The Boy, Callum - LGBT, boyXboy

17

(Two Weeks Later)

The boy quickly settled into his new life at Vin's house.

He got used to Leda coming and going at all hours, after he realised it was her coming up the stairs at three in the morning, not his father.

He managed to convince himself after a week or so that Leda wasn't planning to kick him out of the house at a moment's notice.

The boy still wasn't used to his new freedom, though.

At home, his father had set strict curfews, and enforced them with hard beatings when the boy broke them.

He could come and go as he pleased now, as long as he told Leda where he was going before he left.

After he'd been living with them for a week, Leda and Vin presented him with a mobile phone – the first he'd had in his life – so that he could call them whenever he needed to.

The boy was quickly falling in love with his new life; the freedom, the peace and quiet, the company.

He'd never had friends before; his father had said friends were a waste of time and energy, and set such strict curfews the boy had no chance of socialising outside of school hours.

It was with great reluctance that the boy's father had let him join the library and start working there.

Only after days of persuasion – and a couple of beatings for arguing back – had the boy managed to convince his father that the frequent hours at the library would give him time to study for his exams, outside of school.

A former teacher, the boy’s father had always impressed upon the boy the importance of a good education – mostly with his fists – and the mention of extra exam studying seemed to make him relent.

The only thing spoiling the boys' now idyllic life was his missing parents; the threat that they might suddenly return and demand he be returned to them was ever-presence in the boy’s mind.

Leda would sometimes bring home news that they'd been seen at various petrol stations, travel inns and takeaways, but other than those few, brief sightings, the police were no closer to finding them.

Despite the tranquillity of his new life, the boy still felt like something was missing. A part of him he felt he'd lost long ago, and had yet to find again. He was still missing his identity.