All conversation stops when I shove through the door. I step up to the counter, fill out the paperwork attached to the clipboard, and catch the eye of the gray-haired receptionist behind the desk.
She rolls toward me in the desk chair, giving me the stink eye behind her thick purple glasses.
“You’re late, and your little buddy has been waiting for eight minutes.”
What is she, the volunteer police? Eight minutes is hardly a big deal.
I give her a one-shoulder shrug. “I had class.”
“Try to be on time from now on or you’ll get written up.” She snatches the clipboard out of my hand, glances down at my scribbled responses, then asks, “And where will you and Kyle be spending your two hours today?”
Who the hell is Kyle? “Who’s Kyle?”
The woman—Nancy, according to her nametag—tilts her head, bobbing her chin toward the back wall. The boy in the chair sits, feet dangling—he can’t be more than ten or eleven years old—glaring from underneath the wide brim of an Oakland A’s baseball cap.
I have to spend the next two hours with this kid?
Shit.
I try not to grimace, but fail.
“Well? I need an answer.” She winks at the kid on the bench, even as her fingers hover above the keyboard on her desk, ready and waiting to input the location of my play date with my new Little Brother. “Where will you be taking Kyle?”
“Where?”
“Yes, Mr. Daniels.” She annunciates impatiently. “Where will you be and what will you be doing with your little? Which activities?” She speaks carefully like I’m slow to understand. “We need to know specific information because of liability.”
Nancy purses her lips and folds her arms. “This information was in the informational packet you signed off on when admitted to the program—reluctantly I might add. Now, you signed a release form stating you’d read the rules and regulations for our organization. Is that ringing any bells, Mr. Daniels?”
Right, I did do that.
Clearly I didn’t fucking read any of it.
“I guess we’ll…” I look up into the mirror above Nancy, scowling when I catch a reflection of the little bastard, Kyle, rolling his eyes behind my back. “Is there a park nearby we can walk to so I don’t have to put him in my truck? The one on…State Street.”
“Oh boy,” Nancy mutters, affronted. She collects herself. “Greenfield Community Park, or Central County National?” Nancy’s hands are back, hovering above the keyboard.
“There’s a park called Central County National? Sounds like a prison,” I deadpan.
“Well Mr. Daniels, there are a number of parks in the area, and those are two of them. If you’re looking for a prison”—she looks me up and down again with pinched lips—“the nearest one is forty minutes north.”
“Seven parks,” interjects a smaller, youthful voice helpfully. “There are seven parks in the entire city.”
“Right. Yeah. I’ll take the Greenfield Community Park option, I guess.”
“On State?” The older woman types it out. “Just to be clear.”
Goddammit Nancy, who the hell cares?
“Sureeeee.”
Nancy raises her head. “If you’re meeting here, always log in your pick-up and drop-off time on the clipboard. If not, please email or text us your hours. Kyle knows the drill.” She shoots him a smile and a wink. “You make sure to show the new guy the ropes, Kyle.”
Another wink.
Kyle hops off the bench, and off we go.
“Looks like I’m stuck with you kid. Try not to be annoying.”
The grubby kid in question doesn’t respond.
Instead, he’s busy moving farther toward the edge of the sidewalk to avoid me, putting as much distance between us as humanly possible on our walk to the park near the Big Brothers building. The kid—Kyle—balances on the curbs, walks on the grass, beneath trees, dodging and weaving his way in and out of yards along the way.
His scuffed up black sneakers offer zero tread when he takes another curb, barreling ahead by at least thirty paces like the hounds of hell are nipping at his heels—maybe they are, in the shape of…
Me.
Closing in on Greenfield Community Park, the place Violet mentioned yesterday, I try to rein him in.
“Don’t go running all over place. You should probably get back here.”
He ignores me.
“I’m fucking talking to you, kid.”
“I fucking heard you,” he smarts back, his prepubescent voice cracking with false bravado that doesn’t quite reach his posture. He adjusts the brim of his hat so he can ogle me better.
According to his file, Kyle Fowler is a fourth-grade latchkey kid who spends most of his time at the community center while his mom works. According to his file, he’s quiet, respectful, and shows an aptitude for sports, his favorite being soccer.
Soccer? Gimme a break.
But according to my observations, Kyle Fowler is a wiseass punk with a chip on his shoulder bigger than mine and a foul mouth to go along with it.
I narrow my eyes. “Hey, watch your mouth.”
He doesn’t even blink. “You watch your mouth. I’m eleven.”
I stop walking to cross my arms over my chest. “Look, if we’re going to be stuck together for the next few months, the least we can do is try to get along.”
To my own ears, I sound as disgruntled about it as he does.