"Ivan Allen Collins," I answer.
"Birthday?"
"September twenty-third."
"Place of birth?"
"I don't..." I stop, trying to search my fragmented memories. It was in my file once, I think. A social worker might have mentioned it at some point during one of the placements. "Atlanta, maybe? I think I was born in Atlanta."
"You need to know for sure. Next time you see any paperwork, look for it. Same with your mom's name, your dad's name, anything like that. The more details you have, the easier it'll be to track you down if I need to find you."
I nod, and I'm thinking about all the things I don't know about my own life, all the blank spaces in my history. I don't remember my parents at all—just vague impressions, shadows without faces. I was in the system before I was old enough to hold onto memories, and no one ever bothered to tell me the story of where I came from. I'm justIvan, floating through the world without any roots, without any history, without any anchor.
But I have Jay. That's something. That's everything.
"What about stuff that's not in files?" I ask, a thought occurring to me. "Like, things only we would know?"
Jay looks at me, and a small smile crosses his face. "That's smart. Really smart. Because anybody could look up a file if they had access to the system. But only you and me know the things that happened between us."
"Like a secret code. Something to prove it's really us. Something nobody else could know."
"Exactly." He shifts so he's facing me more fully, his knees pulled up to his chest and his arms wrapped around them. "Let's think of some. Things only you and I would know. Things we could ask each other to prove we're real, that we're really who we say we are."
I think about the last six months, about all the moments we've shared that no one else has seen or knows about. The barn at night, the loft with the rain coming down just like it is now. The first time Jay smiled at me for real and I felt like maybe everything would be okay, like maybe I'd found something worth holding onto. The way he held me after Henderson first took the belt to me.
"The first night I got here," I say slowly, the memory crystal clear in my mind, "you told me I could breathe. Remember? I was pressed against the door and you said I could breathe, that you weren't going to hurt me."
"I remember," Jay says softly, his eyes distant like he's seeing that night too.
"So that could be a question," I continue, warming to the idea. "What did you say to me the first night we met? And the answer is 'you can breathe.'"
Jay nods, and his eyes are bright in the dim light of the barn, reflecting what little moonlight filters through the cracks. "That's good. That's really good. What else?"
"Your safe place," I say, remembering our conversation from weeks ago. "The beach. You told me about the beach you go to in your head when things get bad. White sand and blue water."
"And your safe place is the barn," Jay says quietly. "This barn. With me."
I feel my face get warm and I look down at my hands because I didn't know he knew that, didn't know it was that obvious. I never told him out loud. But of course, he knows. Jay knows everything about me, even the things I don't say out loud, even the things I try to hide.
"What about something physical?" Jay asks, moving on before I can get too embarrassed. "Something we could describe, something that wouldn't change even if we got older? Scars, birthmarks, things like that?"
I think about this for a minute, and then I remember. "Your scar," I say. "On your left hand. Between your thumb and your finger. You said you got it from a broken bottle when you were nine."
Jay holds up his hand, and even in the low light I can see the pale line of the scar, a thin crescent shape against his skin. "Good," he says approvingly. "And you've got that birthmark on your right shoulder blade. Shaped kind of like a kidney bean."
"It's not shaped like a kidney bean," I protest, and I'm almost smiling now despite everything, despite the heavy conversation we're having. "It's shaped like a blob. Just a blob."
"A kidney bean blob." He's smiling too, and for just a second it feels like we're not two kids hiding in a barn from a drunk man who beats us. It feels like we're just friends, just brothers, making up a secret code like any other kids might do, like this is a game instead of a survival strategy.
But then the moment passes, and the weight of what we're really doing settles back over us like a heavy blanket, smothering the brief lightness.
"We should practice. Go over all of it again right now. And then again tomorrow, and the next day, and the day after that. Until we know each other's information as well as we know our own. Better than we know our own."
"Like homework?"
"Better than homework. Way better. This actually matters. This could save us."
So, we practice, there in the loft with the rain drumming overhead. Jay quizzes me on his birthday, his birthplace, his mother's name and maiden name. I quiz him on mine, even though I don't have as many details to give him, even though my history is mostly blank spaces and unknowns.
