My mentor grabbed his tattered coat out of the large closet along the eastern wall, specially built for a large group of people by the man himself, and shrugged into it.
“I’m leaving, Sam,” Laurence informed the boy hiding silently in the corner of the room. “If I’m not back before nine, please don’t give Emerson a hard time. He’s helping me out with the bedtime routine tonight, and it’s a lot of responsibility. The last thing he needs is to have to go searching the woods for a missing little boy.”
With that, Laurence led us back outside. We walked toward the van in the driveway as our warm breath made white clouds of ghostly vapor in the frigid air.
When I motioned to open the passenger side door for Millie, she waved me off. “I’m going to sit in the back so you can catch up with Laurence. I want to listen as I enjoy the beautiful view.”
I smiled at my thoughtful mate and helped her into the back of the van. Before she could sit, she had to move a stuffed bear out of the way.
Laurence started up the engine, and it sputtered to life like it was on its last leg. “Sorry, that’s Sam’s favorite stuffy. Just set it aside and I’ll bring it in the house when we get back.”
“Is that the little redheaded boy who answered the door?” Millie asked, gently setting the child’s beloved toy on the seat beside her.
“Yeah,” my mentor answered with a smile. “He came to Cascia House six months ago. He’s struggling to adjust to all the changes and hasn’t spoken a word to anyone yet.”
Millie gasped, looking down at the boy’s toy with renewed interest. “That’s terrible! Do you know what happened to him?”
Laurence shook his head as he pulled out of the driveway. “Not really. Only bits and pieces. His father doesn’t have any pack affiliation, and the boy was living with his human mother. When she got evicted from her home, she fell pretty heavily into drugs and left the boy for days on end to fend for himself with near strangers. His father brought him here when she dropped him off at his apartment and never returned. He was practically feral when we first met.”
“Why didn’t his father take care of him?” She asked, clearly upset on the boy’s behalf.
“He should have, but he had his own demons to wrestle with, and he didn’t feel he could give the boy a life he deserved. I try not to judge when people come to my doorstep asking for help. The only thing that matters at the end of the day is that the children are safe and cared for.”
I’d always respected that about Laurence. He was a problem solver that didn’t dwell on the mistakes of the past. He worked tirelessly on behalf of the children in his care, keeping their best interest at heart. He never turned anyone away or bashed the parents of the children who were left behind, even when many of them deserved it.
“That poor, baby. No wonder he doesn’t want to talk to anyone. He’s in too much pain to properly express himself,” Millie reasoned.
Laurence’s mouth pressed into a straight line. “I wish I could say it was a rare quality of the boys who end up with me, but it’s not. Hopefully, with some time and patience, Sam will speak again. If he doesn’t, that’s okay, too. As soon as he’s ready, I’ve got a ware friend who’s a child therapist. His name is Tate. He spent some time at Cascia House when his family was going through some hard times a while back. He works with kids of shifters that need a little extra TLC. I swear, he can work wonders with traumatized children and makes more progress in days than I could in years.”
That was the thing about Laurence. He’d touched so many lives and helped so many people over the years, he’d managed to create a web of good karma that had a ripple effect of goodness and kindness across the globe. Thirty years after he’d founded Cascia House, the founder had a seemingly endless network of people who were willing to assist him for all he’d done for them and their families. In essence, Laurence was the physical embodiment of the butterfly effect, and the best kind of shifter to know in a troubled world: a selfless one.
As Laurence drove to the restaurant, he chatted about what former members of Cascia House had been up to. The more we talked, the more impressed I was by my mentor. Somehow,he had time for all of us. Though some children from the group home had disappeared once they came of age, most stayed in contact with the supportive ware. Seeing him as a father to help guide them when life’s tough choices inevitably came our way.
“Have you heard from Logan?” Laurence asked then, his eyes darting from the road over to my face.
I wasn’t sure how to answer that, so I started at the beginning. I told him about my brother abruptly showing up, before abruptly departing.
“I don’t say this lightly, Ethan,” my mentor began, “but I’m not sure Logan can be of much help to you. He’s had a lot of problems with the local shifter community. From what I’m being told, he owes a lot of people money, the kind who don’t take I-owe-you’s or send someone to collections to get reimbursed.”
I wish I could say I was surprised, but I wasn’t. My brother had many faults. Mix that with his rough upbringing and the shifter tendency toward risk-taking and violence, and that made for a volatile cocktail of poor life choices and sketchy acquaintances.
“Since he disappeared without a word, I’m not sure it’s something I have to worry about. It would have been nice to have my brother’s support with this. You know, when I needed him most,” I spoke earnestly. “I think I’ve learned my lesson though. You can’t get something from someone who doesn’t have anything to give.”
Laurence didn’t try to deny the obvious or sugarcoat the truth. “All shifters need community, Ethan. When we live outside of our packs in constant survival mode, it’s too easy to forget the needs of others and focus solely on ourselves.”
Like always, my mentor had succinctly summed up the crux of Logan’s situation. “Since our parents’ death, my brother has been living by himself, for himself. I don’t think he knows, or can adapt to, any other way.”
“He’d have to want it, to do it,” Laurence quietly added. “Only time will tell if he does. Nothing we say or do can change another’s will. Love doesn’t fix anything. It doesn’t quell the storm. It simply gives us the strength to endure it.”
Damn, I missed this man. He didn’t say much, but everything he did hit hard and resonated so deeply. I was incredibly lucky to have him in my life. If I hadn’t, I might have turned out like my brother. Cold. Self-serving. Angry. Totally undeserving of a mate like Millie. If that wasn’t a warning about the dangers of selfishness, I don’t know what was.
We turned into the restaurant, and I spotted our rental parked amidst the sea of cars. I texted Flint to let him know we were here. He was waiting out front for us before we’d even cut the engine.
As soon as we reached my brother, I could tell something was wrong. The look on his face, or rather, the blank landscape that was his usually expressive countenance, told me there was something amiss.
“What is it?” I demanded, my arm protectively banded around Millie’s shoulders.
Flint didn’t mince words. “Jenny’s inside. She’s alone. She’s begging to talk with Millie before we go to the compound tomorrow. She claims it’s urgent.”
