The memory brings you into a grey room: dull, distant, and detached. That's the feeling, though it's a small space in reality, crowded by the small fold-out beds and the young men that occupy them, with a book or waiting on some next step.
There's one waiting there now. The one this memory is about, that you're drawn to, sitting on the edge of a bed with its thin dark sheet and no pillow. His head hangs and his hands are gripping into the mattress, foot tapping out of anxiety more than impatience. You can't see the signs of it, but you know he's in pain, a stinging in the exact place you'll notice it once he lifts his head.
'Alright, everyone we called for visitations, get up. Valasquez, Binder, Espinoza, Keene.'
He's bolted up onto his feet the second the last name is given, a painful hope rising in him. There's a bruise around his left eye, but you know the trepidation inside him is doing numbers inside his chest more than any sting left from the fight he had yesterday. That was bad, but today is important. Today, there's the glimmer of hope of something familiar -- of someone being there.
His dad.
You follow him with the line of other young kids, walking down halls until you reach a room that may be familiar in purpose, or not. It's lined with tables steel-grey and chairs white, but you know they're going to be hard as soon as you see them. Robby doesn't care, taking a place at one of the middle tables without a word; his head kept down, though a glance taken to examine the room once, the large window ahead of him that shows a camera room on the other side.
Everything about this is waiting. Every second obvious, every one that turns into minutes. Robby shakes his leg incessantly under the desk, only stopping when--
'--Hey. Robby?'
You only notice him because Robby does, a kind older man with a bald head, gentle eyes. He comes to Robby's table dressed in a black-blue suit, offering his hand.
'I'm Pastor Brown, a friend of your father. It's good to see you.' Robby's been hiding his face - or just his mouth - by his hands cupped in front of it, but he lets them go to take the hand offered to shake. The man sits down, with a joke about Johnny never being one to be punctual ('I see that hasn't changed'), and there's light talk of how Robby is, one he only answers with an 'Okay' that's reluctant to be said.
And then, the real wait begins. It's a memory of waiting for an agonising hour, sat there, and being stuck waiting with him. A glance taken at the door each time it opens (you might not look, but Robby does, and he does it every time it does open, sometimes when it doesn't), the crumbling hope inside the boy, though you don't see him change outwardly much. He stays sitting, hunched, hands in front of him and that leg always shaking.
All you have - and all Robby has - are his thoughts. Thinking about a school fight that brought him in here, how he'll explain to his dad that he tried to stop the fight, he did, and he wasn't trying to kick Miguel over the edge. He thinks about his face, how he might look; how he's fearful about seeing his disappointment, but he's hoping more for his father to look at him, see him--
Would he touch him? Put a hand on him, say something about his bruise? Robby's ashamed about that, the thought of the fight and how he tried to defend himself. But it was him against a room of others, how his fighting is about defence, not about escalation or punching back.
He thinks about his sensei failing him, the one who taught him that. But he's a thought and an anger (a hurt) that Robby doesn't want to think about for long, and doesn't.
People come to the other tables, you hear the hushed voices and the few sobs that escape; you hear the sound of hugs by the slide of fabric and the sounds of relief from loved ones. Robby never looks, but he knows, and even Pastor Bobby's expression comes less capable of hiding its concern.
He checks his watch, and Robby looks over at it, too. It's been nearly an hour. The pastor reaches over and touches Robby's arm, asks him to give a little more time.
But the last of Robby's hope has crumbled. He's not disappointed--he's bitter. At himself for thinking his dad would come in the first, that he ever would when he never has--that he doesn't blame him for Miguel's being in hospital, and why would he ever come for his screwed up kid?
'He's not coming,' Robby says, the first real words he has since this whole memory. 'I knew it.'
And it's to stand up, and leave the pastor where he sits, heading to out of the door -- and to the end of the memory, figuring that the only reason his dad had signed up to come was because someone else made him do it, first.
That's the only way he ever remembers Robby, anyway.
Edited 2022-12-08 16:14 (UTC)
[ HOME ALONE: DANIEL LARUSSO FINDING HIM, child neglect, hunger, poverty ]
You're somewhere dark. Dark, but not pitch-black. It takes a moment perhaps for you to realise you're in an apartment, the curtains left open to let it the few dots of light that come in from the street. There are some light sources inside the room you're in, too: two electric lamps, their spread not reaching farther than the counters they rest on.
