Loving Hart Part 1

Loving Hart.

by Ella Fox.

Dedication:

Once again, this book is dedicated to my amazing readers. You've been incredible, and everything I write, I write for you.

*Important Note about Loving Hart*

There was a lot of debate about how to construct chapter one. I chose to start the narrative when the twins were introduced into Spencer's life. I wrote, re-wrote and then re-wrote the chapter again, but in the end, I went with what my original idea was. While Spencer might seem to be very self aware for such a young child, I a.s.sure you all that children are VERY smart, especially when they are in regular physical danger. The Hart/Cross children would not have been treated like "normal" children, and their maturity reflects that.

Chapter One: Spencer

The two tiny babies make me real nervous. I've never seen anything smaller. Dante keeps tellin' me that I won't break one if I pick it up, but for now, I'm keepin' my distance. I'm four, and I don't know a thing about babies. Damien doesn't either, but he picks them up and holds them all the time. "I love my babies," he tells me. I like them 'cause he does, but I can't pick one up 'cause I'm too scared. Just thinkin' about droppin' one, and how upset Dante and Damien would be, makes me feel sick.

Can't help but stare at them though. They might be tiny, but they are cute for babies. Damien's always kissin' and huggin' them, tryin' to make me see what he sees. When he picks them up he always says, "I love my pretty little lady bugs." Don't know why he calls them that, but he thinks it's funny. Never saw Damien love somethin' so much before. Always smilin' at them and makin' funny noises.

Dante watches over them like he's GI Joe. He says they deserve better than this kind of life. Don't know what that means for sure, but I think think I get it, 'cause their parents never hold or even touch them. If I was one of the babies I wouldn't want them touchin' me anyway. I think the babies agree with me, I get it, 'cause their parents never hold or even touch them. If I was one of the babies I wouldn't want them touchin' me anyway. I think the babies agree with me, ' ' cause whenever their parents are in the room they cry and scream. It makes Mr. Hart real mad, and he'll start screaming back at them, right in their faces. It's scary. Mrs. Hart ain't no better 'cause she don't just scream, she hits. When they cry, she spanks their diapers, which makes them cry even more. Dante and Damien are always havin' to jump in front and try and get her to hit them instead. It's crazy that they have to beg their mom to hit them instead of the babies. The babies are way too small to be gettin' hit, so Dante says we got to always keep an eye out for when the Hart's are comin' so we can take the kids away, because otherwise they could really hurt them. cause whenever their parents are in the room they cry and scream. It makes Mr. Hart real mad, and he'll start screaming back at them, right in their faces. It's scary. Mrs. Hart ain't no better 'cause she don't just scream, she hits. When they cry, she spanks their diapers, which makes them cry even more. Dante and Damien are always havin' to jump in front and try and get her to hit them instead. It's crazy that they have to beg their mom to hit them instead of the babies. The babies are way too small to be gettin' hit, so Dante says we got to always keep an eye out for when the Hart's are comin' so we can take the kids away, because otherwise they could really hurt them.

For a while, I thought the babies weren't real, because Mr. and Mrs. Hart said they were born, but they didn't come home for a long time. Now everything's changed, and when Damien and I come home from Pre-Kindergarten, he runs into the house to start taking care of them. He and Dante say we got to take care of these babies and make sure they're okay, so I'm tryin' to help. The babies got what Dante says is a nanny, but she don't stay longer than when we get home from school and she don't speak English. Dante says it's the same lady that took care of Damien when he was born, and that she's okay.

I spent a few days not knowing which one was which, but I finally figured out a way to tell the difference between the two of them. Dominique is all squirmy, and Delilah is quieter. Never saw two people look the same but be so different. Dante says Delilah really likes me because when I sit with them on the floor, she lays all quiet and stares at me while she holds my finger. For someone so tiny, she's real strong. Sometimes I have to fight to get my finger away cause she holds it so tight, and she cries like crazy every time I walk away. Dante says that's 'cause she wants me to pick her up and hold her. "You see that Spence? She trusts you already. You can pick her up bud."

When Mr. Hart overheard Dante saying that , , he laughed. "Don't care if you drop one. They're ugly. Nothing you do could make them uglier. h.e.l.l, all of you are dirt dumb and ugly. f.u.c.kin' kids." he laughed. "Don't care if you drop one. They're ugly. Nothing you do could make them uglier. h.e.l.l, all of you are dirt dumb and ugly. f.u.c.kin' kids."

I keep dreaming about that, about what he said, and the way he said it, over and over. I bet that's what my dad said when I was just little. Doesn't make sense why our parents had kids when they don't even like us.

