*******************************

“I said leave me alone!” Ethan screamed as he ran, but a group of some younger and older boys surrounded him quickly blocking his path.

“You were lucky before Mr. Tang always protected you but now you have no one!”

“You fatherless child!”

“Your mom must have looked like a mother she chased him away!”

“Don’t talk about my mommy!” Ethan shouted putting his hands into fists.

One of the older boys laugh, “What? Are you going to hit us?”

“Come on! I dare you!”

One of the boys pushed Ethan to the ground and threw his hand forward. Ethan shut his eyes tightly but when nothing happened he opened his eyes again to surprisingly see a man standing there pulling the older boy up.

“A real man doesn’t pick on people who aren’t his size you got it?” Jiro said. “Go on and apologize to him.” The boy stood there refusing. “Go on.”

“Sorry,” the boy muttered.

“Now run off before I tell your mother,” Jiro told. “Don’t let me catch you doing it again.”

The boy ran off and Jiro turned to the rest of the boys, “Same goes for all of you. I’ll let all your parents know.”

Ethan watched as they all ran off together and turned to Jiro looking up at him. Ethan smiled showing both rows of his teeth.

“You’re the man from the hospital!” Ethan exclaimed.

“Your name’s Ethan right?” questioned Jiro bending down to equal his height with the little boy. “Is your mommy doing ok?”

Ethan squeezed his lips together, “I don’t know. At first she didn’t like when Uncle Dan took us out a lot but now she takes me out a lot. We always go to noisy places. I miss Uncle Dan, do you know when he’s coming back?”

Jiro stared at Ethan wondering why Selina hadn’t explained to him clearly about Danson.

“In a while. He’ll come back in a while,” Jiro said Ethan’s head. “Is your mommy coming?”

Ethan looked around and turned back to Jiro, “I don’t think so. Mommy forgets sometimes now, but when Uncle Dan was here she never forgot, but now she forgets.” Jiro smiled a little. “You look sad.”

“I do?” Jiro asked. “Come on I’ll take you home.”

“Mommy said not to go with strangers,” Ethan told.

“You know me right?” Jiro said.

Ethan though to himself, “Yea, I do!”

Jiro led Ethan by the hand to his car and put the seat belt on him in the back and got into the driver’s seat. Jiro stopped the car in the parking lot and took Ethan out.

“Did you get any new toys?” Jiro asked as he helped Ethan down from his seat.

“Mommy didn’t buy me any new ones,” Ethan said.

Jiro smiled remembering the one he’d bought the day he and Ive had gone out for their last day together.

“Here you go,” Jiro said handing him the toy. “Do you like it?”

“Whoa!” Ethan gasped as he grabbed the toy from Jiro’s hands. “A dinosaur! It’s a T-Rex!”

“Don’t bite it or your mommy will get mad ok?” Jiro said putting his hand on Ethan’s head.

“Ok mister!” Ethan said.

Jiro smiled, “Can you go up alone?”

“Yea! The woman at the desk will take me up. Buh bye!” Ethan said running off waving.

**********************************

I was still taking a nap when I heard the door open. Curious I got up and opened the door of my bedroom finding Ethan standing by the door holding something in his arms.

“Ethan! Oh my God! I’m so sorry! I forgot about you!” I exclaimed running over to him.

“It’s ok mommy,” Ethan said. “Mr. Nice took me home.”

I frowned. It’s the first time I heard that name ‘Mr. Nice’.

“Who brought you home?” I asked bending down to look at him.

“The man from the hospital and he gave me this,” Ethan told holding out his toy so I would see it.

One glance and I recognized the toy. Mr. Nice was Jiro. Anger erupted in me and I grabbed the toy from Ethan’s hands throwing it to the ground.

“Why did you take that?! Why?! Did I ever teach you to take stuff from strangers?!” I questioned in a loud scolding  tone.

Ethan looked back at me with huge scared eyes. I caught myself and tried to calm down. Ethan started crying and grabbed his toy. Feeling guilty I went over to him to hug him. He pushed me away at first then on the second try he let me pull him into my arms.

“I’m sorry,” I apologized.

“I miss Danson!” he cried.

I placed my hand on the back of his head and replied, “Me too. I miss him too.”

The next day I sent Ethan off to school promising to pick him up. I then went to the restaurant and worked around in the kitchen for a while then retreated into my office. Hours later I returned to look at the clock to find that it was time to pick up Ethan. When I got out of my office I found a man in a suit walk through the door. He looked around for a bit then saw me and smiled.

“Miss Ren,” he said.

I recognized him, “What is it.”

“I need you to go somewhere with me,” he told.

“I can’t. I need to go pick up my son…” it slipped out.

“I promise it will only take a moment,” he promised.

I was a little relieved he didn’t catch the 'my son' part of the sentence.

“Lian!” I shouted.

“Yes boss?” she asked running from out behind the counter.

“Could you go pick up Ethan? It seems I can’t get out of this,” I told.

“Sure thing!” she said.

The car traveled down a street I had never been on before. I watched all the tall buildings pass as we drove by. The car made a smooth turn into a parking lot and I got out following the man. This seemed to be a business building but what was I doing here? We went up a few floors and down a long hallway. Finally we reached a huge wooden door and the man stood by the door and nodded at me with a smile. I walked in as he opened the door and when I went inside he closed the door. I turned to look around the green carpeted room. A white sofa was placed in front of the large oak desk. I let my eyes catch sight of every detail in the room and turned around when the door opened again. Mr. Wang entered.