As for anything else, you'll find a kid on the couch by those windows, laying there. Longer hair that he might be familiar by, but it's his memory--Robby's, that is. And at this point, he's thinking; he has nothing to do but think, with it being this late -- too late to skateboard, to read, to do anything that requires light and doesn't piss you off when you try and use the glow of the lamps and sting your eyes more than achieve anything helpful. He's not thinking out loud, but he doesn't need to be. This is his memory, and his thoughts and all are as open and in view as the clutter strewn around the room.
You know the electricity is off, that there's no hot water in the apartment, but Robby isn't thinking about that. He's thinking about that day's training, keeping on top of a wooden wheel in a pond that would tip him and Sam off if they didn't maintain equal balance between each other. Each movement he had to do, the thoughts of actually doing it, the pride; how sharp and cold the water was each time he fell, his feelings on karate in particular. The something he has in his life to look forward to--really, the only thing.
He thinks about the shape of Sam's smile, too, and the flutter in his stomach he gets when he thinks about her.
Except, it just reminds him of the hunger he's trying to desperately ignore. There's nothing in his fridge, even if it did work, and there's no using the oven or the microwave. There's cereal, he knows that, reminding him he'll have to get more tomorrow or whatever he can get his hands on. Snacks and coke cans are easier to steal than cornflakes, but what else is he to do?
(There's shame in those thoughts, too -- shame, and an anger. Remembering his mother who said she'd call tomorrow, a call that never came; a trip taken to Mexico that's 'only' a week and a half, and it's been a week, and you know it's going to be more, but you don't want it to be because where are you going to live--)
He gets up. It's been nothing but silence, his thoughts to occupy this empty space, a defeated sigh as he stands finally, walking in the dark over into the kitchen space to find a bowl. There's a box of off-brand rice snaps still there, and he fills it enough to leave himself something for breakfast tomorrow. There's no milk, so he turns to the tap and fills it with water from there.
--There's a knock at the door.
Robby looks over, and there's a dread, and that's now what fills anywhere, the room. Nothing good comes from visitors, but there's not avoiding it; he goes over to the front door, making sure the latch is on before he opens it up. Worry about if it's the landlord to talk about the rent he isn't going to get, but the face Robby sees--
'Hey.' Robby's confused, but he's undoing the latch anyway, all earlier fears gone. He opens the door more to speak to the man properly, curious. 'Mister LaRusso, what are you doing here?'
'Well, I could lie and say I was in the neighbourhood...' You might catch the way the man looks into the apartment, maybe even at you (where you stand, anyway), but Robby doesn't. Nothing about him changes until Mister LaRusso asks: 'Is your...mom home?'
It's a question Robby doesn't know how to answer without the following question of why, and that isn't a road he wants to go down. He doesn't want to lie to Mister LaRusso.
So he doesn't say anything, lowering his gaze. Mister LaRusso takes a step closer with a 'Hey,' a hand coming to rest on Robby's shoulder.
'Listen, it's going to be alright. Okay?'
It doesn't feel like that, but that might be the shame talking in Robby's heart -- because you know he's quietly thankful, too. You know the lopsided smile he makes in place of any answer.
'You can come stay with me and Sam until we can reach your mom. Grab what you need for tonight, alright?' Mister LaRusso offers to help him grab some things, but Robby tells him no, thanks, it's alright, standing awkwardly with this feeling in his chest he doesn't know how to comprehend. But the man makes it easier, says alright, and that he'll wait in the car, not seeming to mind as all Robby does is nod.
Because Robby isn't used to this: to someone coming and helping him, and how exactly he should be, what he should do, in the face of it.
But he does the obvious, and goes into his room to grab his bag, the memory ending on that difficult sense of appreciation and relief in escaping.
Edited 2022-12-08 15:53 (UTC)
[ LARUSSO AUTOSHOP: STOPPING A THIEVERY (he was supposed to be part of) ]
You're outside, that much you know upon first examination. There's a building in front of you, objects that you might know as cars parked by glass doors and windows that glow with the lights inside. Look up, and you might just see -- though, it's really hard to miss anyway -- large letters that read LARUSSO bolted to the wall.
