“So you haven’t heard the whole story then. That wasn’t some random guy, that was our father.” the moment the words left Jane's mouth the laughing stopped almost instantaneously. They all looked over at us. The guy walked toward us. Once he was at least a foot away, he stopped and smiled. I grabbed Jane’s hand and gave her a look that she understood to say, ‘If this goes sideways, you run and don’t look back.’ and she nodded. The man reaches his hand out.

“My name is James. We could use someone like you, kid. You’re a protector and you’ve got the guts to kill. You could think of me as Peter Pan and my group as the lost boys. You and your brother Jamie would be safe with us.” I studied him for a moment before looking to Jane for consultation. She nodded her head in agreement. She hesitantly reached out and shook his hand.

“That’s nice of you to say but you’ve got it wrong. We didn’t blow the house up.” I took a sharp inhale and everyone turned to look at me. Jane looked concerned. I sighed and signed to her.

[I blew the house up.] her eyes widened.

“Are you kidding me!? You did?” I nodded my head. “Why!?”

[He deserved it for everything he’s done. What he did to mom. What he did to me. He spared you but for how long? I ended it for our sake.]

“You didn’t have to do that. We could have gone to the police if you wanted to do something about it.”

[Putting him in jail would be letting him off easy. He deserved to burn.]

“You could have told me about this.” I scoff at her and cross my arms.

“So you killed the man?” I frowned at him.

[So what if I did?]

“What did he say?” Jane looks over at me and I shrug her off.

“He wants to know why you care.” he ruffles my hair and throws his arm over my shoulder.

“Because I think you’re amazing, pequeño zorro.”

 [My name is Jamie.]