I've Got You Now
ErinisMagic
David was trudging home from school far later than he would have liked. It was already dark out, and the air had taken on a particular nighttime chill. He was tired and hungry and really looking forward to making it back home so he could just relax. Tomorrow was the day before Thanksgiving, and the school was nice enough to start their long weekend there—he could, and would, be sleeping until noon.
He hadn't planned on today being so long. The main reason he'd been kept out so late was because of an annoying snafu that had happened with the kid he tutored. David was good at earth science, so he had begun tutoring one of the kids in his class who needed some extra help to earn a little extra cash. Usually it went fine, but today hadn't worked out as planned. Their scheduled time to meet was at three o'clock in the library, but today the kid didn't show up. He waited for about half an hour, but still nothing. When he called the kid to try to find out what was up, he was frustrated to learn that he had known he was going to be late and hadn't told him.
“Sorry,” the kid had said, not sounding all that apologetic, “I'll be there by four.” He hadn't shown up until after 4:30, and David spent the next two hours explaining and re-explaining the same concept to the kid, because he just wasn't listening. It was a little past seven by now, and he really just wanted to be home.
He'd gotten over the weirdness of calling Mr. Campbell's house home a while ago. From the moment he had started living there until now, he was so grateful to his hero that he allowed him to live there. His parents had been... not great, and Mr. Campbell had caught him trying to live at Camp Campbell after the summer was over. Rather than sending him back to his family, he had taken him in. He said he needed someone to look after the house while he was away. It was a little difficult sometimes—Mr. Campbell was away more days than he was home, often disappearing for months at a time. He would leave David with a couple hundred dollars in cash and trust him to take care of himself. It was hard at first, but David had gotten used to it.
Speaking of taking care of himself, David had been planning on going shopping this afternoon. He was starting to get low on food, and wanted to get more before he ran out completely. However, he was far too tired to go to the store as he trudged down the street. He told himself that he'd get to it tomorrow.
David nearly jumped out of his skin when he heardsomething screech in the dumpster he just passed by. He whirled around to face it, but the sound stopped before he could really work out what had made it. He took a deep breath and tried to calm his racing heart. It was probably just a raccoon or something.
He was about to turn around and continue on his way home, but a tug in his heart stopped him. Maybe he was just imagining things, but the poor thing had sounded distressed. David frowned and peered into the shadows. The dumpster lid was closed. Was the raccoon trapped? He sighed; he couldn't just leave it stuck in there.
He took a few steps over and turned into the alley. A cold wind picked up and he shivered, drawing his arms in closer to him to try to stay warm. It felt unreasonably cold that night, even for late November, and he was looking forward to getting back home, even if it was empty. And lonely.
He opened the lid of the dumpster, hoping the raccoon would realize he was trying to be nice and not attack him, and froze solid. It wasn't a raccoon that had gotten trapped in the dumpster.
It was a baby.
The little boy, he assumed, couldn't have been more than a few days old. He was wearing a thin white onesie and a tiny blue hat that couldn't contain his already huge mass of curly black hair, halfheartedly wrapped in a stained hospital blanket. He turned his brilliant green eyes up to David and let out another cry, reaching up as though he might be able to grab him.