Either you recognise this as a car dealership, or you're going to have some ideas about a certain Miyagi-do dojo, if you happen to know who that last name belongs to.
But that's not where the owner of this memory is looking, is. There's a view to large garage doors, but there's a young man standing by a wall that pokes out from that, more to the side and not as well-lit, no interior lighting to bring attention to this part of the lot. He's waiting, dressed in work clothes, on the cusp of a decision.
You know, because he knows, that two guys are coming to rob the place -- that they're coming with the expectation that he'll let them in, take whatever they can get their hands off while he makes sure there's no trace of them ever being here. They told him about the plan, and they've done this plenty of times before, elsewhere.
He would have gone along with it, a couple of weeks ago. But the face he's making to himself as he seems to be waiting speaks enough without his thoughts. A couple of weeks ago, he didn't have a man teaching him karate, showing him the way his body can move by instinct; a just a few days ago, he had that same man letting him into a room filled with small bonsais, careful and delicate, telling him, you have strong roots.
Visualise what you want your future to look like, and make it happen.
A far off future is hard to imagine, but Robby knows who he doesn't want to be.
You hear then the sound of hurried steps, of talking, and you recognise the voices, even if you don't the people. But Robby - taking in a deep breath - moves off away from the wall and rounds the corner, meeting the two looking for him.
'Where the hell is he at?'
'I dunno.'
'I'm right here,' speaks up Robby from behind, getting them to turn in surprise. One chastises him for sneaking up on him (a white guy in red), while the other (a black guy in a cap) asks about the code for the door in. 'Yeah, I got it,' Robby informs them, and the one who asked is itching to get going, praises Robby.
But the other one is watching him, knows. He raises a finger to stop the other, eyes staying on Robby.
'What you waiting on, man? Let's do it, where's the code?'
Robby looks down, knowing how this will go--they're not going to like his answer. But he looks back up again, at them. He's made his decision.
'I can't.'
'Can't what?' asks the one who's been watching Robby this entire time, taunting in the question. 'Remember the code?'
'Sorry, I mean I won't. I always get those two confused.'
'Robby, Robby.' The guy in the cap punches a fist in his hand. 'C'mon, man, don't do this. Just open the god damn door.'
'It's not gonna happen,' Robby answers firmly, and the guy laughs, turning to his friend.
'He's really gonna make me do this,' he tells him, before turning around with a fist aimed at Robby's head--but he's already raising up a hand, meeting it in a block that surprises even Robby to see. Looking at his hand, staring at the other two.
The guy in the cap laughs, while the other remarks, 'What, ninja boy teach you some karate or something?', but the first is back on Robby. Punching, blocked, but he can't stop himself getting grabbed. He manages to get out of it however as another fist comes swinging for him, keeping up a good defence. But it's still two against one, and even as he's kicked into another's hold, manages to elbow his way out and to get one to punch another, it's an attack to Robby's side that leads him open to getting thrown to the floor.
He's kicked hard to the stomach, and he can't manage to work himself up onto his feet -- so he scrambles towards the wall, the two laughing behind him, following to where he's been cornered.
'Nowhere to run,' threatens the guy in the cap, hunching towards him.
'Nowhere to hide,' Robby answers -- and points up at the camera facing the doors, its red light flashing. It's recorded everything, you know, even if you've never seen a security camera before.
The other two know what it is, cursing. The one in red points at Robby with a threat ('you better watch your ass') before the pair run off, and Robby can relax. Breathing hard from the fight, knowing--he can stay down here for long. He should see if the footage is stored locally, and see if he can change it. Unless he's lucky, and no one ever checks the night's recordings. Not without an alarm being tripped.
It's the one last thing he'll do, Robby thinks, that he shouldn't. Because Mister LaRusso can't know--
He doesn't want him to know.
Edited 2022-12-08 16:12 (UTC)
[ MOTHER BAILS: child being left alone, mention of drugs but none taken ]
The memory begins with a startle, a clicking noise that whirls one's thoughts to attention. There isn't much time for pause: there's danger that beats through the veins -- perhaps not yours, but the owner of the memory, whose focus leads yours to the singular bright source of light: an open doorway, a shadowy figure standing in its way.
