Excerpt: Fabian and Ghino (working title)

Maybe not graduating high school was a bad idea. Maybe he should have waited before rashly moving away to Wisconsin. But now his fate is sealed. Besides, how could he be so many miles away from Ghino? It wouldn’t work. He wouldn’t be able to do anything. He wouldn’t be able to function at all without knowing how his brother was doing. It would take too long to get answers from Ghino, having the mail travel across states. Ghino didn’t have that much money for stamps. Fabian pretty much couldn’t do anything at all without his little brother there at all times. I know I mentioned that before, but it didn’t make sense for him to be without his brother.

Take their trip to Canada, for instance. They saw a minor league baseball game in Ontario. The Barrie Baycats were the players. The Barrie Baycats are an independent, minor league baseball team of the semi-pro Inter county Baseball League based in Barrie, Ontario. They play their home games at Barrie Metals Stadium at the Barrie Sports Complex outside of Barrie, which is just where Fabian and Ghino went.

Why they saw a baseball game in Canada is beyond them. Dear old dad has always been a huge fan of baseball. In fact, Dear old dad used to be a manager for the Barrie Baycats, but he never told his sons. He just wanted them to enjoy the game. Dear old Dad didn’t reveal much about his past, but it was sure that he had one.

So at the game, Fabian was watching the game, Ghino right by his side. Ghino was about 6, making Fabian sixteen. He was enjoying the game and everything, when Ghino was tugging on his sleeve.

“I gotta go potty,” said the young kindergartener. Fabian rolled his eyes.
“You can go by yourself, you know,” Fabian said. Ghino looked up at his brother sadly. He could go to the bathroom by himself, but… going with Fabian made him feel safe. Fabian was safe. Fabian would keep him safe.
“Yeah…” Ghino replied, knowing that keeping his brother happy was sometimes more important than his brother keeping him safe.

But that’s not the truth. Fabian couldn’t do anything when Ghino was alone.
“What if he got lost?” Fabian thought. “Or kidnapped?”

Dear old dad wasn’t at the game. He had business matters elsewhere in Canada. So Ghino and Fabian were on their own. And Ghino was now lost. Forever. He was kidnapped, Fabian was sure of it. Some old man would have seen the little boy and thought “Hmm, what an excellent addition to my kiddy – collection. I should rape him. I should tie him up and throw him in a dumpster in Chicago, in a known dangerous part of town. I should kill him after he gets beat up by ruffians that hang out by dumpsters. I should drug him and make him cry. I should cut off all his hair and then cut his neck. I should set the corpse on fire. I should give him a swirly. I should make sure he can never talk again.”

Fabian was sure that man had Ghino. He ran out of his seat and to the bathrooms, where he found Ghino tenderly getting off the toilet and walking to the sinks to wash his hands. But before he made it to the sink, he was ambushed, but not by the old man Fabian was thinking about: by Fabian himself.

Ghino screamed, but Fabian laughed. “I thought you were kidnapped,” Fabian confessed. “I thought some old man was going to drug you and rape you and throw you in a dumpster and get you all roughed up and cut off your hair and your neck,” Fabian cried. He rubbed his face in Ghino’s shoulder, who was obviously quite confused. This weird, tall boy was nuzzling a young boy in the middle of a boy’s restroom… no wonder they got so many weird looks on the way back to their seats.

It was just proof that Fabian couldn’t do anything unless he knew exactly what was going on with Ghino. Maybe it was because Fabian felt his father was an incompetent bastard. But whatever the matter was, Fabian had to keep Ghino close to heart at all times. Fabian was all Ghino had left. Ghino was all Fabian had left. They had to keep close to each other, else they be alone: desperately, desperately alone. No one to talk to. No one to understand them.