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Will winced as he opened the creaky front door. He prayed his ma wasn't home, he wasn't in the mood to deal with her today. They weren't answered when he heard a person clear their throat.His head whipped up, "Hey ma," he whispered. Viola sneered, “What’d I say about speaking up?”He stiffens, he always forgets this rule. “Sorry ma,” he says louder.Viola smiled faintly and harshly grabs his hair, "Will, you know I do this because I love you right?" his eyes still downcast he nodded eagerly,"Yes ma, I just need a little help remembering the rules. Nothing less nothing more.”Viola smiled and leaned in the kiss him, Will stiffened when a kiss landed on his forehead. Viola turned around and left.Immediately Will pulled the arms of his sleeves over his hands and harshly scrubbed at his forehead, with a look of disgust on his face. Viola knows he hates being kissed.He got off extremely easy today, Will smiles. He didn’t even get hit. He turns and leaves the opposite way Viola left.Will enters his room and closes the door behind him. He grabs the miniature basketball from his desk and shoots it into his basketball hoop on the back of his door, he steps back, swish. He imitates a crowd cheering for him and celebrates. He grins and changes out of his clothes and jumps into his bed.He had a game tomorrow although they hadn’t played against this team before he’s confident that he’ll carry his team to victory with Tray right behind him. His phone vibrates on the nightstand.He grabs it and picks it up, “Hello?” he smiles at the voice that responds, “What’s up my boy? Are you ready for tomorrow’s game?” Tray.Will scoffs, “Baby, I was born ready, that team won’t even know what hit ‘em” He smiles as Tray responds. “Damn right, I’m fixing to go to sleep though” Tray yawns around his words.“A’ight imma catch you later, yeah… night” Will chuckles as he puts the phone down. He sighs when he hears his mom calling him, he reluctantly sits up on his bed. What would happen if he breaks his legs right now? Real fast.Will stutters in his movement, what the fuck was that thought? He shakes his head before standing up as if it would clear his mind from the intrusive thought.He leaves his room and meets his mom in the living room. She looked to be in a good mood. Despite that, he had a feeling something is going to go wrong. His stomach turned in uneasiness.“Yes ma’am,” he says this time remembering to speak loud enough.“Who were you talking to in your room?” Will furrows his brows, why does she care? And honestly, Tray is the only person he would call this late at night.Viola doesn’t seem to like his lack of response and walks toward him. Will freezes and subtly takes a few steps back. Viola sneers and grabs his chin, “I said. Who were? you talking. to.” Will winces as her nails dig into the skin on his chin.“Tray, I was talking to Tray” he whispers still not making eye contact. His heart was beating like a jackhammer in his ribs. Viola sighs relieved at the answer before looking at another behavior to pick at.“Look at me.” Will’s mind reels, he hasn’t made eye contact with his mother in so long and he was grateful for it. For some reason eye contact makes his eyes burn, it also makes him nauseous. And just downright uncomfortable.Tray told him once that it’s probably because of his ADHD but it’s clear Viola doesn’t care at the moment. Viola grips his chin harder; he’s taking too long. Will forces his eyes to look into his moms and the consequences are immediate. His eyes start to tear up and his stomach starts to cramp, it feels like his brain is squeezing itself out from his ears like molten lava.He quickly tears his eyes away and downcast.Viola’s grip tightens again and Will is sure he’s bleeding, “Will, look at me.” A command, his mind blares to him but it's as if his eyes are glued to the floor. No matter how much he tries, his eyes keep on glaring at the brown carpet decorating the floor. Will’s heart rate speeds up significantly he knows what happens when he disobeys a command.The time he had to skip school for 2 weeks because he couldn’t walk without collapsing in pain came to his mind. He hoped the memory of that would tear his eyes away from the carpet but no dice. He starts crying, knowing this is going to end in punishment. A bad one.