Haven 1/5
Title: Haven 1/5
Pairing: Micky/Changmin, Micky/Ricky, Micky/Ricky/Changmin
Rating: NC-17
Disclaimer: They are only mine to play with in fanfictions.
Summary: A strange Korean boy walks into a cafe in the middle of BFE Arizona. He stirs up a rife of trouble and a gaggle of feelings that Micky should know better than to act on.
Warning: incest, underage (Changmin is 16 and Ricky is 17; Micky is 20)
A/N: This fic takes place in the United States, where Ricky and Micky are Americans and don't speak Korean. Oh, and BFE stands for "Butt Fucking Egypt" which is a term that means the middle of nowhere.
Fanart by crazyaboutchun
Part 1:
Pink and pale orange strips of clouds brightened the gray sky. The vivid neon glow from the flashing OPEN sign faded as the dawn light spread over the desert. The dry weeds in the parking lot blew in a violent gust of wind.
Micky stood behind the counter and watched the sun rise through the windows. Shadows painted the booths in stripes. He held a warm cup of coffee to his hand and checked the clock. 5:58. The sun was rising sooner and sooner every day.
Right on schedule, a dusty blue pickup truck pulled off the paved road and into the dirt that resembled a parking lot.
Micky set his own coffee down behind the counter, shouted at Rafael that the crotchety old Harrison was right on time. Rafael saluted him, head bobbing to music that came out of the earbud in his left ear. Micky poured more coffee into a green mug and Rafael started on hash and eggs.
“Morning, Park,” Harrison rumbled.
Micky smiled. “Good morning, Mr. Harrison.” He set the coffee down just as Harrison sat down, and the routine of his morning started.
At precisely seven, Ricky stumbled into the café, yawning and smiling hello. Again, Micky had a cup of coffee ready, doctored specifically for his younger brother tastes and the two of them, with Rafael, handled the morning rush of farmers in desperate need of coffee and families out for breakfast on a Saturday. Their mother arrived at eleven and the three of them easily handled the lunch rush. At three, too exhausted to eat, Micky left the diner and biked the mile and a half home. He stumbled into their trailer and collapsed on his and Ricky’s bed and slept.
His alarm blared at two. Moaning, Micky tried to roll to the side, and found an arm firmly around his middle. He smiled and reached to shut the alarm off and then rolled over so his face was right next to his brother’s. Micky smiled and watched him sleep. He ran his finger over his cheek. Ricky’s face scrunched in irritation and Micky bit his lip against a smile. He leaned over and pressed a kiss to Ricky’s lips, and the muscles in Ricky’s face relaxed and he almost smiled, exhaling softly. Micky wanted to push him to the bed and wake him up with more than a simple kiss, but Ricky rarely slept well, and Micky definitely should not be thinking of his brother that way no matter what the younger one kept hinting at.
Carefully, Micky lifted Ricky’s arm off him and climbed from the bed. He left the bedroom and went down the short hallway to shower and get ready for what he considered his day.
Showered and dressed in jeans and a flannel shirt, he left the trailer and headed back to the café. He yawned on his way. The sound of his tires on the road was the only disturbance in the darkness of night. The moon sat midway in the sky, a thin crescent of blinding light.
Micky saw the flashing red neon open sign before he saw anything else. Their main sign, the one with their name, had shorted out months ago, and his mother was trying to get the money saved to have it fixed. It wasn’t cheap.
He couldn’t read the blue letters on the white background until he was almost at the café.
Oasis Café. A haven in the desert.
Micky did not agree with that proclamation, from his point of view, but it was all he knew. He’d been serving the same customers at this diner since he was old enough to carry a plate without dropping it.
He leaned his bike against the railing of the walkway. He walked up the metal platform and entered the empty café.
Micky smiled at his mother, and it was her turn to hand him a cup of coffee. Black.
“How’s Ricky?”
“Sleeping actually,” he replied. “Or he was when I left.”
She smiled and pressed a kiss to his cheek. “Thank you. You both mean so much to me.”
