Chapter Three

After facing a trauma Gin Moreno will never forget, he begins to wonder what value his life really has to offer. Well, now it's his time to prove it. Will it be him or them?

“This place isn’t nearly as nice as our townhome, but the amount we pay for day sure is a lot cheaper. And they give discounts for long stays. What do you think?”

Three days had passed since the attack and at first they stayed with Olivia’s mother. In normal situations, an aging grandmother would love to have her daughter and grandson live with her during hard times. Except, she was not an aging grandmother. Several generations of teenage pregnancy lead her to being a grandmother in her 30s. The last time Olivia stayed with her mother was when she had just turned 14 and announced her very own unplanned and underaged pregnancy.

With their home still being a crime scene, they could not retrieve any of their belongings and only had the clothes on their back and whatever they could find from Good Will with the little change carried in their pockets.

“Live in this motel?” Gin asked looking around. Every fabric in the room had light colored stains on them. For a moment, he had to wonder if he preferred white or dark stains. Part of the wallpaper above the double bed that they would have to share looked as if it had been ripped by a bear, or a prostitute that was great at acting. Gin had no intentions of being ungrateful or forgetting their roots, but he had gotten used to having his very own room, something he never had until the townhouse.

“Yeah. We’ve done it before. Though, you might not remember. You were just a baby. Did I ever tell you that story?”

Gin shook his head. It was obvious that his mother was barely older than him and he could never ignore that fact that she struggled to provide for him. All of this he had known for years, but she had not started opening up about her experiences until Gin turned 13. It was likely her way of reminding him to always use birth control even though he did not like being reminded that his birth is the reason why their lives have been so hard. He was older and already knew or would find out eventually so Olivia saw no point in hiding things.

“My dad was never really around so I didn’t have anywhere else to go when my mom kicked me out. I slept on friends’ couches the whole time I was pregnant with you. Their parents felt bad for me and my friends thought it was cool that I was having a baby. But then it wasn’t cool anymore and I was homeless again. Luckily, my mom wasn’t a total monster. She gave me the child support my dad paid every week and I used that to live in motels with you until you were 2.”

“That long?”

“Uh huh. Then once I was 16, I was finally old enough to get a job.”

“I remember that. Then we moved into the trailer in that old woman’s backyard. She’d invite us over for dinner every night.”

“I’m convinced that every old woman named Barbra is a saint.”

“She’s the only old woman you knew named Barbra.”

“Yeah, but she was so nice. And she loved babysitting you. I could never turn down free childcare.”

For the first time in days, they were smiling. Times were hard, but looking back at the struggles they have gotten passed not only made them stronger, but closer. They were less like mother and son and more like brother and sister.

They sat beside each other on the bed made more out of metal than cushion as they talked. Talking was something that both needed to do to heal, but neither had the courage to bring up the attack. They were treating the incident just like another eviction.

There was a long moment of silence.

“Don’t you wish there were things you could do-over?” Gin asked. That was a question he asked frequently but always had different ways of asking. For years, he had always wondered about what his mother truly thought about his very existence. He knew she loved him, but also knew that she would be much better off without him.

“Of course, but getting pregnant at 14 isn’t one of them,” Olivia answered seeing through Gin’s question once again.

“That’s a dumb thing to say.”

“No it’s not. If I waited, I wouldn’t have my best friend. It would be a completely different kid that I’d probably raise to be a spoiled brat. Sure, it would be easier to have a house, career, and a husband. But I’d much rather have you than any of those.”

There was never much discussion about his father and Gin knew that was something he shouldn’t ask many question about. All he knew was that his mother was unsure of who he was. And at 14, she was not that type of woman. At least not yet. That only left one other option that surely neither of them wanted to discuss. Only, Olivia seemed to mention the existence of a father every now and then while Gin avoided the subject like the plague. Either his conception was not what he had been assuming, or the truth is harder for him than it is for her.

There was nothing else for Gin to say. He had lost this battle. “Can I have a dollar for the venting machine?” He asked, avoiding any other uncomfortable topic.

Olivia reached over the bed to grab her purse. “Vending machines are $1.70 now,” she said as she searched through the torn and worn out bag that must have been at least 3 years older than Gin. She got out the money and handed it to her son who then took his leave.

The sun was setting when Gin exited their room on the second story of the motel and it seemed as if everyone else had turned in for the night. No other soul was around and no lights were on in the other units.

The vending machine was on the bottom level to the side of the motel where all the prostitutes would wait to find their clients. When they spotted Gin, they slowly took their leave. Either they wanted to seem like they were walking away naturally but it was hard for them to move in their big shoes and tight skirts. It wasn’t his greatest thought, but if his family didn’t have Wi-Fi, his mother would be one of them.

Sometimes the vending machines at nicer motels would have sandwiches for sale, but this one just had chips that were likely stale. Not that Gin would find out since someone had broken into it and stole everything inside.

Chains were wrapped around the machine, but somehow the thief could get around them by completely removing the shell.

“Are you Giovanni Moreno?” Asked a gentle female voice.

“Who wants to know?” Gin asked. That’s what his mother had told him to say if anyone approached him, even though he was sure this was just a prostitute desperate for work. It may be risky, but approaching a teenager going through puberty would earn you his weekly allowance. But when he turned around, the person he saw didn’t look like the average hooker. Maybe a fetish hooker since she wore a large brown fur coat and the mask of an owl over her head. Before he could do anything or even make a sound, the woman struck him in the eye and sent him to the ground. That was the last thing he remembered.