#v. second son

”Don’t come in!”

The door opened anyway, as Rowan had known it would. What, the child thought angrily, was SO confusing about the phrases, ‘Don’t come in’ and ‘Leave me alone’ that not a single one of his four parents -- all brilliant men at any other time of day -- simply could not get through their skulls?

It was probably the blood, he decided, looking down at himself. His nose was still bleeding rather heavily, his lower lip was cut, and there was another one just above his left eye. The rest of his body was a mass of welling bruises and scratches, but he was used to that. Still, it had been naive to think he might be able to sneak upstairs without even one of the guys coming to check in on him. Even non-biological guardians were alarmed if their charge came home looking the way he did... but they should have been used to it by now...

He turned his face away from Venkman, avoiding his eyes. It was embarrassing, coming home every afternoon looking as if he’d been run over by a bus. There wasn’t exactly anything he could do about it either. Other children did not like him. It was as if someone had sewn a ‘Kick Me’ sign into his DNA...

On the bright side, things could have been a lot worse. ‘It’s got to be here somewhere,’ Rowan thought, pulling all the books out of his locker and carefully stacking them on the floor. But it wasn’t. He knew it wasn’t. The diary wasn’t in his backpack, his locker, or the lost and found. He’d been to all his morning classes again just to double check, but no dice. The diary was well and truly lost.

Well. Stolen, was far more likely, but that wasn’t something to advertise. Angrily, the middle schooler stuffed his books back into his locker and slammed it shut. How he ever could have been so careless... Rowan shouldered his backpack and headed up to the school library. He’d spent the morning break hiding between the stacks, maybe he’d left the diary there.

Hesitantly, the boy approached one of the other students, seated alone at one of the study tables, and nervously cleared his throat.

It was all Rowan could do to stop himself from bouncing up and down. Grinning, he clutched the torn piece of paper in his hand tightly, and peered cautiously over the arm of the couch again. The other boy was still there. Still glaring at him through familiar, bright eyes.

UP Starters || Accepting

The little boy stared down at the sticker on his sweater, and tried to ignore the stinging, watery feeling in his eyes. The bright blue star swam in his vision, and he quickly rubbed his sleeve across his face so Venkman wouldn’t see him cry.

It wasn’t that he didn’t want this. Of course he did. It meant Venkman cared about him, that the older man thought he might have been special. They were friends.

‘Or he pities you,’ a nasty little voice in the back of Rowan’s mind whispered. ‘Pity that you can’t make any friends your own age. Pity nobody wants you. He’s always taking care of you. Always taking you, because no one else will…’

“I don’t even like art that much,” he lied, avoiding the doctor’s eyes. For a second, just a second, Rowan hated Venkman. Hated him for caring. If everybody in the whole world hated him, it might have made things easier. He could have just been alone. It would have been easier. But Venkman wouldn’t let him. One person cared, and that made the fact that no one else did hurt so much more. What would happen when Venkman stopped caring too?

Rowan mused silently, eyeing the girl with something between curiosity and disdain. Finally, the little boy crossed his arms and let out a long, low sigh.

( @paravenkman )

It wasn’t until around six or seven in the evening that the boys seriously started to worry. It certainly wasn’t as if this was the first time Rowan had been late coming home from school, some afternoons the other kids gave him more of a hard time than others and he had a bit more difficulty making the walk... or perhaps he had just missed his train, or the subway had broken down... But he was always home at the latest by six or six-thirty. But eight o’clock rolled by... eight thirty... nine o’clock... (by this time Egon had phoned the police, and Winston and Venkman had gone out to look for the boy, leaving Ray to man the Firehouse and the phones) and there was still no sign or word from him.

Three days. Three nights. Three days spent walking the length of the city, talking to police, and stopping strangers on the street; “Have you seen this boy?” Three nights spend pacing, anxious, fighting to focus on work and focusing harder still on not fighting one another. And then...

The call came early on the fourth morning. 2 AM. A boy matching Rowan’s description had been found in the meat packing district, wandering the streets dazed and alone. A couple of prostitutes had found him and led him to the nearest police station. He was fine. A bit bruised, some trauma marks around his throat, wrists and ankles where he had evidently been bound, but no permanent damage. The hospital had okayed him, and within fourth-five minutes, there he was, standing on the front doorstep between two officers in blue.

“Fine” might have been a bit of an overstatement. Rowan’s face was still slightly swollen, and his bruises ranged from purplish-black to a sickly green. The hospital had lightly bandaged his neck, wrists and ankles, but the skin around them was noticeably pink and raw. He was shaking like a leaf, his grey eyes wide and glazed, his mouth pressed tightly shut, and the moment the door to the Firehouse opened, he shot inside, making a beeline for Venkman, and promptly burst into tears, burying his face in the doctor’s stomach, and wrapping his little arms around him as tightly as he could, sobbing hysterically.

“Yeah, kid. I’m Doctor Venkman. You’re Rowan Poha, huh?”

Venkman pursed his lips and knelt down in front of the child. He slipped a hand into his pocket and brought out a candy bar which he placed in the boy’s hand. “Whaddaya say we head to the firehouse? I’ll give you a tour, and you can even stay the night. You can have my old bed and everything.”

The boy’s eyes widened, then narrowed fractionally. He studied the man in front of him, his gaze alarmingly piercing for one so small, sizing Venkman up and weighing his words as he took the measure of the man before him. It was an unusually kind offer for someone who did not know him, and next to no true knowledge of his father. This would go one of two ways; either he would go on the proffered tour, spend the night, and be returned to his father’s side come morning... or this was simply the kindest way Venkman could conceive to pry him and his father apart, before leaving him on the doorstep of some old biddy or orphanage in another state. Well, if it was the latter, the joke was on him. Rowan had an excellent sense of direction, not to mention an uncanny and unfailing determination. His father would not be rid of him so easily.