Chapter 3
Clint once again hides in his room until dinner time which in reality he wished he could hide through as well. Unfortunately, Phil was not allowing that as he guided the boy down to the table where everyone had already begun to eat. Upon getting to his seat, however, he realized he didn’t have a plate which just confirmed that this was the type of household that made you earn your meal.
Except he’s quickly proven wrong.
“Alright, bud, so Dr. Cotter gave me a calendar with the meals you should be getting each day, so we can get your nutritional levels up to par. They’re all pretty simple, but if you don’t like them just let me or Maria know, alright? I need you to finish your plate before leaving the table,” Phil says as he places down a bowl of food.
Clint gives the man a questioning look before he analyzes the plate in front of him. It definitely didn’t look as appealing as everyone else’s meal, but he wasn’t looking to get punished over something as little as being given food. This meal is much chattier than both breakfast and lunch had been, however, no one seemed to look at him during the entirety of the meal. Not that Clint was complaining about that, but he’s just confirmed that it is definitely a household versus him type of situation.The meal is finished quickly after that, and once everyone placed their dishes on the counter Clint noticed it was once again just him, Bucky, and Phil left in the room.
“We’re on dish duty together, think you can manage?” Bucky says while throwing a towel at the boy, only to have it swiped away while in mid-air.
“I’ve got it covered on your part tonight, Bucky. How about you go set up in the family room and I’ll meet you there in about 15 minutes so we can have our session?” Phil offers, and Bucky doesn’t even think twice before walking out of the kitchen just glad to be out of dish duty for the night. “So, don’t know if you recall but I mentioned yesterday that everyone has a personal counselor?”
“Yeah and I fall under as one of your wards,” Clint says as he begins to wash and dry the dishes on his own.
“Here, I’ll wash you dry,” Phil cuts in as he hands Clint the dishrag. “And yes, that you do. I work with you, Bucky, and all Tony one-on-one. You’ll come to realize that most people don’t have pre-set times in which they meet for their one-on-ones except maybe on Sundays, but for now I think it might be good if we work on a schedule.”
“Whatever you say,” Clint replies dryly.
“Hey, bud, this isn’t a punishment, okay? This is for you. For now, this isn’t to talk about anything from your past; it’s to talk about how you are now and to see how you’re feeling in the house, We just wanna make sure you feel comfortable and safe.”
“I have a bed and get food, I think I feel safe.”
“That’s true and I’m glad that those things indicate safeness to you, but sometimes it goes further. Or something we have bad days and need to talk about them, so that’s what I’m here for. Like today, it was a really long day and you had to meet a lot of people and allow a lot of people to touch you and I know that can be overwhelming, so it helps to sometimes talk those things through.”
“It was something you said I had to do, no need to talk about it.”
Phil can see that the day’s events definitely took a toll on Clint, however, he can also see that personality wise he’s very similar to Bucky where he’s a bit hard headed, and definitely won’t be easy to get to open up.
“Okay well maybe not today, but maybe in the future there will be a day you wanna talk about. While it’s just you and me do you have any questions about what happened during our group session? Rules that you want us to consider?”
“Nope,” Clint says with a pop of the lips.
“Clint,” Phil says grabbing the last plate from the boy’s hands. “I know this is all hard for you especially considering the lifestyle you’re coming from, but I need you to know you can talk to me. I’m not asking you to trust me just yet, but I do hope you at least give me a chance to gain your trust.”
The two remain in silence for a couple minutes, finishing the last plates and remaining silverware. Just as Phil was going to tell Clint what he needs to do the rest of the night, though, Clint surprises him by speaking up.
“What are the con-consequences for breaking rules?” Clint mutters just above a whisper that Phil barely hears it.
“Well, it depends,” Phil says as he sits down at the table they had been at not too long ago and gestures for Clint to do the same. “We work on a point system here. Everyone when they first get to the house starts at 1000 points. This gives you the basic privileges of watching TV, supervised mediaroom access, and you can be in the garage game room area. I do ask though that if you want to use the gym stuff run it by me or one of the staff people cause I don’t want you using that when no one’s down there okay?”
When Clint nods with wide eyes Phil can’t help but smile as well as internally coo at the boy’s innocence.
“Every week your social worker gets a report on you. It’s a basic checklist of marking your behavior with members of the house, behavior with staff, how you interact in group or your personal one on ones, how compliant you are with eating and taking meds and other things as such. Based on the behavior component of that you can increase your points by 100, and if you go the whole month with good behavior reports you get an additional 250 points. Other ways you can increase your points include doing your chores extra good, helping out house members, or doing well in your academic reports,” Phil says with a smile.
“B-but how do I lose points? And-and what happens when I lose points?” Clint asks a bit louder now, and the fear is also much more prevalent.
“Well, when your behavioral reports aren’t that great and there’s more poor behavior than good than you lose 100 points per week. You also lose points for not doing your chores or homework. Once you fall to 750 points then privileges start getting taken away, like there will be no more TV or you can’t go down to the garage. If you get to 500 points then you’ll likely have your curfew moved to an earlier time or you might get an extra chore for the week. Once you hit 300 you don’t really get privileges. You’re required to be with a staff member at all times, and that’s not fun because even though I think I’m cool I do a lot of paperwork so it’s not entertaining to watch.”
“And if I get to zero?” Clint manages to ask without stuttering though his eyes show a different story that Phil fears the day he cracks the boy into trusting him.