“WILL, LOOK AT ME” Will sobs as his throat starts to close up, he couldn’t explain to her now even if he wanted to. He snaps his head towards her but his eyes stay down.Viola throws him onto the floor in rage, and Will sobs knowing what is about happen to him. Viola kicks his stomach repeatedly with the steel toe shoes she’s required to wear in the hospital, Will yells as her foot digs into a rib. “SHUT UP” Viola yells as she stomps on his cheek in retaliation. She steps back and sweeps her leg back. It connects with a crack and a yell.Something broke, and his ribs burned like lava. His vision blurred and he was sure he saw stars. Viola kneels and claws at his face, nails ripping into skin.Will sends out a leg and kicks her in the stomach, she falls over with a yelp. Will immediately turns around and starts army crawling towards his room. Every movement hurt. He enters it and locks the door. He hyperventilates as he hears footsteps walking around.“Where the fuck are you!” Viola yells. Will covers his mouth with his hand and crawls towards his phone. With shaking hands, he dials 911. It rings once, twice.“Hello, this is 911. What’s the location of your emergency” Will quickly mumbles out his address. He sobs as he hears Viola nearing his room.“P-please, please hurry up. She’s going to kill me.” The 911 dispatcher attempts to comfort him.“What’s your name, sir.” Viola’s banging on the door. “Will, Will Smith.”The banging gets louder. “Good, Hello Will, can you tell me what’s happening?” He hears the wood start to splinter.“I-It’s my- my mom. She’s mad, so, so, mad. I think she broke one of my ribs, she's trying to break d-down the door of the room, I’m- I’m in.” The 911 dispatcher yells something to someone.“Okay Will, you’re so brave. The police and ambulance will be there soon okay.” Will nods before realizing they can’t see him. “Okay- okay please hurry.” These were his last words before his mom burst open with a baseball bat.His blood ran cold. It was the baseball bat she kept in case an intruder broke in. He yells and scurries to a corner in his room. “Please! PLEASE!” Viola simply grinned before rearing her arm back and swinging.Another crack and a yell, his arm was bent at an unnatural angle and he yelled again when he saw it. She swung the bat back again and home-run, he distantly thought. There wasn’t a crack this time but it didn’t change much as white-hot pain bloomed on his torso.She jostled the broken rib and it sent a shockwave throughout his torso. As he fell over and his mother continued batting at his body he wondered where the hell the police were.He sobbed in relief when he saw the blue and red lights flood his room. He smiled bitterly; they had finally come.---Finch sped past a red light, he had gotten a 911 report of an abusive mother and her child. By the looks of things, the situation was already bad. He could only hope he got there before it got even worse.As he arrived at the crime scene, he saw a group of people standing outside the home, murmuring. One person had a phone against his ear, seemingly calling 911. They let out shouts of relief when they saw him and the ambulance arrive at the house.Finch shot out of his car and ran towards the front door. He kicked the door, once, twice, three times before it gave in shattering and splintering on the floor. Immediately he knew this was the worst abuse case he’d ever seen. The house was clean but there in the living room was a puddle of blood, upstairs was a consistent thudding sound.He let out a curse and ran for the stairs. He pulled out his gun and walked towards the room making the sound. He burst open the door and a look of horror stretched itself across his face.There in the corner of the room was a smiling woman standing over a teenage boy’s body repeatedly smashing a baseball onto his body. Finch froze, this- this was much worse than the dispatch call. The boy sobbed loudly and it was clear his arm was broken.Finch snapped out of it and went to detain the woman. He ran towards her and knocked the bat out of her hands. She whipped around with a yell before seeing the gun in his hands.“Put your hands up!” Finch yelled at the woman. She shakingly did as she was told. The boy's sobbing didn’t get any quieter.