'Stuff-- let's get out of here,' you hear the person say, their voice male.
You're in an apartment. It's dark, early morning by the blinds that show bars of light peeping through their gaps, but not bright enough to be what wakes the teen on the red couch near them. He's turned quietly to the scene he sees, kneeling by the seat to watch what's happening.
It might take a second to recognise him with his longer hair - or not at all - as Robby Keene.
What is immediate obvious, regardless, is his emotions at that moment: fear, and an increasing anticipation with the decision being calculated -- the one leading him slowly forward with crouched steps. You know - because Robby knows - that whoever's over there (two people? one by the door, one ransacking his kitchen; he can hear them rummaging) has probably found his mom's drug stash if they're lucky. Maybe they haven't been; but that's all that's in that area, and they won't find cash or anything useful. There's jewellery in his mom's room, with no mom occupying said room.
It might be dangerous. But Robby's making his choice, a confidence in his action as he moves in faster. The one by the door speaks again ('C'mon, we don't have all day,') but mere seconds after, Robby's running forward, lifting himself off the ground with a help of the kitchen counter and slamming a kick into the trespasser's chest. The person crashes into a kitchen rack, and a light flashes on before Robby can do anything more.
'Oh my god--Rick, are you okay?'
--It's his mom there in the kitchen, brown hair curled, pill bottles in her hand and rushing over to check on the man already up on his feet again. Robby stands stunned, confused, as much at the sight of his mother as he is the stranger. All the confidence has drained from him, but there's something left in its place, a restless energy.
'Robby!' The boy's mother looks at him, upset. 'What is wrong with you?'
'What's wrong with me?' Robby snaps back, that restlessness turning indignant. 'You haven't been here in days, I thought someone broke in!'
His mother concedes with okays, showing her hands, the orange pill bottles shaking. 'I'm sorry, I just came to grab a few things, 'cause um, Rick is--flying me to Cabo,' she shares cheerily. ('Cabo adjacent,' the man--Robby doesn't care what his name is--affixes.)
'Wait,' Robby speaks up, 'You're going to Mexico?' Uh-huh. 'With this guy? How long? I mean, we have rent to pay, and I don't have--' (money, a job, a way to pay, no means of getting money anymore--)
His mother stops him, tells him not to worry as she gestures to the man. Rick is going to pay, who flashes him a fingergun, a I got you, pal as his mother puts away in her bag more bottles. The earlier indignation has left Robby, not burning as hot as it had before. His brain is still swarming over Mexico, his mother's plans, her standing in the kitchen at all; how she's obviously giddy to get going, to leave him, and was she going to say goodbye? She didn't even say hello--and now she's just going away. He hasn't seen her in days.
'When are you coming back?' Robby asks, tentatively. A few days, his mother says; a week and a half, says the guy. Robby watches him, the new man who his mom's going off with, this time. There's always a new man; there's been men before, some of them Robby knows he doesn't get to see. None of them make his mother happy, and Robby doesn't know what this guy's deal is, what he plans to do--what good intentions can a guy have to take someone he just met a couple of days ago have, and with his mother?
Everything about how he looks is suspicious, fake, this memory tells you. He looks like a con artist. But Robby's thoughts are pulled away from him as his mother comes over to him, playfully poking him on the chest.
'You have the place to yourself, don't party too hard,' she teases sweetly, and his emotions--there's a desperation that's starting to build in his chest, hate dropped, a longing there before she's even left, even as she holds his face and leans in to kiss him on the forehead. 'I'll call you tomorrow, okay, sweetie?
I love you.'
It only makes the longing grow, a fervent scrambling in his chest, but Robby can't do anything but watch her leave--he never can. Except to tell the guy who's about to leave with her -- 'Hey, you hurt her, next time you won't get up.'
The man mocks fear, and then walks out -- and Robby is left, looking at the mess of his apartment, the door out still open. It's emptier than it'd been before, sleeping the nights on the couch, waiting on a phonecall or his mother to come back home.