“You won’t get to zero, buddy, no one ever has because when you guys are having a rough time we work really hard with you to make sure we can help you in any way possible. One thing you should know though, is that your punishment will never involve sending you away from this home, okay? You’re the only one that can decide if you leave, alright?” Phil asks while making sure the boy is looking at him.
“Alright, well, if you don’t have anymore questions how about you go up to shower and then come back down here so we can get you set up with your first nebulizer treatment,” Phil says with a smile.
“C-can I- uh, nevermind,” Clint says before rushing upstairs.
As Phil exits the kitchen he can’t help but smile at the remaining bit of the boy’s figure he can see climbing up the stairs before entering the family room where he knows Bucky would be patiently waiting for him.
Clint learns quickly that night that he does not like the nebulizer treatments even in the slightest. For starters, having a mask strapped around your mouth that’s blowing out hot steam that also doesn’t smell great just isn’t comfortable. However, the real reason he doesn’t like it is because of all the looks he’s getting from the rest of his housemates. No one’s said anything aside from one teasing comment about Clint using a pacifier still when Phil had initially set up the treatment with the internal mouthpiece.
The taunting remark may have led to Clint quickly standing from his seat– knocking it over in the process– and attempting to charge towards Bucky before being intercepted by Phil before anything could occur. Once the situation was controlled Bucky was sent upstairs for the remainder of the night while Clint finished his treatment from his initial position. Once it was done, though, the boy was also sent upstairs for his near lights out call. And just like the night before Phil checks in on the boy once more, asks if he needs anything, before turning the light off in the room.
Clint waits on the bed for about 10 minutes after Phil leaves before he creeps out of the bed and walks towards the window bench. At first Clint just wanted to get a better view and idea of where he was, but eventually he can’t help but crawl up onto the cushioned bench as he looks further out the window. Before he can continue to look around too much, though, he hears the door open only to reveal a slightly confused Tony.
“Oh, I thought you were supposed to be asleep,” the boy says nonchalantly, however, Clint reacts anything but nonchalantly.
“Sorry, don’t tell, I’m going to sleep now!” Clint rushes out as he runs underneath his covers, tightly gripping them over his head.
“Hey, you’re good, don’t worry. I didn’t mean anything by it, just wasn’t expecting you to be awake,” Tony tries to push, however, the boy stays hidden under his blankets and Tony swears he can see the bed vibrating.
Before the boy can go over to make sure he’s okay, though, Phil is popping his head back into the room with a questioning look.
“Hey, what’s going on here?” Phil says while looking at Tony, and Clint just waits in fear for Tony to bust him for being out of bed after curfew.
“Uh, nothing. I forgot Clint moved in here, got confused by the lump on the bed,” Tony says casually which surprises the younger boy.
Upon mentioning the boy’s name, Phil can’t help but look over to his figure only to frown at the sight of him curled tightly in his bed with the blanket being clutched like a life preserver.
“Hey, Clint, hey, buddy, you alright? Do you not feel well?” Phil says in concern.
“M’fine, sorry, goin’ t’sleep,” Clint says from under the covers.
Phil gives a look to Tony, though, the boy just shrugs as he begins to get ready for bed himself. When nothing else is spoken from either boy Phil sighs as he wishes each a goodnight before once again closing the door to their room.
As he makes his way downstairs to his office he isn’t surprised to find Maria waiting for him with a sympathetic smile.
“Bucky was good today. I say he’s ready to go back to school with the others, but I’m not sure if that’s what he wants? He seemed intrigued by Clint. Kept asking questions about him while you two were out today. Was curious how long he’ll be homeschooled for, or if you’ll attempt to include him on your monthly outing with him and Tony now that he’s one of your wards,” Maria says with a smile.
“All good questions that I haven’t thought about yet,” Phil says with a smile back. “But that’s good. I say he finishes up this week here and I’ll reach out to the school to let them know Bucky is ready to come back for next week. Get a couple standard test for Clint as well to see where he’s at.”
“The already low self esteem is unfortunate; already figures he should be placed in a lower level grade. Any idea what his last formal education was?”
“He ran away at 10, but that last home appears to have been his most abusive home based on how some of the other kids in the home were found. Apparently most of the kids there were being used more for personal use, so there wasn’t a lot of schooling. It also doesn’t help that he was moved into so many homes in a short time frame. His records were never able to be properly updated so he was always repeating stuff. If I had to guess, last grade he formally finished might be 3rd grade?”
“The poor kid, I know I haven’t spoken to him just yet, but just his interactions alone show how much this system has screwed him. How was his visit with Cho?”
“It was good, no sedatives were needed so like good on that standpoint. It’s pretty clear he’s malnourished, so I have his diet schedule taped up on the pantry and I’ll be emailing it out to everyone tonight. His ribs are broken and he has a fractured wrist. Some majorly serious bruising surrounding his body, especially in some areas that seriously concerned both myself and Dr. Cho, but based on how jittery he was we chose to not go that extreme on the exam.”
“Sexual abuse?” Maria asked in a way that sounded as though she feared getting an answer.
“It looked like it, so some of the bloodwork is going to be used for an STI test. Based on that we may not be able to postpone some of the conversations that will be about his life when he was on the street.”
“God, he’s a baby, that isn’t right.”
“I just hope he gives us a chance.”