We kept tryin' and tryin', but Delilah was so sick and had what Dante said was a "real bad fever", and nothing we did was makin' it go away. Dante went and got his mother and then later his father, beggin' them to call a doctor, to do anything to help her, but they just yelled at him and told him to stop being a baby.

I never saw Dante that scared before, and it made me and Damien real scared too. Dante was tryin' to hold it in I think, but when he put Delilah in the tub to try and bring her fever down, I saw him cryin'. Never saw him cry before, not ever.

Delilah was so quiet it was weird. Dante said that's 'cause she was so "out of it."

The more time that went by, the worse it was gettin'. Damien asked Dante if one of our babies was gonna die, so I knew he was real scared too. I was so sick I thought I was going to die. Don't know what I'd do if something happened to one of the girls, especially Delilah. She's my favorite, always starin' at me and holdin' my hand.

Her breathing sounded real weird, real loud. Poor Dominique curled up next to her cryin' real quiet, and Dante said that wasn't a good "sign."

When Delilah started coughin' and fightin' to get a breath, Dante stood up and ran from the room. Damien and I were scared and confused, and then there were sirens in the driveway, and two men and a nice lady came in all dressed in uniforms with a rolling bed. They took Delilah away, said they thought she had somethin' called pneumonia. Dante had to look that word up to see what it meant. Mrs. Hart asked if they could just take Dominique without her, but they said she had to go. She was mad and she went, but the look she gave Dante was not good.

The next morning when Dante came into the back yard, he was walkin' funny. Damien made him show us why, so Dante took off his s.h.i.+rt and shorts. Mr. and Mrs. Hart woke him up and beat him with a belt in the middle of the night for calling for help for Delilah.

Delilah was in the hospital for two weeks. Poor Dominique cried every day, wantin' her sister so bad. Dante was so upset that she was that sick, and no one would take us to see her. I missed that little girl like crazy too, and I promised myself that I'd never let anything happen to the girls ever again.

When she came home she was asleep, and Dante held her for a long, long time, quietly cryin' while Dominique was curled up against them both. It felt so good when Delilah finally opened her big blue eyes, reaching out one hand to me and one hand to Damien. Neither of us could help that we cried, too.

All of our parents are in the house having one of their parties. These parties are the worst, and I just want to puke. Last week, at another one of the parties, some old lady started touching Dante, and he got real scared. Damien started yelling and crying, and then Mr. Hart came outside and beat Dante so bad that there was blood everywhere. I wish the parties would stop, that someone would make our parents act normal. I wish that my father wasn't a monster, and that my mom was like the moms of the other kids at school. Timmy's mom brings in cupcakes for us, and Danny's mom reads us stories, but I never even seen any of me and the Hart kids parents at our school. Not even sure they would know how to get there.

I wish a lot that they would all just disappear and leave us alone. Damien says he thinks that every day. Dante don't say much, just always tryin' to keep us all safe. Damien and I try to copy everything Dante does cause he's bigger and smarter.

Both the girls started talking right around the same time, and their first word was dada. Normal kids would be sayin' that to their grown up dads, but the twins called Dante that for a while. He's more of a dad to them than Mr. Hart is that's for sure. Dante's got even more serious about the girls since the day Delilah went to the hospital, and we catch him checkin' up on them all the time. Always needs to know they're okay. Damien and I aren't much better, always lookin' at them and makin' sure they're safe.

They are healthy and happy, and Damien says we're gonna keep them that way, no matter what. They're smart, too. We got paper and crayons and wrote the alphabet out for them, and now they know almost all their ABCs. They're gettin' better at talkin' now, and they call Dante "Tay", Damien "Dame" and me "Pence." Funny girls, always smilin'.

Even on nights like this, when we're packed together in a shed, the girls are just happy to be with us. Damien and I are real good at making beds out of lawn chair cus.h.i.+ons, but the girls are a lot of work to get down. Neither of them will even lie down until Dante hugs and kisses them and tells them they can sleep tight. It's like they don't believe they can unless he says it. Dominique has to have 'Goodnight Moon' read to her exactly four times in a row, and only Damien is allowed to read it to her.

On nights when we all have to sleep in the shed, Delilah does what she's done ever since the first day I met her. She holds my hand and just quietly stares at me until she falls asleep. If I try to move, she flips out, so I've learned to stay real still. Weird having her stare at me, like she sees something no one else does. Dante says she loves me, that both of the girls love me. I don't think I ever had no one love me but my grandmother, and she died.