“I know, Mom.” He hugged her and went into the kitchen. He was on cook duty until Rafael showed up at five. He didn’t have much to do. At this time of the morning, it was mainly prep work for the rest of the day. When his mom was here alone, she did the cooking and waitressing.
Micky worried about her sometimes, but back in her youth, she’d been taught martial arts and she still liked to toss the broom around. She once told him that when it came right down to it, everything could be considered and used as a weapon.
But she wasn’t alone long. Alicia, the night cook, went home at one, and he came in at three. She stayed only long enough to make sure the dishes were done and everything was ready for breakfast, and then Micky was left to watch the sunrise again.
But it was only four-thirty when the first customer walked through the door and threw Micky’s entire schedule off. He couldn’t remember the last time someone had come in before Mr. Harrison.
He hurried from the back, the bells on the door tinkling and urging him to hurry.
The person in his café was tall and had his back facing Micky.
“Hello,” Micky said. “Welcome to the Oasis Café.”
He spun around, and Micky tried not to let his surprise show that the other was Asian. There were not a lot of Asians in the middle of the American desert. The boy was really tall, arms and legs too long, gangly and awkward. Micky was sure he was Ricky’s age. Maybe younger. His hair curled over his ears and his face still a bit pudgy with youth. His ears stuck out. He was really cute, and Micky knew he’d be gorgeous and handsome and probably even taller in a few years.
The boy bowed at the waist and said, “Hello. I …” He stopped and bit his lip, and Micky wondered if he spoke English.
“Coffee?” the boy said, making it a question, but it was accented enough that it sounded like “cappe.”
Micky smiled and waved at the counter. “Sure. Have a seat.”
The boy looked warily at the barstools, and then out the window.
“You can sit at a table if you want.”
He looked over at Micky, confused, and Micky smiled and pointed and said, “Table. Sit at the table.”
Comprehension morphed his face into a bright smile and he hurried to the farthest table, back in the corner, eyes on the world outside. Micky stared at him for a little longer. The flashing neon sign painted his skin red and shadowed the obvious curve of his jaw line and neck. Micky cleared his throat, and then turned away.
Micky poured a cup of coffee into a mug and grabbed a small bowl of creamers. He took them both to the young man’s table and smiled at him.
The young man swallowed nervously, so Micky didn’t linger, heading to the kitchen to make himself some breakfast before the crowd came in. He poured a single pancake on the griddle and dropped two eggs next to it. While those cooked for a few seconds, he added a spoonful of hash browns.
In less than five minutes, he had his breakfast.
But on a normal morning, he sat where the young man sat. Instead, he sat at the counter and ate as fast as he could.
When he stood up, he caught the young man staring, and Micky realized he hadn’t even asked if he wanted more than coffee. He was so used to his regular customers just shouting at him.
“Are you going to order something?” he asked.
The boy looked confused again.
Micky sighed and tried to think of an easy way to say it. “Eat. Are you going to eat? Food. Do you want food?” Micky mimed eating.
The boy blushed and shook his head, but then his stomach grumbled loudly in the quiet café.
“What do you want to eat?” he asked.
The boy shook his head again, face scrunching in confusion. He sighed, and then pulled out his wallet and showed Micky that he only had two American dollars. The rest of the money was foreign.
Micky shook his head. “Don’t worry about it. What do you want?”
The other shook his head.
With a sigh, Micky went to the back and thought about what his mom had said about Asian culture. She had been born in South Korea and followed his father here to the U.S. after only knowing him for a month. What a mistake that had been.
Knowing that his mom would be mad for giving the boy free meat, he threw some diced ham and bacon on the grill anyway. He poured two pancakes onto the griddle, and then added some peppers and onions to the meat. After they sizzled, he added the eggs mixture. He flipped the pancakes and then the omelet, cursing when it broke, but he had added a lot of meat into it. Still, he managed to salvage it into a clump of eggs. He had a feeling that the boy wouldn’t know the difference.
Micky plated the food, grabbed butter and syrup for the pancakes, and then went over to the table.
The boy seemed surprised to see him and then his eyes widened when Micky put the food down in front of him. He shook his head rapidly.
