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he’s my fiancé now, but yes, my boyfriend too.”
    She nodded and kept eating. She obviously knew, like most of the kids did, that my partner was a man.
    “Does that bother you?”
    She shrugged and speared the last of the salad with the fork. “Nuh.” And she kept on eating like I’d asked her if she was bothered by the colour of my shirt. “It’s the twenty-first century, remember?”
    I laughed at that. I held out my fist which she bumped with hers, still holding the fork. “I like you, kid.”
    She slid the empty container back onto the table. “Tell Kira I said thanks. It was real good.”
    “Come on, time to hit the gym. You can go slow at first. We’ll be going for an hour, so pace yourself.”
    “Why do you exercise so much?”
    I quickly rinsed out the lunch container and wiped it down. “It’s good for your body. You have to look after your body. It’s the only one you’ve got.”
    And that’s pretty much how the day went. I did an hour or so on the bike and treadmill, then practised jabs with Arizona, then Claude did too.
    She had fun. Asked a hundred questions, and seemed to absorb everything she learned. She sat quietly through my meeting with the community college while I tried to garner as much information on free courses and things the local kids could get into. I explained our goals to help the kids learn and better themselves and I think I made a good contact.
    Janelle, a middle-aged lady with purple hair, was impressed with my Narcotics Division background and my new direction of teaching kids about drugs and trying to better their lives. I asked if I could get a group of kids together, maybe we could visit the college and take a look around. Janelle thought that sounded great and she left with promises that she’d be in touch.
    “That went well,” Claude said with an approving nod. “You really gonna take some kids up there?”
    “Sure,” I said, putting away my folders and locking the cabinet. “Maybe Rueben would be interested?”
    “Maybe.” She shrugged again.
    I wondered where her older brother was. They were never too far apart. I’d asked once already today and she’d chosen not to answer, so I left it alone. But about half way through the defence class I ran for the kids in the afternoon, Rueben came in.
    Without disrupting the class, I gave him a pointed nod towards the other kids, silently asking if he wanted to join in. He quickly got into formation with the others, picking a spot next to his sister and finished the class with her.
    When the class wrapped up, Rueben gave his sister a bit of a hug. “Thought I might find you here,” he said to her.
    “You took all day, Ruby,” she chided him. “I was here all day.”
    Rueben scanned the room until he saw me. “She wasn’t too much trouble?”
    “Not at all,” I said, walking over to them. “She was my little helper.”
    The older boy, all of twelve or thirteen, looked at his little sister and smiled. “As long as you don’t get in his way.”
    She rolled her eyes. “Matt said I was helpful , Ruby, not in his way.”
    “Come on,” he said to her, putting his arm on her shoulder to lead her out through the doors. But then he stopped and turned back to me. “Thanks, Matt. I appreciate it.”
    I checked my watch. “Kira will be here soon to pick me up,” I told them. “Do you guys need a lift home?”
    “Nah, it’s cool,” Rueben said. “Thanks anyway.”
    Then Claude frowned. “How come you don’t drive?”
    “I do,” I answered. “Sometimes. If Kira’s working late, I’ll drive myself, but if he’s finishing work around the same time, he’ll swing past and pick me up. I’m not supposed to drive too much,” I admitted. “Doctor’s orders.”
    “Because of your ear, right?” Claude asked.
    “Because of the vertigo, yes.”
    “That must suck.”
    I smiled. “It does. But it could have been worse.”
    “If you say so.”
    I chuckled at her snarkiness. “Well, Claude, you did good