I think both of the twins love me almost as much as they love their brothers. I love buildin' stuff with Dominique, so I play with her a lot. We make buildings out of sticks and mud, and stuff we find in the yard. Now whenever she sees me she says, "build Pence!"

Delilah just likes to be cuddled and held. She's always with me, holdin' my hand. Follows me wherever I go, always needs to know where I am. Dante says on nights that I sleep at home she cries and calls my name.

I'd never admit it to Damien or Dante, but I feel better when she's holding my hand. Like someone understands me, even though I know that's silly. She's just little. Hope she doesn't really understand what's goin' on around here. This is no place for kids.

Mrs. Hart killed herself. She wasn't a happy lady, but I didn't think she'd do something like that; not that I can say I'm sad about it. She hit the girls all the time, and at least with her gone they won't have bruises on them anymore.

All us kids were huddled up in the shed 'cause Mr. Hart was havin' a party. He didn't have no funeral for her or nothin'. Just announced that she "killed her own s.l.u.tty a.s.s," and that was that. It's only been five days and it seems so wrong that Mr. Hart's havin' a party already. There were naked people all over the house doin' drugs, and it was just gross.

After we got the twins to sleep, we sat talkin'. Dante and Damien have both been real weird this whole week, only acting normal if the girls are awake and paying attention.

I kept askin' why, and they kept not tellin' me; told me they'd show me someday soon. Saddest thing I ever saw was Dante and Damien both tryin' not to cry as they held two pieces of paper out to me. I thought they were cryin' cause they missed her, that they were sad 'cause she was gone. Once I read the letters she left them, I knew they were sad 'cause their mom left such mean letters to them, tellin' them to kill themselves, too.

I got scared, and begged them to promise me they would never do that, never leave me and the girls alone. Dante hugged me tight, told me not to be scared. "I would never leave you guys, Spence. But these letters... I'm never getting a girlfriend, never going to love no one but you guys. Already have the girls, so I don't need any kids."

Damien nodded his head, agreeing with what Dante said. "Me either. I don't want no one killin' themselves 'cause I'm bad to love. Never gonna have kids either."

I threw right down with them. "Then me either. None of us will ever get married or have kids."

"Count to fifty, and no peekin' Spence!"

I love Delilah's silly laugh. Love that no matter where she hides, I always know exactly where she is. Every game of hide and seek we've ever played, I've always known. It drives her nuts, so sometimes I pretend I don't know exactly where she is just to make her feel like she's got a shot at stumping me.

It's not like her hiding places are bad. They've gotten better and better over the years. But I always know where she is. For as long as I can remember, I've always been able to feel it when she's around. Damien says we've got some weird radar for each other, because she always knows where I am too.

Dominique is always harder to find. I can spend twenty minutes searching for her and never find her. The worst part is, she'll hide in the most obvious places, but I'll still miss her. Delilah's my secret weapon with that, and when I'm ready to quit, she'll show me where Dominique's hiding spot is.

I heard when Delilah left the room to go hide, and I knew she'd gone outside. As usual, I've got no clue where Dominique is. In order to make Delilah feel like she's possibly getting one over on me, I look for Dominique first. After five minutes, I've got no clue. Heading into the back yard, I stand still for a second before turning and walking to the bushes that line the side of the yard. She's good, and she's blended in pretty well, but I know she's there.

Reaching into the bushes, I tag her. "Gotcha!"

Her squeals and giggles ring through the yard as she flies out of the bushes, blonde hair flying in front of her face as she jumped up onto my back for a piggyback ride.

"How do you always know where I am? When I played with Dante and Damien yesterday it took them forever forever to find me back there." to find me back there."

I answered the way I always have. "How do you always know where Dominique and I are?"

"'Cause I can feel it silly," she said with a giggle.

"Well, that's how I know where you are too. Wish that worked with Dominique! I can't find that crazy girl anywhere."

She laughs like she always does and then stopped to think. Pinching my arm she said, "Dominique's in the kitchen. Hiding in the cupboard with all the pots, I think."

Of course, she was right, and Dominique was just where Delilah said she would be.

"Aww, you told him Delilah! No fair. You're always tellin' him where I am! Spence is always going to be a bad seeker if you don't let him find me himself."

As usual, Delilah jumped to my defense. "He's not a bad seeker Dominique. You're just a real good hider. Best in the world, cause he can never find you, but he finds me every time."

Sticking out her tongue at her sister, Dominique laughed. "He doesn't find you 'cause he's a good seeker. He find's you 'cause you guys can read each other's minds or something. Either that or he's magic."