“Eat,” Micky said. “Don’t worry about money.”
The boy’s coffee was empty. Micky tapped the cup and said, “More?” while miming pouring coffee.
The boy nodded. “K-k-kamsah-amni-Thank you. Thank you.”
Micky’s eyes widened at the familiar yet foreign word. “Korean? You’re Korean.”
The boy nodded quickly and said something in a language that Micky did not speak.
Micky made a face and said, “I don’t speak Korean. My mom … omma … is Korean.”
The boy nodded in understanding and said something in the foreign language.
Micky blinked and said, “Sure. Now eat.”
The boy wasted no time diving into the omelet. Micky refilled his coffee.
A few minutes later, Rafael showed up, bobbing his head in time to the beat echoing through his headphones. He stopped in surprise and stared at the boy. “Oh wow. There are more Asians in the world than just your family. I had no idea.”
“Shut up, shithead.”
Rafael laughed and poured his own coffee.
An hour later, Micky realized that he hadn’t watched the sunrise through the glass. He’d watched it brighten the boy’s skin, darken the shadow on his jaw, and paint his dark hair with golden highlights.
Micky jumped when Mr. Harrison suddenly demanded to know where his coffee was. Micky hurried to pour it and set it at his normal seat. And his day fell back into pattern. With too many glances at the boy in the corner.
The sun was shining right into the café when the boy suddenly stood up, alarmed and sputtering something in Korean. Micky moved to him quickly. The other patrons in the café had already ordered and he’d only been talking to Mrs. Cornwall.
“What’s wrong?” Micky demanded, grabbing the other’s shoulders.
His eyes were darting everywhere around the small diner and then out the window. Micky looked out the window and saw a black car that definitely didn’t belong in the parking lot full of pickup trucks. An older Asian man in a suit climbed out of the back and stared at the café. Fortunately, the sun was shining directly in the windows, and from experience, Micky knew the man couldn’t see inside. The boy really started panicking. And jabbering in Korean.
“Well, for heaven’s sake, Micky,” Abigail Jones said. “Get the kid out of here. He’s obviously hiding.”
Micky nodded and said, “Come with me.”
The kid was blabbering and didn’t hear or understand him, so Micky grabbed his arm and yanked him back around the counter. He pointed to a corner and said, “Hide.”
The boy’s eyes were wide with fear and Micky rolled his eyes and pushed his shoulders, and finally the kid understood and his knees folded and he curled up on himself in the corner, shaking. Micky put his finger to his lips in what he hoped was a universal sign for the kid to be quiet. The kid nodded.
Micky grabbed a towel and wiped down a counter just as the door opened.
The café went even more silent, and Micky did his best not to roll his eyes. Seriously, was being Asian such a novelty around here?
“Hi,” Micky said, smiling. “Welcome to Café Oasis, can I-”
One of the men held up his hand and cut Micky off. He reached into his suit jacket and Micky saw more than one regular patron shift in his seat. All he retrieved was a piece of paper.
No. A picture.
The man shoved it in Micky’s face and demanded, “You see this boy? Tall. Korean. Pretty boy.”
Micky’s eyes went wide. He was staring at what couldn’t be anything but a school picture of the boy, but back before he was skinny. His hair was cut short around his head and his ears stuck out even more. Round cheeks. Eyes crinkled in a forced smile. Poor kid.
Micky shook his head. “No, I haven’t seen him.”
“He not here,” the man said again, lips pursing.
“Nope. Not here.” Micky shook his head again.
“Other people. They see him?”
Micky looked around the café and saw all eyes on him. He cleared his throat. “Any of you guys see some Asian kid around here besides me?”
They shook their heads, some of them spoke. The two men looked around the café.
“Hey, wait,” Rafael suddenly said, and Micky turned to him, his back to the Asian guys. He did his best to not look down at the poor shuddering boy.
“This kid pretty tall?” Rafael asked.
The man turned to his comrade and then nodded. “You see him.”
Rafael shrugged. “I don’t know, man, but at about five-thirty someone walked by the diner. All I could tell was that he was tall.”
“You see him,” the man said again, more urgently.