But she never really comes back home, these days. And it's in the void of where that longing love had been that anger stews, and Robby goes to the door to slam it close. His hand gripped tight and lingering on the door handle, forehead pressing against the wood.
He already knows his mom won't call, he doubts that man will pay for an apartment that's none of his concern, and there's that ugly part of him that knows his mother won't think about him at all.
Ugly, because it consumes him more than the worry of what could happen to her out there.
The memory ends on the empty thought of getting ready for karate practice as Robby lets go of the door, quieter than the hurt chewing away in his gut.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
in hereee
[ JUVIE: WAITING FOR JOHNNY LAWRENCE, mentions of violence ]
There's one waiting there now. The one this memory is about, that you're drawn to, sitting on the edge of a bed with its thin dark sheet and no pillow. His head hangs and his hands are gripping into the mattress, foot tapping out of anxiety more than impatience. You can't see the signs of it, but you know he's in pain, a stinging in the exact place you'll notice it once he lifts his head.
'Alright, everyone we called for visitations, get up. Valasquez, Binder, Espinoza, Keene.'
He's bolted up onto his feet the second the last name is given, a painful hope rising in him. There's a bruise around his left eye, but you know the trepidation inside him is doing numbers inside his chest more than any sting left from the fight he had yesterday. That was bad, but today is important. Today, there's the glimmer of hope of something familiar -- of someone being there.
His dad.
You follow him with the line of other young kids, walking down halls until you reach a room that may be familiar in purpose, or not. It's lined with tables steel-grey and chairs white, but you know they're going to be hard as soon as you see them. Robby doesn't care, taking a place at one of the middle tables without a word; his head kept down, though a glance taken to examine the room once, the large window ahead of him that shows a camera room on the other side.
Everything about this is waiting. Every second obvious, every one that turns into minutes. Robby shakes his leg incessantly under the desk, only stopping when--
'--Hey. Robby?'
You only notice him because Robby does, a kind older man with a bald head, gentle eyes. He comes to Robby's table dressed in a black-blue suit, offering his hand.
'I'm Pastor Brown, a friend of your father. It's good to see you.' Robby's been hiding his face - or just his mouth - by his hands cupped in front of it, but he lets them go to take the hand offered to shake. The man sits down, with a joke about Johnny never being one to be punctual ('I see that hasn't changed'), and there's light talk of how Robby is, one he only answers with an 'Okay' that's reluctant to be said.
And then, the real wait begins. It's a memory of waiting for an agonising hour, sat there, and being stuck waiting with him. A glance taken at the door each time it opens (you might not look, but Robby does, and he does it every time it does open, sometimes when it doesn't), the crumbling hope inside the boy, though you don't see him change outwardly much. He stays sitting, hunched, hands in front of him and that leg always shaking.
All you have - and all Robby has - are his thoughts. Thinking about a school fight that brought him in here, how he'll explain to his dad that he tried to stop the fight, he did, and he wasn't trying to kick Miguel over the edge. He thinks about his face, how he might look; how he's fearful about seeing his disappointment, but he's hoping more for his father to look at him, see him--
Would he touch him? Put a hand on him, say something about his bruise? Robby's ashamed about that, the thought of the fight and how he tried to defend himself. But it was him against a room of others, how his fighting is about defence, not about escalation or punching back.
He thinks about his sensei failing him, the one who taught him that. But he's a thought and an anger (a hurt) that Robby doesn't want to think about for long, and doesn't.
People come to the other tables, you hear the hushed voices and the few sobs that escape; you hear the sound of hugs by the slide of fabric and the sounds of relief from loved ones. Robby never looks, but he knows, and even Pastor Bobby's expression comes less capable of hiding its concern.
He checks his watch, and Robby looks over at it, too. It's been nearly an hour. The pastor reaches over and touches Robby's arm, asks him to give a little more time.
But the last of Robby's hope has crumbled. He's not disappointed--he's bitter. At himself for thinking his dad would come in the first, that he ever would when he never has--that he doesn't blame him for Miguel's being in hospital, and why would he ever come for his screwed up kid?
'He's not coming,' Robby says, the first real words he has since this whole memory. 'I knew it.'
