The Jacksons
May 01, 2020 8:45 PM
Informed Decisions by The Jacksons
“Baloney on white bread, salted chips and a KitKat,” Claire smiled, holding out the lunchbox which contained absolutely limited nutritional value but was going to score high in bribery points, which she needed right now. “Oh, and an apple in case you get desperate.”Bertie nodded, and took the lunchbox, tucking it into his backpack.
He was hard to read. He always had been. She was pretty sure he was not totally happy about summer camp but that he saw it as a necessary evil rather than a gross betrayal. He still firmly seemed to see it as means to an end, a ticket to get himself into Sonora. She was trying to get him to see it as a chance to evaluate both schools fairly, and make an informed decision.
“Have a good first day,” she offered him, giving him a hug and a kiss, which he wiped off. Again, she wasn’t sure whether that was because she was in the doghouse right now, or because he was eleven and mom kisses were just gross.
Bertie took his dad’s arm, letting him pull him in as they turned and disappeared into the squeezy air of disapparation.
They reappeared outside a cheerful redbrick building which Bertie was already holding several things against:
It’s official name was the Central Academy of Magic And Communication. Its abbreviation was CAMAC. They had counted the ‘a’ of ‘and’ but not the ‘o’ of ‘of’ and that was just cheating.
They liked putting rainbows and smiley faces on things
None of his other siblings had had to do stupid summer camps to work on their school skills
People kept acting like he might actually want to go to school here, full time. They kept talking about ‘giving it a fair shot’ or ‘making an informed decision.’. He was going to do the summer program, learn the useful speech stuff, and then make an informed decision to go to Sonora, and that was that.
He took a deep breath, deciding to approach this as Agent Jackson. That made the whole thing a lot better. Agent Jackson was going deep undercover on a special summer mission. He was going to acquire a set of secret codes that would be known only to him. With them, he would have unstoppable power.
Or at least, be able to get through his classes at Sonora without blowing anything up.
13
The Jacksons
Informed Decisions
0
The Jacksons
1
5
The Jacksons
May 02, 2020 9:14 PM
And secret missions by The Jacksons
Bertie might have fancied himself the secret agent of the family, but Claire had one or two tricks up her own sleeve too. When she had asked him how day one had gone, he had responded that it was ‘classified’ and raced off to his room.This was one of the difficulties with raising Bertie. Almost everything was ‘classified.’ Things he liked and was excited by were things he hoarded to himself, building his arsenal of spy resources. So, those were classified. The trouble was, so were feelings and incidents he didn’t want to talk about. She wasn’t sure how it had happened, in a house full of chatterboxes, but he just didn’t like to talk about anything. You could barely stop Zara or Eva from rambling on about what made them happy or excited, or yelling with the force of a storm at each other when they were annoyed. Bertie just kept it all on the inside.
So, she had to play secret agent herself. Or perhaps detective. And these were the clues she had gathered thus far.
1). Lunch. Bertie did not, as far as she knew, have any particular feelings towards sandwich crusts. Her evidence for this was that he ate them without complaining, or even seeming to notice, when happy or distracted. However, he seemed to know that they were a point of contention between parents and children. When he was in a bad mood with her, his crusts got left on the plate or in his lunchbox as a pointed comment. Since day two of camp, his crusts had been gone.
2). His backpack. It disappeared up the stairs with him each evening. That meant there was something inside that he wanted to keep secret, and to work on in his bedroom.
Both of these pointed to the fact that something at camp had genuinely caught his interest. She tried to put aside her curiosity as to what. Either there would be a parents’ meeting at some point, or Bertie would start slipping his new knowledge into everyday life, happy for the chance to know something his older siblings and cousins did not. She would just have to wait it out. He was like one of those fingertrap thingies - the more she fought him to know what it was, the less likely he was to tell her.
*
Up in his room, Bertie sprawled on his bed, the fingerspelling chart facedown in front of him. The spell signs from that day face up. When he had told himself that he was going on a secret mission, he had thought that was really, deep down, just something he was telling himself. He had expected the ‘secret codes’ were going to be more boring breathing exercises and soft sounds like his regular therapist had taught him. Not that those were totally worthless because they did help. A bit. But the secret codes were… really secret codes. Okay, they were calling it signing, but they had to be covert. He had memorised the finger spelling chart in a single evening. There were some kids who’d done summer programs there before who were faster, but he was the fastest beginner.
He had to admit that this place was actually not total crud at all. In fact, not even really a bit crud. He actually liked it.
13
The Jacksons
And secret missions
0
The Jacksons
0
5