Tomorrow's Lies (Promises #1) Read Online Free

suffered.
    Eventually, you get used to living with the pain. The empty hole in your heart, the one that makes your chest hurt on the nights you can’t sleep, becomes a constant companion.
    My dad is arrested for killing Galen. He’s tried and convicted, sent away to rot in prison.
    I wouldn’t have it any other way. Even when it means I become an orphan, a ward of the state.
    Whatever, man. My dad wasn’t doing such a great job, anyway.
    The state can call me anything they want, but the truth is I am one of the unwanted, the discarded. Another kid in the system, another cog in a broken wheel.
    At first, I live in a group home—a prison unto itself. Then, I am sent to one temporary home after another. Some families are okay, but I unfortunately soon discover many are in it for the money. In any case, I am bounced all around. Even the decent families send me on my way. No one wants to adopt a troubled teen boy.
    After a bunch of new moms and a few new dads—not a single one of them really interested in becoming a real parent to me—I take off.
    I run for a while, discovering soon enough that the streets aren’t kind to a runaway kid. I end up trying drugs to ease my loneliness. That shit does nothing but make me feel lonelier, so I replace drugs with sex.
    At fifteen, I hook up with a seventeen-year-old girl, a runaway, like me. We have tons of sex, and she lets me try everything a teen boy can think of. All we engage in is safe sex, of course. The last thing either of us wants is a disease, or, God forbid, we produce a kid who’ll be stuck out on the streets with us.
    Runaway Girl is pretty cool, and she teaches me a thing or two when it comes to pleasing a woman. We practice a lot, and I get damn good at everything she shows me. Probably why she sticks around for a while. Eventually though, like everything else in life, our relationship ends and we go our separate ways.
    Not long after, I am caught stealing some shit from a store and get my ass sent to juvie. When I finish my stint, I am thrust back in the foster system. What a cluster-fuck . I move through a carousel of homes, switching houses instead of merry-go-round horses. Spinning around, moving through different rooms. Some are shared and some I have all to myself. A few foster moms buy me clothes, but most don’t bother. The one constant is I’m never in the same place for long.
    Round and round I go. Where I’ll stop, nobody knows .
    Then, one dreary October day, I get word I’ve received a permanent placement for my final two years in the system.
    “Mrs. Lowry promises to keep you until you’re eighteen,” my overworked, underpaid social worker tells me in a monotone voice.
    “Great,” I reply, just as enthusiastically.
    It’s my sixteenth birthday. Happy fucking birthday to me .

 
     

    PRESENT DAY

Jaynie
     
    “Y ou’re lucky to be getting this placement, Jaynie. Mrs. Lowry is quite selective of the kids she chooses to come live with her.”
    Saundra, my social worker, relays this tidbit to me in a way that conveys I should be thanking my lucky stars. What does she want? Does she expect me to drop to my knees on the candy- and gum-wrapper-strewn floorboard of the little rust-bucket car we’re in and praise Jesus?
    Yeah, like that’s going to happen.
    I have nothing to be thankful for, certainly not this placement. Besides, the ability to feel real gratitude is something I lost a while ago, along with a lot of other things.
    Saundra turns at a faded green sign that indicates we’re entering the city limits of Forsaken, West Virginia . I suppress a laugh. Seems I may have found an appropriate home after all.
    Saundra nods to the sign as we pass. “Don’t let the name fool you, Jaynie. This town is actually a solid community. A bit rundown,” she adds when we start driving by cars on blocks, dotting the front yards of dilapidated homes. “But Forsaken is still a good place.”
    Sure it is , I think. I keep my mouth shut, though. One