And it's to stand up, and leave the pastor where he sits, heading to out of the door -- and to the end of the memory, figuring that the only reason his dad had signed up to come was because someone else made him do it, first.
That's the only way he ever remembers Robby, anyway.
[ HOME ALONE: DANIEL LARUSSO FINDING HIM, child neglect, hunger, poverty ]
As for anything else, you'll find a kid on the couch by those windows, laying there. Longer hair that he might be familiar by, but it's his memory--Robby's, that is. And at this point, he's thinking; he has nothing to do but think, with it being this late -- too late to skateboard, to read, to do anything that requires light and doesn't piss you off when you try and use the glow of the lamps and sting your eyes more than achieve anything helpful. He's not thinking out loud, but he doesn't need to be. This is his memory, and his thoughts and all are as open and in view as the clutter strewn around the room.
You know the electricity is off, that there's no hot water in the apartment, but Robby isn't thinking about that. He's thinking about that day's training, keeping on top of a wooden wheel in a pond that would tip him and Sam off if they didn't maintain equal balance between each other. Each movement he had to do, the thoughts of actually doing it, the pride; how sharp and cold the water was each time he fell, his feelings on karate in particular. The something he has in his life to look forward to--really, the only thing.
He thinks about the shape of Sam's smile, too, and the flutter in his stomach he gets when he thinks about her.
Except, it just reminds him of the hunger he's trying to desperately ignore. There's nothing in his fridge, even if it did work, and there's no using the oven or the microwave. There's cereal, he knows that, reminding him he'll have to get more tomorrow or whatever he can get his hands on. Snacks and coke cans are easier to steal than cornflakes, but what else is he to do?
(There's shame in those thoughts, too -- shame, and an anger. Remembering his mother who said she'd call tomorrow, a call that never came; a trip taken to Mexico that's 'only' a week and a half, and it's been a week, and you know it's going to be more, but you don't want it to be because where are you going to live--)
He gets up. It's been nothing but silence, his thoughts to occupy this empty space, a defeated sigh as he stands finally, walking in the dark over into the kitchen space to find a bowl. There's a box of off-brand rice snaps still there, and he fills it enough to leave himself something for breakfast tomorrow. There's no milk, so he turns to the tap and fills it with water from there.
--There's a knock at the door.
Robby looks over, and there's a dread, and that's now what fills anywhere, the room. Nothing good comes from visitors, but there's not avoiding it; he goes over to the front door, making sure the latch is on before he opens it up. Worry about if it's the landlord to talk about the rent he isn't going to get, but the face Robby sees--
'Hey, Robby'.
--is a different surprise, a man he knows. Sensei, you know too.
'Hey.' Robby's confused, but he's undoing the latch anyway, all earlier fears gone. He opens the door more to speak to the man properly, curious. 'Mister LaRusso, what are you doing here?'
'Well, I could lie and say I was in the neighbourhood...' You might catch the way the man looks into the apartment, maybe even at you (where you stand, anyway), but Robby doesn't. Nothing about him changes until Mister LaRusso asks: 'Is your...mom home?'
It's a question Robby doesn't know how to answer without the following question of why, and that isn't a road he wants to go down. He doesn't want to lie to Mister LaRusso.
So he doesn't say anything, lowering his gaze. Mister LaRusso takes a step closer with a 'Hey,' a hand coming to rest on Robby's shoulder.
'Listen, it's going to be alright. Okay?'
It doesn't feel like that, but that might be the shame talking in Robby's heart -- because you know he's quietly thankful, too. You know the lopsided smile he makes in place of any answer.
'You can come stay with me and Sam until we can reach your mom. Grab what you need for tonight, alright?' Mister LaRusso offers to help him grab some things, but Robby tells him no, thanks, it's alright, standing awkwardly with this feeling in his chest he doesn't know how to comprehend. But the man makes it easier, says alright, and that he'll wait in the car, not seeming to mind as all Robby does is nod.
Because Robby isn't used to this: to someone coming and helping him, and how exactly he should be, what he should do, in the face of it.
But he does the obvious, and goes into his room to grab his bag, the memory ending on that difficult sense of appreciation and relief in escaping.
