It’s probably no surprise that my penchant for ending up bruised was growing strong even then. I tripped on my laces and fell down the stairs. Luckily I only banged myself up. Though I did lose a tooth.”

“Your dad must have been pissed.”

“My dad brought out the fucking army. I shit you not. He had a bunch of buddies who’d fought in Vietnam, and they brought their buddies, and let me tell you, after that day, none of those assholes dared to go near our block, much less one of us. Tony made an announcement on the news. He was fine with assholes messing with him, but if some jack-off tried to come near his kids, he was going to turn their kneecaps inside out. A year later, the chief of Therian Defense personally recruited him to the THIRDS. You’re probably thinking that has fuck all to do with your question, but it has everything to do with it. During all that shit, Tony was the best dad a kid could ask for. Don’t get me wrong, if we were out of line, we’d be in trouble, but Tony never stopped doing everything in his power to give me and Cael the best family he could.

“We had pizza nights and video games, music, vacations to Disney World, camping, Slip ’N Slide in the backyard. He’d chase down the ice cream truck if we didn’t get outside in time, read us bedtime stories, made snow angels in the winter, and in the summer he’d let us bury him in sand at the beach. I guess, whenever I hear a song from back then or watch some cheesy movie I grew up with, it makes me feel… good. Like the world isn’t such a shitty place.”

“Like when you were a kid, with Tony and Cael,” Sloane said, nodding his understanding.

“Yeah. When you ask me how I do it, how I stay so upbeat all the time? That’s how. When the job starts getting to me, I go to my happy place. I know it’s nostalgic bullshit, and I’m a grown man—”

“Fuck that.”

Dex arched an eyebrow at his partner. The conviction in Sloane’s voice took him by surprise.

“You had a great childhood, Dex, with a family that loved you and accepted you. There was, and still is, a whole lot of love in your family. If listening to your music makes you think of those good times, makes you feel good inside, then forget everything else. Who gives a shit what anyone else thinks?”

“Thanks.” Dex felt his heart flutter, and he squeezed Sloane’s hand.