Rafael held his hands up. “I don’t know who it was, but he was walking and he didn’t stop. It was dark out and all I saw was that he was tall and he was wearing a white shirt.”
“What direction?”
Rafael pointed south. “He was walking that way.”
“He not stop?”
“No, he didn’t stop.”
The first man pulled out another card. “You see him. You call me.”
“Yeah, sure,” Rafael said, taking the card and handing it to Micky.
The two men nodded and left the café.
Micky let out a harsh breath and then slugged Rafael in the shoulder. “What the actual fuck, man?”
“Micky, watch your mouth,” Mrs. Jones said.
Micky winced and apologized.
“Hey, shut up, man,” Rafael said. “It got them to leave. Those guys are like some Asian mafia or some shit.”
“Just because they were wearing suits doesn’t automatically make them part of the mafia,” Micky said. He looked out the window and sighed in relief as the black car left the parking lot, going south. He looked down at the card. Foreign language. Weird lines, boxes and circles. Some of it looked like English letters. And some numbers. Micky had a feeling it was an international telephone number.
A whimper pulled his gaze to the kid still cowering under the counter.
“Damn it, I need my mother,” Micky muttered. Louder he told the patrons to get anything they needed from Rafael. He reached out to the boy, and tentatively, he took Micky’s hand and let Micky pull him to his feet.
Micky took him into the back corner, where his mom had nothing more than a chair and a desk and some filing cabinets.
“Stay here,” Micky said, and pointed at the chair.
The boy nodded, and then Micky noticed he was shivering. It had been cold out this morning, and the boy didn’t have a coat. Micky quickly grabbed his sweater and handed it to him.
“Th-thank you,” the boy stammered, and then said it again.
“No problem, kid.”
The boy sat on the chair, curled up with Micky’s sweater. Micky pondered him for a moment and then grabbed Rafael’s hoody and threw it over him as well. The boy smiled at him and Micky’s heart twisted. What had this kid gone through to have him run away? Micky couldn’t wait for his mom to get here and tell him.
Part 2: Generosity
.
Pairing: Micky/Changmin, Micky/Ricky, Micky/Ricky/Changmin
Rating: NC-17
Disclaimer: They are only mine to play with in fanfictions.
Summary: A strange Korean boy walks into a cafe in the middle of BFE Arizona. He stirs up a rife of trouble and a gaggle of feelings that Micky should know better than to act on.
Warning: incest, underage (Changmin is 16 and Ricky is 17; Micky is 20)
A/N: This fic takes place in the United States, where Ricky and Micky are Americans and don't speak Korean. Oh, and BFE stands for "Butt Fucking Egypt" which is a term that means the middle of nowhere.
Fanart by crazyaboutchun
Part 1:
Pink and pale orange strips of clouds brightened the gray sky. The vivid neon glow from the flashing OPEN sign faded as the dawn light spread over the desert. The dry weeds in the parking lot blew in a violent gust of wind.
Micky stood behind the counter and watched the sun rise through the windows. Shadows painted the booths in stripes. He held a warm cup of coffee to his hand and checked the clock. 5:58. The sun was rising sooner and sooner every day.
Right on schedule, a dusty blue pickup truck pulled off the paved road and into the dirt that resembled a parking lot.
Micky set his own coffee down behind the counter, shouted at Rafael that the crotchety old Harrison was right on time. Rafael saluted him, head bobbing to music that came out of the earbud in his left ear. Micky poured more coffee into a green mug and Rafael started on hash and eggs.
“Morning, Park,” Harrison rumbled.
Micky smiled. “Good morning, Mr. Harrison.” He set the coffee down just as Harrison sat down, and the routine of his morning started.
At precisely seven, Ricky stumbled into the café, yawning and smiling hello. Again, Micky had a cup of coffee ready, doctored specifically for his younger brother tastes and the two of them, with Rafael, handled the morning rush of farmers in desperate need of coffee and families out for breakfast on a Saturday. Their mother arrived at eleven and the three of them easily handled the lunch rush. At three, too exhausted to eat, Micky left the diner and biked the mile and a half home. He stumbled into their trailer and collapsed on his and Ricky’s bed and slept.