[ LARUSSO AUTOSHOP: STOPPING A THIEVERY (he was supposed to be part of) ]
Either you recognise this as a car dealership, or you're going to have some ideas about a certain Miyagi-do dojo, if you happen to know who that last name belongs to.
But that's not where the owner of this memory is looking, is. There's a view to large garage doors, but there's a young man standing by a wall that pokes out from that, more to the side and not as well-lit, no interior lighting to bring attention to this part of the lot. He's waiting, dressed in work clothes, on the cusp of a decision.
You know, because he knows, that two guys are coming to rob the place -- that they're coming with the expectation that he'll let them in, take whatever they can get their hands off while he makes sure there's no trace of them ever being here. They told him about the plan, and they've done this plenty of times before, elsewhere.
He would have gone along with it, a couple of weeks ago. But the face he's making to himself as he seems to be waiting speaks enough without his thoughts. A couple of weeks ago, he didn't have a man teaching him karate, showing him the way his body can move by instinct; a just a few days ago, he had that same man letting him into a room filled with small bonsais, careful and delicate, telling him, you have strong roots.
Visualise what you want your future to look like, and make it happen.
A far off future is hard to imagine, but Robby knows who he doesn't want to be.
You hear then the sound of hurried steps, of talking, and you recognise the voices, even if you don't the people. But Robby - taking in a deep breath - moves off away from the wall and rounds the corner, meeting the two looking for him.
'Where the hell is he at?'
'I dunno.'
'I'm right here,' speaks up Robby from behind, getting them to turn in surprise. One chastises him for sneaking up on him (a white guy in red), while the other (a black guy in a cap) asks about the code for the door in. 'Yeah, I got it,' Robby informs them, and the one who asked is itching to get going, praises Robby.
But the other one is watching him, knows. He raises a finger to stop the other, eyes staying on Robby.
'What you waiting on, man? Let's do it, where's the code?'
Robby looks down, knowing how this will go--they're not going to like his answer. But he looks back up again, at them. He's made his decision.
'I can't.'
'Can't what?' asks the one who's been watching Robby this entire time, taunting in the question. 'Remember the code?'
'Sorry, I mean I won't. I always get those two confused.'
'Robby, Robby.' The guy in the cap punches a fist in his hand. 'C'mon, man, don't do this. Just open the god damn door.'
'It's not gonna happen,' Robby answers firmly, and the guy laughs, turning to his friend.
'He's really gonna make me do this,' he tells him, before turning around with a fist aimed at Robby's head--but he's already raising up a hand, meeting it in a block that surprises even Robby to see. Looking at his hand, staring at the other two.
The guy in the cap laughs, while the other remarks, 'What, ninja boy teach you some karate or something?', but the first is back on Robby. Punching, blocked, but he can't stop himself getting grabbed. He manages to get out of it however as another fist comes swinging for him, keeping up a good defence. But it's still two against one, and even as he's kicked into another's hold, manages to elbow his way out and to get one to punch another, it's an attack to Robby's side that leads him open to getting thrown to the floor.
He's kicked hard to the stomach, and he can't manage to work himself up onto his feet -- so he scrambles towards the wall, the two laughing behind him, following to where he's been cornered.
'Nowhere to run,' threatens the guy in the cap, hunching towards him.
'Nowhere to hide,' Robby answers -- and points up at the camera facing the doors, its red light flashing. It's recorded everything, you know, even if you've never seen a security camera before.
The other two know what it is, cursing. The one in red points at Robby with a threat ('you better watch your ass') before the pair run off, and Robby can relax. Breathing hard from the fight, knowing--he can stay down here for long. He should see if the footage is stored locally, and see if he can change it. Unless he's lucky, and no one ever checks the night's recordings. Not without an alarm being tripped.
It's the one last thing he'll do, Robby thinks, that he shouldn't. Because Mister LaRusso can't know--
He doesn't want him to know.
[ MOTHER BAILS: child being left alone, mention of drugs but none taken ]
'Stuff-- let's get out of here,' you hear the person say, their voice male.
You're in an apartment. It's dark, early morning by the blinds that show bars of light peeping through their gaps, but not bright enough to be what wakes the teen on the red couch near them. He's turned quietly to the scene he sees, kneeling by the seat to watch what's happening.
