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Chapter 13

Back at home, Yuna and David put the two boys down for a nap. They weren’t terribly surprised that neither boy protested.

They tucked them into their respective beds and sang them a lullaby before they went into their bedroom and changed back into more comfortable clothes for lounging around at home.

David was the first one to slip out of their bedroom and headed into the kitchen to prepare them some of the green tea Yuna preferred to drink.

He set out cups and some biscuits while working through the whole ceremony that one needed to get the tea ready the proper Japanese way.

Yuna stepped up behind him, wrapped her arms around him, and placed a gentle kiss against his shoulder blade.

“Thank you, Love,” she murmured softly before slipping away and settling down at the table, waiting for David to join her.

When he did, he wrapped his hands around the cup and looked at his wife.

“What did the doctor say?” he asked softly.

Yuna took a sip before sighing.

“It’s bad,” she admitted. “From what Doctor Landry figured out, Evan was born to donate bone marrow … a savior baby … those scars on his hip point toward bone marrow aspiration, but doing it to a baby this young is apparently morally questionable. She was quite angry and already got ready to call both CPS and the police to give them what she figured out. It might help to figure out who his parents are, but Doctor Landry already said she wouldn’t trust anyone who puts a child through such an operation to raise them … you’ve seen how afraid Evan was of her even touching the scars, which tells me that they didn’t handle his pain properly in the aftermath because from what Doctor Landry said it’s an incredibly painful process.”

David’s hands tightened around the cup, and he didn’t say anything as his jaw worked through a series of motions before he finally spoke up.

“I seriously hope whoever it was, will have to face the consequences of their actions because no child deserves to be born to be hurt like this and then tossed away in the aftermath,” he said with a voice that was dangerously calm.

“You sound like you want to kill them,” Yuna whispered.

“I’m ready to wring their necks,” he admitted softly. He took a slow sip of his cup and allowed the heat of the tea to calm him down.

Yuna nodded slowly.

“I understand,” she said. “I frankly can’t understand how someone can have a child to use them for … for spare parts and then toss them away once they aren’t needed anymore. Children are to be loved and cherished, but maybe that’s just me.”

“No, Yuna. It isn’t just you,” David replied. “I don’t get it either. But not everyone has children because they want to the way we did. Some see children as accessories, and if they don’t … work, for a better word, as they are expected, they often get tossed away.”

Yuna closed her eyes.

“I don’t even want to think about people who treat children like this … that’s just awful and callous and people like them don’t deserve to have children,” she snapped.

David just nodded softly. He reached across the table and gave her hand a gentle, reassuring squeeze.

“It is what it is,” he said. “Our task right now is to take care of Evan and help him to become healthy and learn to trust the adults in his life again.”

“I think we’re doing a good job. He allows us to touch and carry him without too much of a fuss, though he clearly fears doctors and maybe even nurses. He was very wary about allowing Doctor Landry to touch him as we both saw, but at least we managed to get through the doctor’s visit without a serious meltdown. I was surprised that Shane remained as calm as he did,” Yuna admitted.

David nodded.

“It certainly wasn’t what I expected. No matter how much Shane likes Doctor Mike, he usually doesn’t tolerate those visits because of how many people are around,” he mused.

“I think he was trying to be brave for Evan,” Yuna admitted.

“We can’t allow that to keep happening,” David said. “Shane needs to know that he is allowed to have his own issues, that he is allowed to let Evan know that he has issues of his own.”

Yuna nodded.

“We’ll get a handle on this and we probably should look into having a therapist on hand to help us treat all those issues we’re likely going to face,” she agreed.

David nodded and fell silent. He leaned back in his seat and closed his eyes.

Yuna joined him, and they relaxed in their seats.

Both of them sipped their tea and eventually stood to head into the kitchen to start preparing lunch together.

Shane was the first of the little ones who woke, but he didn’t make his way into the kitchen like he usually did. Instead, the little boy slipped into the room where little Evan slept.

Shane quietly sat down in front of the crib and watched Evan sleep. When he realized that Evan seemed to be having a nightmare, he stood, approached the crib and climbed into it to lay down next to him.

He tucked Evan’s wolf plush toy closer to him and hugged the little boy, humming a soft song as his parents did for him when he didn’t feel great.

It felt good to take care of the younger boy, though he didn’t know if he would want to touch anyone else the way he was currently touching Evan.

He didn’t know how to express it, but he mirrored the gentle touches his parents offered when he was agitated. He didn’t like looking into people’s eyes.

As he hummed, he carded his fingers through Evan’s blond curls, and eventually, he fell asleep beside the younger boy.