His alarm blared at two. Moaning, Micky tried to roll to the side, and found an arm firmly around his middle. He smiled and reached to shut the alarm off and then rolled over so his face was right next to his brother’s. Micky smiled and watched him sleep. He ran his finger over his cheek. Ricky’s face scrunched in irritation and Micky bit his lip against a smile. He leaned over and pressed a kiss to Ricky’s lips, and the muscles in Ricky’s face relaxed and he almost smiled, exhaling softly. Micky wanted to push him to the bed and wake him up with more than a simple kiss, but Ricky rarely slept well, and Micky definitely should not be thinking of his brother that way no matter what the younger one kept hinting at.
Carefully, Micky lifted Ricky’s arm off him and climbed from the bed. He left the bedroom and went down the short hallway to shower and get ready for what he considered his day.
Showered and dressed in jeans and a flannel shirt, he left the trailer and headed back to the café. He yawned on his way. The sound of his tires on the road was the only disturbance in the darkness of night. The moon sat midway in the sky, a thin crescent of blinding light.
Micky saw the flashing red neon open sign before he saw anything else. Their main sign, the one with their name, had shorted out months ago, and his mother was trying to get the money saved to have it fixed. It wasn’t cheap.
He couldn’t read the blue letters on the white background until he was almost at the café.
Oasis Café. A haven in the desert.
Micky did not agree with that proclamation, from his point of view, but it was all he knew. He’d been serving the same customers at this diner since he was old enough to carry a plate without dropping it.
He leaned his bike against the railing of the walkway. He walked up the metal platform and entered the empty café.
Micky smiled at his mother, and it was her turn to hand him a cup of coffee. Black.
“How’s Ricky?”
“Sleeping actually,” he replied. “Or he was when I left.”
She smiled and pressed a kiss to his cheek. “Thank you. You both mean so much to me.”
“I know, Mom.” He hugged her and went into the kitchen. He was on cook duty until Rafael showed up at five. He didn’t have much to do. At this time of the morning, it was mainly prep work for the rest of the day. When his mom was here alone, she did the cooking and waitressing.
Micky worried about her sometimes, but back in her youth, she’d been taught martial arts and she still liked to toss the broom around. She once told him that when it came right down to it, everything could be considered and used as a weapon.
But she wasn’t alone long. Alicia, the night cook, went home at one, and he came in at three. She stayed only long enough to make sure the dishes were done and everything was ready for breakfast, and then Micky was left to watch the sunrise again.
But it was only four-thirty when the first customer walked through the door and threw Micky’s entire schedule off. He couldn’t remember the last time someone had come in before Mr. Harrison.
He hurried from the back, the bells on the door tinkling and urging him to hurry.
The person in his café was tall and had his back facing Micky.
“Hello,” Micky said. “Welcome to the Oasis Café.”
He spun around, and Micky tried not to let his surprise show that the other was Asian. There were not a lot of Asians in the middle of the American desert. The boy was really tall, arms and legs too long, gangly and awkward. Micky was sure he was Ricky’s age. Maybe younger. His hair curled over his ears and his face still a bit pudgy with youth. His ears stuck out. He was really cute, and Micky knew he’d be gorgeous and handsome and probably even taller in a few years.
The boy bowed at the waist and said, “Hello. I …” He stopped and bit his lip, and Micky wondered if he spoke English.
“Coffee?” the boy said, making it a question, but it was accented enough that it sounded like “cappe.”
Micky smiled and waved at the counter. “Sure. Have a seat.”
The boy looked warily at the barstools, and then out the window.
“You can sit at a table if you want.”
He looked over at Micky, confused, and Micky smiled and pointed and said, “Table. Sit at the table.”
Comprehension morphed his face into a bright smile and he hurried to the farthest table, back in the corner, eyes on the world outside. Micky stared at him for a little longer. The flashing neon sign painted his skin red and shadowed the obvious curve of his jaw line and neck. Micky cleared his throat, and then turned away.