“Get on your knees! NOW!” The woman fell to her knees. I slowly approached her and quickly grabbed her hands and pinning them to her back and put them into handcuffs and put her in a corner of a room.He turned back to the sobbing boy, “Hey, hey, shhh, it’s okay you’re safe now” The boy's sobs quieted and he looked up at me. His eyes were so big and innocent looking despite him being around 16.Finch smiled sweetly, “It’s just me,” I stiffened as the boy started army crawling towards me. I tilted my head in confusion before scooting toward him. He grunted and lifted himself, falling against my chest. He groaned as it jostled his injuries.I gently placed my hands around the boy, and he gripped back a bit weaker. I mumbled reassurance and he burst out into silent sobs. I smiled bitterly and rubbed his back while calling the ambulance on my walkie-talkie. The boy was safe.Another one was saved. Finch smiled and continued rubbing circles into the boy's back as he cried.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
The ambulance comes in with a stretcher. The boy gets taken from my hands and gets placed on the stretcher. As they leave, I turn with a glare towards the mother -no, woman. - She doesn’t deserve to be called the boy’s mother anymore. Her body is heaving up and down in intervals, is she laughing? I walk closer to her and I hear quiet sobs, no she’s crying. I roll my eyes, what right does she have to cry, after what she did? “Alright ma’am up you go.”, I say as I lift her off the floor. I walk and she stumbles as we near the door. We leave the boy’s room and walk down the steps. The sirens are a lot louder when downstairs. We step over the broken door and I hand her off to one of my partners with a nod. I turn and walk towards the ambulance. “Vitals?” I say as I step into the back of the truck. The paramedic fiddles with the IV bag and mutters, “He is stable and surprisingly conscious.” I jump and quickly turn towards the boy; his eyes are lidded but still open. A sincere smile stretches itself across my face. “Hey, how’re you doing.” As soon as the words leave my mouth, I regret them. But cut him some slack, what else was he supposed to ask? It’s human dumbness 101, when someone isn’t feeling well you ask them how they are. That’s just how we humans were designed, what a creator flaw- He’s seriously off track right now, I snap back to reality as the boy starts giggling. The smile on my face gets wider, his laugh is dangerously contagious. “Am’zing! My b’dy’s all fuz’y!” The boy's words are very clearly slurred. The paramedic chuckles running his gloved hands down his scrub, “Yeah, he’s is pumped up on pain meds. He’s a bit giggly.” I let out a chuckle, “That’s okay he’s a sweet kid, God knows he needs a laugh.” My eyebrows furrow as I look at the cast and bandages covering his body. I shake my head, “Forensic found any identification?” The dispatchers were rambling out a location so quickly that he couldn’t even catch a name. He was getting a bit tired of calling the boy, the boy. The paramedic, -Martin, Finch reads the name tag- scrolls through his phone. He lets out a sigh and twists his lips around while scrolling through his messages. “Here we go- The victim's name is Will Smith, 16 years old, and attends Overbrook High School, was even an athlete.” Martin trails off looking at the casts and bandages covering the still, giggling boy. I let a smile grace my face when the boy lets out an exaggerated yawn. I sit down on the chair next to the boy and pat his head. I wince at the flinch that accompanied the action. My smile gets softer as I whisper out,
“Go to sleep, Will. I’ll be here when you wake up” I let out a relieved sigh when I see the boy’s eyes drop and finally shut. --I get wheeled out of the house and get placed into something. A car? A bus? A- honestly Will doesn’t care as long as it’s not in his house. He feels the car bob around him as someone walks toward him. So not car, truck? He distantly hears mumbling and light chuckles. The world around him is fuzzy and gray. His head sloppily drops as he turns to look at the human-shaped blob next to his bed. He tries his best to clear the fuzz by blinking, and it works the blob turns into a human wearing a scrub. Not truck then, ambulance. Yea that makes a lot more sense. “H’y, Will. W’re go’ng too p’t an IV in you. - “The rest of the words cut off into mumbling as Will sloppily turns his head the other way around. He feels an oxygen mask go around his face, he subtly flinches at the random action. The air in it smells funny, like fake air. If that’s a thing, like the air that comes out of a balloon. He giggles, that’s