Born by a teenage mother not prepared for the responsibility of caring for a child, let alone a child with a mental disability, Rufus's infancy was not perfect. Rufus's original full name was Irene Rufus Nodrick being born as a female, given the middle name Rufus after her grandfather. Irene was surrendered to a mental institution in Minnesota to be forgotten about, all she knows of her life are doctors and people who are on a more severe spectrum of mental retardation.

 

Under staffed and overcrowded the institute fall neglectful to their patients and fails basic care procedure, the strong smell of urine and feces on the walls, in the beds, and repeatedly used diapers becomes a norm. Violent patients are forcibly strapped to chairs and beds and left alone for hours or sometimes days. Meals were skipped to save food, patients being fed only once a day. The only time Irene is free from this torment is school time, being taught ASL due to being mute, Irene loves school time and enjoys story books, she only begins to misbehave when its time to go back throwing a temper tantrum leading to being stuck with needles and drags back to be strapped to a chair.

 

Doctors were required to remove reproduction organs to avoid unplanned pregnancies, Irene was scheduled to be operated on soon and was left alone in a hospital bed while the operation room is being prepped, Irene realizes the opportunity she is given, takes a pair of scissors, loosen the bolts and escapes through the vent. 

Irene is memorized by the scenery of whats beyond the barred windows that she starred out for years, she wanders down the road and doesn't stop walking, nowhere to go and no one to run too. 

 

Irene notices people climbing a bus and follows along being mistaken as a child of one of the adults and takes off, falling asleep, she ends up in the next state over before the driver realizes the child is alone, the driver tries to help the kid but unable to talk he contacts the police, seeing the officers as a threat, unknown of their intention she flees. Irene's new norm is traveling either by foot or sneaking on transportation, eating in soup kitchen  and sleep on side walks, bus seat, bench, or shelter, gets up and does it all again. At this point she's quite savvy with her surroundings and dodging danger, something she knows all too well from the institution.Walking down the road, she sees a fence with a cat walking across it, this intrigues her and she follows in hot pursuit into a backyard, she grabs the cat, sits behind a bush, and cuddles the feline. All the commotion alerts the people in the house and is discovered by none other then Laz and Joey.

 

Unknown to the gender of Irene by both herself and the family, she refers to herself as a "he", when taken in to the family as a foster child and they discover his name under "Rufus Nodrick". The father's priority is to take him to the doctors, but seeing another white coat triggers a massive panic attack, screaming and grasping onto dad signing frantically to be saved, the doctor administers a sedative to calm him down and advises the father to take a different approach to his check ups. His father drives back to the house and lays Rufus in bed, another doctor visits him but in street clothes instead, making it seem just a casual thing for blood work and other tests being performed on a house call. Dad realizing that Rufus can communicate he jumps to the chance to learn sign language to better understand Rufus. Only having a daughter in his life, Laz's father takes the chance to raises him as a boy, excited to have a son. Rufus taking a liking to his new family he sticks next to his dad feeling protected due to the TLC Rufus longed for.

 

Dad worked out of his garage fixing up cars, Rufus wanting to stay near to dad, would watch what he's doing, once and a while his father would show him what he's doing and why he's doing it, thinking maybe he can pass the profession down to Rufus.

 

 

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While in the institute Irene makes friends with one of the patients named "Rial", the communication barrier doesn't hold back their bonding, teaching Rial sign and speaking to him through drawings and writing in her note book. They feel connected through their experience at the hospital, comfort in the others company they run away together to live on their own, no plan, no family, and no where to go, looking at a community map they discover a shelter they can stay in while they think of their plan. Outside of the shelter, they notice a man preaching nonsense about the government and how their going to expose the lizard people and aliens amongst us, he approaches Rial and Irene, who are gawking at the mad man, and asks if they're ready to see the truth and join them, Rial asks the important question "are we going to get food?" the crazy man explains his group is like family, they take care of everything and everyone as long as they follow their values, all Rial heard was "food" so he quickly agreed letting the man ramble about their group as their guided to their camp.

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The so called "group" lives out on the land in cabins near a lake deep in the forest, there's a few cabins to fit six people each, an outhouse and fire pit. The leader that recruited them is known as "Father Truth", the men and women are treated as equals in their group, their not allowed electronics, factory made items, or food from companies supported by the government. They spend the day making tools, hunting, gardening, preparing clean water and crafting soap, rope, and clothing out of fur and leather, they learn from native american culture and adapt to it, believing the world would of been better if the Europeans didn't white wash the nation. Everything felt right, it was peaceful, they were acquiring skills that are useful for survival, and being out in nature after years surrounded by concrete walls was freeing, it seemed like a happy ever after, but something still wasn't right. 

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Irene realize that the government phobic paranoia wasn't going to keep the peace stable, Father Truth ends up placed under custody after a messy run in with the cops, Irene decides to pack up and leave with Rial to keep them safe. They sell the crafts they made to make enough money to find a new place to live, Rial finds a used old RV for them to live in and Irene goes out finds a job at the fishery. Rial still makes crafts to pass the time and starts selling the crafts at markets and carnivals while Irene supports them at the fishery.

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