Micky poured a cup of coffee into a mug and grabbed a small bowl of creamers. He took them both to the young man’s table and smiled at him.
The young man swallowed nervously, so Micky didn’t linger, heading to the kitchen to make himself some breakfast before the crowd came in. He poured a single pancake on the griddle and dropped two eggs next to it. While those cooked for a few seconds, he added a spoonful of hash browns.
In less than five minutes, he had his breakfast.
But on a normal morning, he sat where the young man sat. Instead, he sat at the counter and ate as fast as he could.
When he stood up, he caught the young man staring, and Micky realized he hadn’t even asked if he wanted more than coffee. He was so used to his regular customers just shouting at him.
“Are you going to order something?” he asked.
The boy looked confused again.
Micky sighed and tried to think of an easy way to say it. “Eat. Are you going to eat? Food. Do you want food?” Micky mimed eating.
The boy blushed and shook his head, but then his stomach grumbled loudly in the quiet café.
“What do you want to eat?” he asked.
The boy shook his head again, face scrunching in confusion. He sighed, and then pulled out his wallet and showed Micky that he only had two American dollars. The rest of the money was foreign.
Micky shook his head. “Don’t worry about it. What do you want?”
The other shook his head.
With a sigh, Micky went to the back and thought about what his mom had said about Asian culture. She had been born in South Korea and followed his father here to the U.S. after only knowing him for a month. What a mistake that had been.
Knowing that his mom would be mad for giving the boy free meat, he threw some diced ham and bacon on the grill anyway. He poured two pancakes onto the griddle, and then added some peppers and onions to the meat. After they sizzled, he added the eggs mixture. He flipped the pancakes and then the omelet, cursing when it broke, but he had added a lot of meat into it. Still, he managed to salvage it into a clump of eggs. He had a feeling that the boy wouldn’t know the difference.
Micky plated the food, grabbed butter and syrup for the pancakes, and then went over to the table.
The boy seemed surprised to see him and then his eyes widened when Micky put the food down in front of him. He shook his head rapidly.
“Eat,” Micky said. “Don’t worry about money.”
The boy’s coffee was empty. Micky tapped the cup and said, “More?” while miming pouring coffee.
The boy nodded. “K-k-kamsah-amni-Thank you. Thank you.”
Micky’s eyes widened at the familiar yet foreign word. “Korean? You’re Korean.”
The boy nodded quickly and said something in a language that Micky did not speak.
Micky made a face and said, “I don’t speak Korean. My mom … omma … is Korean.”
The boy nodded in understanding and said something in the foreign language.
Micky blinked and said, “Sure. Now eat.”
The boy wasted no time diving into the omelet. Micky refilled his coffee.
A few minutes later, Rafael showed up, bobbing his head in time to the beat echoing through his headphones. He stopped in surprise and stared at the boy. “Oh wow. There are more Asians in the world than just your family. I had no idea.”
“Shut up, shithead.”
Rafael laughed and poured his own coffee.
An hour later, Micky realized that he hadn’t watched the sunrise through the glass. He’d watched it brighten the boy’s skin, darken the shadow on his jaw, and paint his dark hair with golden highlights.
Micky jumped when Mr. Harrison suddenly demanded to know where his coffee was. Micky hurried to pour it and set it at his normal seat. And his day fell back into pattern. With too many glances at the boy in the corner.
The sun was shining right into the café when the boy suddenly stood up, alarmed and sputtering something in Korean. Micky moved to him quickly. The other patrons in the café had already ordered and he’d only been talking to Mrs. Cornwall.
“What’s wrong?” Micky demanded, grabbing the other’s shoulders.
His eyes were darting everywhere around the small diner and then out the window. Micky looked out the window and saw a black car that definitely didn’t belong in the parking lot full of pickup trucks. An older Asian man in a suit climbed out of the back and stared at the café. Fortunately, the sun was shining directly in the windows, and from experience, Micky knew the man couldn’t see inside. The boy really started panicking. And jabbering in Korean.
“Well, for heaven’s sake, Micky,” Abigail Jones said. “Get the kid out of here. He’s obviously hiding.”