funny. Balloon air. Hehe. “There we go.” He hears someone mumble behind him, but he didn’t care. Balloon air was more important. Hehe. His giggles die down as his body starts to feel fuzzy and all the pain -he didn’t even notice before- mixes into the fuzz. He shakes his foot as a stim. It feels weird but good weird. The back doors of the ambulance open as his eyes become increasingly lidded. He hears the IV guy mumble out something about being stable. Will doesn’t care to be honest. The person gets closer to his bed and sighs, “Hey, how’re you feeling?” Will takes the time to answer, how he feels? “Amazing!” Will cheers silently. “My body’s all fuzzy!” Fuzzy. That’s a funny word. Fuzzy, fuzzy, fuzzy. Will starts giggling. He distantly heard them talking about identification and God. He didn’t really care, Will remembered how funny balloon air was so he was back giggling on that. Slowly his giggle dies out, he got tired all of the sudden. His eyes dropped more, and more, and more. And before he knew he was knocked to a quiet line. “Go to sleep, Will. I’ll be here when you wake up” --I wake up after what feels like a century. My head was heavy and my tongue felt swollen in my mouth. Honestly, he would be surprised if it wasn’t after Viola’s outburst. His eyes whipped open. How could he forget about that, there was a beeping sound next to him steadily getting faster. “ey- Hey! Will, you’re okay!” My eyes switched from the wall in front of me to the person next to my bed. My eyes were glued to their chest as I tried to figure out who it was. They were wearing a gray shirt with a pocket on the chest. With lighter gray sweatpants. The skin that wasn’t covered was white? No, a bit darker. My eyes slowly looked up to the person’s nose. My eyes widened with realization once I figured out who it was. It was the police officer. (AN: That sounds a bit ominous without context lol) The one that handcuffed his mom, held him while he cried, and most importantly. It was the police officer that saved him. The lips on the person curved up into a gentle smile. “Hey, it's me. You’re safe. Can I touch you?” Will's mind stopped like a record scratching. He was asking permission to touch him? Is that something people even do? I nodded; how could I say no when he asked? The hand gently grabbed his uncasted arm and placed his hand on the man’s chest. “Breathe with me.” Will nodded, he just now noticed his air was coming in with short gasps. The man took a deep breath in and it almost moved Will’s too, Will’s legs rubbed together under the blanket, this was weird, it was new. Will returned a deep breath, and they exchanged breaths for a few minutes until the man nodded at him as to say ‘Are you okay?’ I nodded and let my hand return to my lap. The small sincere smile was still on the man’s face and it made Will’s stomach flutter with happiness. He couldn’t recall the last time someone older than him looked at him with a smile. A real, genuine one. The man shifted in his seat. “I’m Finch Desmond, I’m autistic and I like plants.” Will’s head tilted to the side still looking at the man’s nose. Was that an introduction? Will cleared his throat. “I’m Will Smith, I have ADHD and I like basketball?” His statement was phrased like a question. Finch chuckled, “Why hello, Will!” Will looked down and his ears twitched twice. Tray told him it was almost his way of blushing. He looked up again when Finch, let out a shaky exhale. His heart sped up a few beats. Finch shook his head a few times from side to side. “Will, I have something to ask you.” Will gulped. “Err, okay?” Finch smiled that sweet smile of his and Will’s body released some tension. Finch rubbed his hands up and down his pants a few times. “I’m going to cut straight to it. You’re a good kid from the small time I’ve known you. And if you would let me, I would like to foster you.” Heh. He would like to do what, to who? Will stiffened, “You’re sure, you mean it?” Finch smiled and sighed through his nose. “I mean it kid; I would be honored to foster you.” Will smiled for the first time in what felt like a million years before muttering, yes. Then again and again, and again in case, Finch didn’t hear. Finch’s head flew back and he laughed. A loud obnoxious, contagious laugh that had Will laughing too.
Will’s laughing died down into giggling, while Finch into chuckling. Will let out a silent sigh. Yeah, he was going to be alright.