He didn’t see his parents watching them from the door, taking pictures, and smiling at the sweet sight of the two boys clinging to each other in sleep.

Chapter 14

Almost seven months passed quietly. The Hollanders took care of their foster son as if he were their own. He joined Shane in all of his activities and slowly relaxed around adults, though he very clearly preferred David and Shane over Yuna.

While the family took care of him, Child Protective Services and the police looked into where Evan had come from.

Doctor Landry’s realizations and the results of her examination gave the police quite a few leads to explore, though it wasn’t easy to get access to the data needed to figure out what kind of doctor would help a family have a child to use for spare parts.

They eventually put word out to the medical community and asked for voluntary help, and the word they got back made the police realize that Evan likely wasn’t a Canadian citizen, though that would make finding his family even harder, given how many options to get over the Canadian border there were.

They looked at the footage from the border stations, but seeing children sitting in the backseats was always hard, and there was little chance to figure out where little Evan had crossed the border.

Eventually, CPS decided to make a choice that would stop the limbo the Hollanders and little Evan were currently experiencing, and so they got another visit from Sophie Bouchard, who came by every week to check in on Evan.

Yuna was the one who opened the door to allow the woman inside.

“Any news?” She asked after greeting her and taking her coat.

They walked side by side into the living room, where Evan and Shane sat side by side at the coffee table with their coloring books and crayons, carefully working on staying inside the lines with their tiny tongues poking out between their lips.

Shane was more successful than Evan, but that was to be expected given that he was a year older and had way better motor control already. But he was still encouraging Evan to try, which was all anyone in this house ever did. No one scolded the little boy when he wasn’t as successful as Shane at something. They always told him he had time to figure it out because he was younger.

Mrs. Bouchard watched the two boys for a few moments while Yuna got them both something to drink.

Yuna sat down beside her and smiled at the sweet sight before focusing on the CPS worker.

“I’ve brought news,” Sophie Bouchard said, her voice soft. “While the police are still looking into the situation, both they and we have run out of routes to explore and figure out where this little boy hails from. The medical community in Canada checked their files and everything came back negative, which tells us that Evan likely is a US citizen, but the Americans aren’t very cooperative, and everyone, including a judge decided that it is in Evan’s best interest to stop keeping the situation in limbo.”

Yuna looked at her with wide eyes.

“Are you saying what I think you are saying?” She questioned, her hand resting on her chest while her gaze flicked toward Evan, who was currently digging through the box of crayons to find a specific color.

Sophie smiled and reached for Yuna’s hand. She gave it a gentle squeeze.

“The judge decided that since the authorities couldn’t figure out where Evan came from, to allow us to go ahead with the adoption you questioned us about a few times. You will soon receive paperwork that needs to be filled out and there will be a couple of visits, and a hearing in court, but since I know that everything here is going well, that you are having Evan in therapy to help him work through the issues being left in front of a fire house and such … and he loves living with you, David, and Shane, I am confident that everything will go well. After everything that little boy has been put through, he deserves some unfettered happiness,” she said, rambling a bit, because she wanted to reassure the foster mother in front of her that her wish of having a second child in her family that wouldn’t be taken away was about to come true.

Yuna gasped and couldn’t stop herself from crying. She grabbed a tissue from the box sitting on the side table and dabbed the tears away before the boys realized what was going on.

“I’m sorry,” she apologized before asking, “Are you really sure they will allow us to adopt him?”

Sophie nodded.

“Something really serious would have to happen before they revoke this choice,” she said.

“I need to tell David,” Yuna said, standing with shaking hands.

Sophie smiled at her.

“I will see myself out,” she said, grabbed her handbag, and was about to walk away when Shane addressed her.

“Mrs. Sophie? Do you want to see our pictures?” he questioned softly.

“I would love to,” she agreed and kneeled beside the boys.

Evan shared a look with Shane and started to explain what kind of pictures they had picked out to draw and which colors they used.

Shane watched Evan like a proud big brother and helped him with the words that were too hard for him to say yet.

“Those are very pretty pictures,” she told the boys. “Do you think I can take some pictures of them?”

They nodded, and she pulled a Polaroid camera from her bag, snapping a few pictures of their drawings and also a couple of the two boys. She left those on the table with a smile before reaching out, running her hand through Shane’s dark and Evan’s light hair with a smile.

“You be good for your parents,” she said. “I need to leave now.”

The two boys smiled and waved goodbye, as she walked away after one last look at Yuna, who was standing in the door to the kitchen, talking on the landline.