Jack scooped water from the tiny sink in his hands and dumped it over his head. Suds ran down the sides of his face as he repeated the process a few more times until most of the soap was out of his hair. He groped behind himself and grabbed the hand towel from the bar. Then, rubbing his head with the towel he stood up to his full five foot ten and peered at himself in the cracked bathroom mirror. A thin coating of mist made his reflection a hazy blur but he could still make out his unruly blond hair – too long – and smooth boyish face – no sign of facial hair yet but he was only seventeen. He frowned noting the wet spots where water had dripped on his faded AC/DC t-shirt and his one-size too big blue jeans. Both were hand-me-downs but still serviceable.

Behind him his sister was quietly showering in the tub, only a thin plastic curtain between them. This was the reason he was washing his hair in the sink. It was her turn in the shower, once a week was all either of them got.

Besides Jack and his twin sister Jenny there were six other foster kids. The Astors – or as most of the kids called them behind their backs, The Bastards – fostered kids for cash. Each of them was worth $77 per day which meant that at the end of the week the Bastards were clearing over four thousand bucks.

Jack wondered where all that money went because it certainly wasn't being used to keep up the house or buy good food or clothes for any of the kids. All you had to do was look around to see the truth of that statement.

The bathroom was a horror show of cracked lime green tiles with black tile trim around the edges. The sink, tub, and toilet were also lime green where they weren't discoloured by rust stains that no amount of scrubbing could remove. Speaking of the toilet it did not flush, instead Mr Bastard had put a bucket next to it on the floor. If your waste was solid your job was to fill that bucket in the tub and pour it into the toilet bowl. Gravity took care of the rest... most of the time. Pee did not get this treatment so the room tended to smell of stale urine.

Of course, if you did fill the bucket you had to use cold water because warm water was expensive. So said Mrs. Bastard in a nasal falsetto that Jack believed was meant to sound posh but actually was much closer to the high pitched whine of a loose fanbelt.

Since warm water was so costly, each of the eight foster kids – Mrs. Bastard referred to them as "foundlings" – was allowed one seven minute shower per week. There was a timer that you had to wind up before you turned on the water and when it went off so did the shower... or else.

As it happened the timer began to buzz at that very moment and Jenny dutifully turned off the taps.

"I'm coming out." She said, which was obvious, but this was Jenny's verbal warning for Jack to avert his eyes.

He did so and heard the shower curtain rings scrape metallically along the rusted rod as Jenny exited the tub.

He peeked.

He always peeked and then felt like a complete shit for the rest of the day but he couldn't stop himself.

It was only a flash of white skin and pink nipple before she had draped the other towel around herself, his playboy magazines showed much more but that wasn't the point. Jack knew deep down that the thrill he got was not really because he was seeing her naked but because he wasn't supposed to see her naked. Either that or he was just a perv... but aren't most seventeen year old boy's pervs?

"Are you covered?" he asked knowing full well she was but he had to play out the ruse.

"Yes." She said.

Jack turned and handed her the towel he had used to dry himself. Jenny wrapped it around her head like a turban deftly catching up her shoulder length hair, the same blond as Jacks, as she did so.

Of the orphans being fostered by the Bastards, Jack and Jenny were the only siblings. As such they were expected to do everything together almost as if they were one single person. Their bathroom time was shared as was their toothbrush and the rest of their meagre possessions. They shared a bedroom and a double bed – this arrangement had become awkward over the last few years but the Bastards either didn't notice or more likely didn't care. Four of the other children also doubled up room-wise, but they had bunk beds while the two youngest, just three and four years old and both boys slept on cots in the Bastards bedroom.

Then there was Charlie.

Charlie was the Bastards son. Their real son and he was, not to put too fine a point on it, a piece of shit. Charlie was twenty-three and had his own room. He shared nothing, and gave nothing. He was the king of all he surveyed in the Bastard house. Imagine Harry Potters step-brother Dudley but with greasy long black hair, tattoos, a knife in one pocket and a gun in the other. That was Charlie. He was an expert bully, due to years of practice with the foundlings, and parents who always... always... looked the other way.

"Well?" Jenny said, and her voice snapped Jack back to reality.

"Huh?" he said.

"If you're done, get out. I have to get dressed." She said turning away from him to wipe the fog off of the mirror with her hand.

"Oh, yeah... right." Jack turned and went out into the hallway shutting the bathroom door behind him. He took up his position leaning against the door jam. Guard duty, necessary as the lock on the door didn't work and more than once Charlie had "accidentally" walked in on Jenny. More recently he had begun "accidentally" walking in on the only other female foundling, Lena, who was only ten. Like I said, Charlie is a real piece of shit.