Micky nodded and said, “Come with me.”
The kid was blabbering and didn’t hear or understand him, so Micky grabbed his arm and yanked him back around the counter. He pointed to a corner and said, “Hide.”
The boy’s eyes were wide with fear and Micky rolled his eyes and pushed his shoulders, and finally the kid understood and his knees folded and he curled up on himself in the corner, shaking. Micky put his finger to his lips in what he hoped was a universal sign for the kid to be quiet. The kid nodded.
Micky grabbed a towel and wiped down a counter just as the door opened.
The café went even more silent, and Micky did his best not to roll his eyes. Seriously, was being Asian such a novelty around here?
“Hi,” Micky said, smiling. “Welcome to Café Oasis, can I-”
One of the men held up his hand and cut Micky off. He reached into his suit jacket and Micky saw more than one regular patron shift in his seat. All he retrieved was a piece of paper.
No. A picture.
The man shoved it in Micky’s face and demanded, “You see this boy? Tall. Korean. Pretty boy.”
Micky’s eyes went wide. He was staring at what couldn’t be anything but a school picture of the boy, but back before he was skinny. His hair was cut short around his head and his ears stuck out even more. Round cheeks. Eyes crinkled in a forced smile. Poor kid.
Micky shook his head. “No, I haven’t seen him.”
“He not here,” the man said again, lips pursing.
“Nope. Not here.” Micky shook his head again.
“Other people. They see him?”
Micky looked around the café and saw all eyes on him. He cleared his throat. “Any of you guys see some Asian kid around here besides me?”
They shook their heads, some of them spoke. The two men looked around the café.
“Hey, wait,” Rafael suddenly said, and Micky turned to him, his back to the Asian guys. He did his best to not look down at the poor shuddering boy.
“This kid pretty tall?” Rafael asked.
The man turned to his comrade and then nodded. “You see him.”
Rafael shrugged. “I don’t know, man, but at about five-thirty someone walked by the diner. All I could tell was that he was tall.”
“You see him,” the man said again, more urgently.
Rafael held his hands up. “I don’t know who it was, but he was walking and he didn’t stop. It was dark out and all I saw was that he was tall and he was wearing a white shirt.”
“What direction?”
Rafael pointed south. “He was walking that way.”
“He not stop?”
“No, he didn’t stop.”
The first man pulled out another card. “You see him. You call me.”
“Yeah, sure,” Rafael said, taking the card and handing it to Micky.
The two men nodded and left the café.
Micky let out a harsh breath and then slugged Rafael in the shoulder. “What the actual fuck, man?”
“Micky, watch your mouth,” Mrs. Jones said.
Micky winced and apologized.
“Hey, shut up, man,” Rafael said. “It got them to leave. Those guys are like some Asian mafia or some shit.”
“Just because they were wearing suits doesn’t automatically make them part of the mafia,” Micky said. He looked out the window and sighed in relief as the black car left the parking lot, going south. He looked down at the card. Foreign language. Weird lines, boxes and circles. Some of it looked like English letters. And some numbers. Micky had a feeling it was an international telephone number.
A whimper pulled his gaze to the kid still cowering under the counter.
“Damn it, I need my mother,” Micky muttered. Louder he told the patrons to get anything they needed from Rafael. He reached out to the boy, and tentatively, he took Micky’s hand and let Micky pull him to his feet.
Micky took him into the back corner, where his mom had nothing more than a chair and a desk and some filing cabinets.
“Stay here,” Micky said, and pointed at the chair.
The boy nodded, and then Micky noticed he was shivering. It had been cold out this morning, and the boy didn’t have a coat. Micky quickly grabbed his sweater and handed it to him.
“Th-thank you,” the boy stammered, and then said it again.
“No problem, kid.”
The boy sat on the chair, curled up with Micky’s sweater. Micky pondered him for a moment and then grabbed Rafael’s hoody and threw it over him as well. The boy smiled at him and Micky’s heart twisted. What had this kid gone through to have him run away? Micky couldn’t wait for his mom to get here and tell him.
Part 2: Generosity
.