Marcus Webb, who was nine years old, had run away from fourteen foster homes in less than two years. Everyone said he couldn’t be placed. He was told he was broken by every adult. But he kept coming back to one place: our motorcycle clubhouse.
It wasn’t a normal residence for the Iron Brothers MC in Riverside. Most of us were veterans or blue-collar workers who rode Harleys on the weekends, conducted charity events, and fixed bikes. But Marcus felt protected here. He put a crumpled five-dollar bill and a note that said “for rent” on a leather couch with a rucksack as a pillow. For the third time this week.
That morning, I got there early and found him asleep. He froze as he woke up and spotted me, ready to run. He said, “I didn’t steal anything.” “I’ll go.”
“Keep your money,” I told them. “I just want to know why you keep coming back.”
His remark crushed my heart: “You guys don’t yell.” You don’t hit. You don’t lock the fridge door. “I feel safe here.”
Marcus thought that being in a room with motorcyclists wearing leather was safer than being in the foster system. He remembers the toy run we performed in the hospital six months ago and how we were kind to him instead of judging him. He kept coming back because that moment had stuck with him.
I told him I would do my best to improve his life. I called Tommy, our vice president, and then my daughter, who is a family lawyer. By midday, all forty-seven Iron Brothers were at the clubhouse, ready to do what no one thought was possible: fight for this youngster.
We wrote down everything: background checks, charity work, character references, and every time Marcus had been to see us. He even penned a letter to the judge. It was a nine-year-old asking to stay with the only people who had ever made him feel like he cared.
The emergency hearing was really stressful. Forty-seven motorcyclists in leather vests, standing up for a child they scarcely knew, marched into family court like warriors. Marcus gave evidence, carefully explaining why we were the only family he had ever trusted.
Judge Whitmore gave emergency custody. Marcus became our son, brother, and family. Months later, permanent custody was grantedHe now has a bedroom in the clubhouse, attends school, does well, and rides dirt motorcycles with our help. He helps with charity rides every weekend and learns life skills from the men and women who fought for him.
Marcus calls me Pop. He calls the other males “uncles.” He learns loyalty, honor, and family at the age of eleven, not because of blood, but because forty-seven motorcyclists wouldn’t give up on him.
We didn’t only provide Marcus a place to live. We gave him a family. And he reminded us that family isn’t necessarily what society thinks it should be. People who turn up when no one else does are sometimes the best.
