“Kid’s not gonna come out n’ eat lunch with us?”

“He’s just being a brat. Let him stay in there if that’s what he wants.”

They didn’t think he could hear them, but the bathroom door was as good as paper at blocking any noise. After years of overhearing Jennifer’s distress calls to his grandparents, Casey wasn’t entirely convinced she even cared if he heard her talking about him anyway. In fact, he’d have dared to say she wanted him to sometimes, though he couldn’t back that up with anything more substantial than ‘it seems like something she’d do.’

The hotel room was cleaner than it had ever been, or probably ever would be unless Richard opted to stick around, but it felt anything but comfortable. Huddled into the corner of the bathroom, knees to his chest, he was far more concerned about the state of his hideout and where he might sleep than eating.

“Sorry he’s so rude to you, by the way,” Jennifer spoke up again. “I’d say he’s not always like that, but he kinda is.”

Casey rolled his eyes, so familiar with that last line he found himself muttering “but I kinda am” in unison. And maybe she was right about that one; maybe he was always moody and maybe he did always act like a brat. Maybe that was just as much a part of the routine as Richard or whoever else she decided to bring home.

( — How long would it be before Richard got sick of the routine like the rest of them? )

“Oh, I think you’re being a little too hard on ‘im. We had a good time in’ere cleaning up that bathroom. You know ‘e sleeps in there though?”

Casey’s eyebrows furrowed. He’d found a sanctuary in the notion that Richard was just like all the other ones, a comfort in the predictability of it all. The sudden break in the routine had him sick to his stomach from the newfound uncertainty.

“No idea why, there’s a perfectly good pull-out out here,” Jennifer mused.

“You know what I think, Jenny?”

“What do you think, Richard?” There was some shuffling around outside the door, someone walking around the kitchen, throwing a plate into the sink. It had to be Jennifer based on the jarring amount of force behind it. Richard going up to bat for him wasn’t part of the script and Casey could already envision her red in the face over someone defending him, telling her she might be wrong about him.

“I don’t think he’s a brat at all, I think he’s just a sad kid.”

The kitchen went quiet. Casey wanted nothing more than to disappear from the hotel room entirely and pretend he never heard that, yet he couldn’t tune them out either, chin lifting from his knees so he could listen more intently.

“Sad?” Jennifer asked. It wasn’t a question she asked out of curiosity, more a dare for him to elaborate.

“Yeah, sad. Go easy on ‘im, it doesn’t hurt me any.”

“Well… sad or not, he could still have some manners since you’re helping us, and he’s not gonna say sorry, so I will. You ready?” Another dish crashed into the sink, more deliberately than before, followed by the sounds of shuffling around, keys jingling, then finally the front door shutting, leaving him to himself with a conversation he wished he’d ever listened to. Maybe that was true too; maybe he was just sad, but that realization wasn’t part of the routine either.