Chapter Text
“Ollie! Can you come here?” Ollie hears his dad call and stands up to head over. Leo, their dog, who Ollie was playing with, follows after him. He heads over to the dining room where he sees his dads sitting at the table talking to a woman he’s never seen before.
Next to the woman there’s a teenage boy, seemingly only a few years older than Ollie. The boy looks nervous and shy, but mostly he looks sad. The boy’s eyes are glued to the floor and Ollie sees he’s fidgeting with his hands in the front pocket of the hoodie he’s wearing.
Leo darts into the room when he sees the new faces, which seems to startle the boy. Ollie quickly runs over and picks up the dog.
“Sorry, sorry. He likes meeting new people and gets a bit overly excited sometimes.” He apologises as he sits down next to his dads, still holding a very excited Leo.
“Well, hello, you must be Ollie, nice to meet you. I’m Anne, and this is Oscar.” The woman introduces herself and the boy, who doesn’t look up at all. Her voice is calm, collected, serious, yet still laced with a gentle kindness.
“Nice to meet you too. Yeah, I’m Oliver, though most people just call me Ollie, and this little guy is Leo.” Ollie greets, then gives Leo a kiss on his head when the puppy looks up at hearing his name.
Anne then turns to Ollie’s dads, “So, Max, Charles, what do you say? Can Oscar stay here for a few days, while we look for any of his family that could take him? I know you two haven’t taken in a foster kid since you officially adopted Ollie, but there’s nowhere else in the area.”
“Yes, of course. We weren’t entirely prepared, but we can make up the guest room for him.” Max responds, then starts talking to Anne about what things they’d need to buy for Oscar, whether he has a toothbrush and things like that, but Ollie wasn’t listening that intently. Instead, he was thinking about the teen sitting in front of him, still staring at the floor, and thought about what might’ve happened to him.
Ollie also thought about when he was first placed with the two men. His dad had suddenly gotten sick and passed quite quickly, which led to his mum becoming depressed and unable to take care of herself, let alone an 8-year old boy as well. She still lives in assisted living, even after almost 6 years she’s still not better, she probably will never be. He still sees her regularly though, he goes to visit every Wednesday after school.
When Ollie had been with Max and Charles for almost 2 years and Ollie’s mum was still nowhere close to being able to take care of a child the two men asked Ollie if they could adopt him. Ollie yelled at them then, he loved them, but his mother was still alive, and he was sure she’d get better, and they could be a family again, or at least, what was left of one.
2 years ago, just after Ollie had turned 12, Ollie had come to terms with the idea that that wasn’t going to happen, and the two men officially adopted him soon after.
Ollie was shaken from his thoughts by Anne standing up and shaking hands with Max and Charles. After speaking with Oscar, or rather to Oscar, who only nodded in return, she left.
“Ollie, could you show Oscar around the house a bit?” Charles asks him, “I’ll get his room ready, while your dad runs to the store.”
“Yeah of course,” Ollie answers, then after a beat asks, “But, can I still go to Kimi’s later?”
“Just be back before dinner, okay?” Charles answers, then heads up the stairs to prepare the guest bedroom for the unexpected occupant.
Ollie stands up and puts Leo on the floor. Oscar does too and follows Ollie into the kitchen.
“So, this is the kitchen. Snacks are in the cupboard over there. You can grab whatever you want, don’t need to ask. If you finish something though, write it down on that piece of paper over there so my dad knows to buy it again. Same goes for whatever is in the fridge by the way, except for the top shelf, the things on there are for dinner, the rest you can grab whatever you want.”
Ollie rambles on, showing the different rooms in the house to Oscar, who quietly follows after him. Once they’ve gone through every room downstairs they head up stairs where Ollie points out which room is which before showing Oscar the room he’ll be staying in.
Charles had just finished making the bed and getting the room ready for the teen.
“And finally, your room! The door in the corner leads to your own en-suite.” Ollie says, pronouncing 'en-suite' in a very English, and not very French, way.
“That is not how that is pronounced, Ollie.” Charles softly says.
“Yeah, yeah.” Ollie says with a roll of his eyes, then turns to Oscar, “I don’t know if you speak any language other than English, but do not speak it near him, he will relentlessly correct you on everything. It’s annoying.”
Oscar manages a small smile at that, it’s obvious how much these people care for each other.
With the tour done and the room ready Oscar retreats to his room while Ollie gets ready to go to his best friend’s house.
“Hey, dad? Is Oscar okay? I haven’t heard him say a single word yet.” Ollie asks Charles when the man walks into the room.
“Probably not right now. His parents died in a car crash last night. It’s okay if he’s not doing all right right now.”
“I know, I just wanna make him feel better.” Ollie says, “The other kids we’ve had at least talked sometimes, but he hasn’t said a word.”
“Well, I think that’s also because he’s just nervous. He’s not from here, he and his parents were here on vacation. He’s all alone, in a foreign country, with people he doesn’t know, after the worst thing ever happened to him, I think it’s pretty understandable if he’s nervous with all that’s happened to him.”
“Yeah I guess. Do you know how long he’s staying?”
“Probably just a few days. Social Services are trying to contact his family, but it’s not going very quickly due to the time difference with Australia.”
With a short hum in understanding and a goodbye Ollie heads off to his best friend’s house.