“No, Oscar, we are not leaving Miss Moretti with a drunk husband who could do who knows what to his family at any moment,” Bob declared.

“We need more time to cultivate, Bob. I have already spoken with Russel about it. If keep staying here, we might fall behind. We should have joined the Vermillion Tyrant when he went to liberate other cities. Instead, we are stuck with a family of idiots and a retarded child.”

“Fuck, Oscar,” Bob lost his usual composure, “the child has seen a monster up close and he’s just a bit silent. It doesn’t help that you look at him as if he was trash instead of a human being!”

“Sure, the little retard and his book. If I hear another fact about the Divine Comedy, I’ll put him down myself, I swear,” Oscar sneered.

“Oscar, you filthy idiot, what’s your problem? What has that little kid done to you?”

Bob got fired up and had to restrain himself from punching the shorter and pudgier man.

“I don’t like to waste my time, Bob. Just that, really. And this family is a wreck. I hoped I could get a nice place to stay out of them, but the kid’s a little creep and he freaks me out. The dad’s a loser and the mother is a hot piece of ass but she’s tied down to the other two. So, that’s that.”

Bob wanted to punch through the skull of the man, but he knew he couldn’t.

“Oscar, I hope you rot from the inside, I swear. I hope a monster come to you and rips your belly open. Then, I hope the monster will shit inside your guts.”

Oscar simply laughed off the Bob’s fury.

On the side, Russel just kept to himself in silence.

“Russ, you agree with this piece of shit?” Bob had a terrible feeling about this. If Oscar had come with his cards out in the open, it must have meant that Russel was on his side. The accountant was too much of a coward to do otherwise.

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But how could the sailor not have even a crumble of pity for the child and his mother?

“Yeah, Bob. Listen, I love Miss Moretti and I don’t mind the child, but we do need to spend more time training,” Russel said and then added, “fuck! I’ve been itchy for days now!”

The man started scratching his legs furiously, angered by his current situation.

“Goddammit,” Bob observed Russel and for a second thought about the same discomfort he had felt the past few days. The itch had never went away. It wasn’t there all the time, but when it flared up it was always in his legs and worse each time.

“Well, I’ll go give the news to the Moretti Family, hoping I’ll never have to see again that autistic child,” Oscar smiled with a dark tinge in his tone.

“I hope you choke on your spit, Oscar,” Bob despised such a little mean man. But he was sorely disappointed by Russel. The sailor wasn’t the brightest bulb in the bunch, but he had always bene an honest friend. And now, Bob found himself betrayed by those two.

I might as well go keep Lorenzo some company and avoid him listening to us.

They had been talking in the living room, while Claudia and his husband had both been out in the garden.

Raising his gaze toward the stairs, Bob saw Lorenzo stare at him from the upper floor.

Fuck.

…

While Russel and Oscar had went out to find the kid’s parents and tell them they were out of here, Bob went upstairs. Lorenzo had run back to his room and was waiting for Bob with his usual book.

“Uncle Bob, is it true? Are they going away?”

“Yeah,” Bob nodded, feeling the itch in his legs come back again.

Lorenzo just stared at his book.

“I—Well, it doesn’t look too good,” Lorenzo said while scratching his legs.

“Uhm?”

“I mean, don’t worry, I’m not going anywhere. Oscar and Russel are just… I don’t know what they are. They are going, though: that’s for sure. But I’ll stay here, little devil. We can even train a bit together, if you want. You never tell me what level you reached.”

“Uncle Bob,” Lorenzo looked troubled, “are you saying that things will not be alright?”

“I… I don’t think everything will be super alright. But I’m sure we can figure something out, me and you.”

Lorenzo didn’t look like a kid who knew what to say, but as all kids do, he was able to surprise Bob with a bout of wisdom.

“People leave because they are afraid. I understand. Oscar and Russel just want to… survive?”

Bob’s heart ached for the poor little thing.

“Yeah, buddy,” he said, “it’s just how they are. Not everyone is nice in this world.”

“Yeah,” Lorenzo echoes Bob’s words and resumes reading.