Delilah just laughed as she grabbed Dominique and started tickling her. Just that quickly, Dominique's frustration at being found was gone, and the sound of happy giggles filled the air.

Most times, playing with the Hart kids is the only happy I get all day. I wish I felt as safe and as happy as I do with the Hart kids all the time.

Feels like I've been scared my entire life. I'm only ever okay when I'm with the Hart's. Wish we could all run away together, but the girls are too young, and I couldn't ever leave them behind. Seems stupid, but I feel better when they're around, especially Delilah.

I don't remember the first time my dad touched me, so I guess it's always been this way. I hate this part of my life. I hate how his hands and his mouth and his thing are constantly there. Hate that my mother pretends it's normal, tells me boys will be boys and that my dad needs to a.s.sert his dominance, whatever that means. I hate that I'm too weak to tell Dante or Damien, but my father made sure that I never would. "You open that yap of yours, and I'll hurt one of those little ugly troll Hart twins you like to protect so much, you little s.h.i.+t."

I want to grow up, want to get out. I want to leave every day, but I can't. I can't leave my friends, because they're the only people that love me. Can't leave Delilah because I think she'd lose it if I went away. She always knows when I'm thinking about running away, or when things are real bad for me, even though I could never tell her that.

Always she soothes me by grabbing my hand in hers and saying, "I love you more than anything Spence. I'd die without you here. You'll never ever leave me, right Spence?"

My answer never changes. "No silly. Love you best, always going to need my other half."

She's made me promise her dozens of times that I'll stay, and I won't go back on my promises to Delilah, not ever.

I can't wait to be older and stronger though, can't wait until I'm big enough to defend us all. Someday I'll be out of here, away from my dad. Hate him more than anything in the world. Pray every night that he will either leave or die, but he's still here.

I guess I should count myself as lucky that most nights I get to spend the night at the Harts' since my mother and father have some weird s.e.xual relations.h.i.+p with Mr. Hart. It's disgusting, but it's better for me to be at the Harts' than at home. When I'm home, he comes for me. My mother insists that it's no big deal. "It's not like he's raping you, Spencer. Your father isn't doing anything bad. He just wants to touch you, let you know he's the boss. Instead of acting like there's something wrong, why don't you cooperate? Make all of our lives easier."

Sometimes, I look at the two of them and wonder how they can be my parents. When I was younger, I used to dream that two great people would suddenly knock at the door and explain that they were my real parents, and tell me that I was stolen from them. I stopped having that fantasy when my mother showed me a picture of her when she was pregnant with me. I wasn't stolen, Marceline and Hank are my real parents, and my father is a piece-of-s.h.i.+t molester. The only part of my life that makes me happy is the Hart kids, but it's beyond wrong that we're a bunch of kids raising ourselves.

If I didn't have Delilah to keep me on track, I'd probably be doing some pretty bad stuff right now. Sometimes, when she's holding my hand and staring at me, I wonder if she knows what he does to me, if she can see or feel it somehow. Scary the way she knows when I need silence. Always knows when I need a hug. I always feel better when I'm holding her little hand. It's a feeling like nothing bad will happen if we've got each other.

I'm glad that Mr. and Mrs. Hart are both gone, and I don't feel bad for feeling that way. They were both a.s.sholes, and they were awful to be around. Mr. Hart, or "Big Mike" as he insisted everyone call him, was a real d.i.c.k. He was always drugged out and mean, and crazy angry.

I didn't trust him, and I hated the shady look that he would get when he looked at Dominique and Delilah in the last year. I knew that look all too well because I've been on the receiving end of it from my own father for as long as I can remember. because I've been on the receiving end of it from my own father for as long as I can remember.

"Not so ugly anymore," Mr. Hart would slur when he looked at them. I knew he was a time bomb waiting to go off.

Damien and Dante hated that look too. They knew what it meant, even though I don't think their dad had ever touched either one of them. We made a pact that he would have to get through us first, and we knew that meant we'd probably have to kill him if he tried.

Each night for over a year, two of us at a time took turns sleeping on the floor in the twins' room. We'd keep the door locked, with a dresser in front of it, and we always slept with knives with us for protection. As long as we were alive, there was no way he was going to touch them.

When he overdosed, my first feeling was one of relief. The girls are safe with him gone.

Now that Mrs. Hart's younger sister, Sandra Thomas, is taking care of the Hart kids, things are much better. She's normal, not like how all our parents were. She insists that I call her Aunt Sandra, just like the boys do. It's weird that someone finally cares about all of us, tells us that she loves us. Cares about what we do every day, and asks questions.