It might take a second to recognise him with his longer hair - or not at all - as Robby Keene.
What is immediate obvious, regardless, is his emotions at that moment: fear, and an increasing anticipation with the decision being calculated -- the one leading him slowly forward with crouched steps. You know - because Robby knows - that whoever's over there (two people? one by the door, one ransacking his kitchen; he can hear them rummaging) has probably found his mom's drug stash if they're lucky. Maybe they haven't been; but that's all that's in that area, and they won't find cash or anything useful. There's jewellery in his mom's room, with no mom occupying said room.
It might be dangerous. But Robby's making his choice, a confidence in his action as he moves in faster. The one by the door speaks again ('C'mon, we don't have all day,') but mere seconds after, Robby's running forward, lifting himself off the ground with a help of the kitchen counter and slamming a kick into the trespasser's chest. The person crashes into a kitchen rack, and a light flashes on before Robby can do anything more.
'Oh my god--Rick, are you okay?'
--It's his mom there in the kitchen, brown hair curled, pill bottles in her hand and rushing over to check on the man already up on his feet again. Robby stands stunned, confused, as much at the sight of his mother as he is the stranger. All the confidence has drained from him, but there's something left in its place, a restless energy.
'Robby!' The boy's mother looks at him, upset. 'What is wrong with you?'
'What's wrong with me?' Robby snaps back, that restlessness turning indignant. 'You haven't been here in days, I thought someone broke in!'
His mother concedes with okays, showing her hands, the orange pill bottles shaking. 'I'm sorry, I just came to grab a few things, 'cause um, Rick is--flying me to Cabo,' she shares cheerily. ('Cabo adjacent,' the man--Robby doesn't care what his name is--affixes.)
'Wait,' Robby speaks up, 'You're going to Mexico?' Uh-huh. 'With this guy? How long? I mean, we have rent to pay, and I don't have--' (money, a job, a way to pay, no means of getting money anymore--)
His mother stops him, tells him not to worry as she gestures to the man. Rick is going to pay, who flashes him a fingergun, a I got you, pal as his mother puts away in her bag more bottles. The earlier indignation has left Robby, not burning as hot as it had before. His brain is still swarming over Mexico, his mother's plans, her standing in the kitchen at all; how she's obviously giddy to get going, to leave him, and was she going to say goodbye? She didn't even say hello--and now she's just going away. He hasn't seen her in days.
'When are you coming back?' Robby asks, tentatively. A few days, his mother says; a week and a half, says the guy. Robby watches him, the new man who his mom's going off with, this time. There's always a new man; there's been men before, some of them Robby knows he doesn't get to see. None of them make his mother happy, and Robby doesn't know what this guy's deal is, what he plans to do--what good intentions can a guy have to take someone he just met a couple of days ago have, and with his mother?
Everything about how he looks is suspicious, fake, this memory tells you. He looks like a con artist. But Robby's thoughts are pulled away from him as his mother comes over to him, playfully poking him on the chest.
'You have the place to yourself, don't party too hard,' she teases sweetly, and his emotions--there's a desperation that's starting to build in his chest, hate dropped, a longing there before she's even left, even as she holds his face and leans in to kiss him on the forehead. 'I'll call you tomorrow, okay, sweetie?
I love you.'
It only makes the longing grow, a fervent scrambling in his chest, but Robby can't do anything but watch her leave--he never can. Except to tell the guy who's about to leave with her -- 'Hey, you hurt her, next time you won't get up.'
The man mocks fear, and then walks out -- and Robby is left, looking at the mess of his apartment, the door out still open. It's emptier than it'd been before, sleeping the nights on the couch, waiting on a phonecall or his mother to come back home.
But she never really comes back home, these days. And it's in the void of where that longing love had been that anger stews, and Robby goes to the door to slam it close. His hand gripped tight and lingering on the door handle, forehead pressing against the wood.
He already knows his mom won't call, he doubts that man will pay for an apartment that's none of his concern, and there's that ugly part of him that knows his mother won't think about him at all.
Ugly, because it consumes him more than the worry of what could happen to her out there.
The memory ends on the empty thought of getting ready for karate practice as Robby lets go of the door, quieter than the hurt chewing away in his gut.