Specialist help on At Home

Xavier Lundstrom

August 21, 2021 9:49 AM

Specialist help by Xavier Lundstrom

Caro Lundstrom twisted her wedding and engagement rings around on her finger. She adjusted the watch that suddenly felt like it was pinching at her wrist. The idea of having this specialist visit her in her own home had seemed comforting when it had first been suggested, or at least convenient. Now that he was here, it didn’t really feel that way. Although she supposed it was reasonable to be nervous. Medical staff always made her feel… if not that, then certainly keyed up. She kept turning to them for answers, which they kept not being able to provide, but she could never quite squash the belief that one of them might, eventually. It led to a rather delicate feeling, that fledgling breath of hope, tinged with the fact that something was wrong with her son and until that stopped being true she was going to worry about it.

“Do I make you nervous, Mrs. Lundstrom?” her visitor asked. She twitched slightly at being called out so very directly.

“No,” she answered, her fidgeting making it an obvious attempt at a polite lie. She had met a lot of doctors in her time, and he wasn’t the first to have greying hair and a cold, clinical stare. He noted something down, the quill he used scratching against the silence. Caro reached for her water. She had offered her guest coffee, which he had declined, and so it had seemed rude to go about making one for herself. She had poured him a glass of water, which he had set on the coaster on the table next to him and not touched since.

“You’re not used to having a wizard in your house.”

“I...I suppose not.” She wasn’t sure if it had been a question but he had waited after saying it like he expected an answer.

“Apart from your son, of course.”

“Yes. Of course.” She tripped slightly over the words.

“But so much easier for me to come to you. After all, I take it you’re not overly familiar with the ways we travel?”

“No. Not really.” There had been a definite rising lilt to that set of words. “Thank you. It’s very kind of you to come.” She was sure she’d said that when he arrived. The longer he sat staring at her, speaking in that low, overly measured way, like his words were a poker hand he was determined to keep to himself, the less she was sure that applied. It was hard to imagine this man doing anything out of kindness. Still, he could help with Xavier’s migraines. Or at least, he hadn’t yet said that he could not. “We saw a magical doctor at a local hospital. The school gave us the information, and they-”

“Referred you on to me. You believe your son is… allergic to magic?”

If the man hadn’t been so hard to read until now, Caro would have sworn there was a slight sneer to his lip as he quoted her own words back to her, but it was probably just her own paranoia. She couldn’t deny that she had not exactly become fluent in wizardish over the last year, and she almost felt like she was back at school, trying to explain back a concept she had heard and understood but couldn’t yet put into her own words. Perhaps what she was saying sounded stupid, or didn’t really exist, but she hadn’t been able to come up with a better analogy.

“He’s always had migraines. But then, you say he’s always had magic as well, so maybe they go together. And I know that they’ve gotten worse, far more frequent, since he started at school. It seems like something in the environment there sets him off.”

“You don’t believe that your son has always been magical?”

“Pardon?”

“You said ‘you say he’s always had magic.’ You don’t believe us?”

“Oh. No. I mean, I do. I just… meant I didn’t know until you said so.” Her brow furrowed, that wasn’t really the important part as far as she was concerned, but she was forced to pause as he took a note.

“I see. So, returning to the subject of Sonora… You’re concerned about whether it’s a fit and proper environment for your son?”

“I’m concerned that it seems he’s ill more often when he’s there.” She hesitated. The school had not done anything specific to lose her trust, but it had also done very little to gain it. They answered her letters, she supposed. They seemed to genuinely care. But was she happy with them? “It’s still unusual for me, having him sent away from home. And he seems to be making very little progress with his… magic. I don’t know if it’s just the stress from that that’s setting his migraines off, or whether it’s more than that.”

“They’re concerning signs, certainly,” he stated. Caro looked up, still finding he was as gray and closed off as he had been when he had first entered. But perhaps that was just his manner, stiff and old and serious… It didn’t necessarily mean he was a bad person. Certainly, hearing her own words given some form of validation made him a little less intimidating. “There could certainly be a link between his lack of magical progress and his migraines, and that would concern us very greatly. Tell me the details, as you see them…”

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Xavier Lundstrom

August 21, 2021 10:40 PM

And hinderances by Xavier Lundstrom

“It’s like I can feel it there but I can’t get it out. Sometimes it reaches all the way down to my fingers but it’s hard to get it any further, into my wand,” Xavier explained. This, at least, was different to any other conversation he’d had about his migraines in that he had some new symptoms to discuss. He glanced at his mother. She was frowning whilst trying to look like she wasn’t, which was her default doctor’s appointment face. There was a tiny little line in the centre of her brow, even when her face relaxed, for which he wondered whether he was solely responsible.

“How does that make you feel?” the man asked.

“Frustrated,” Xavier answered promptly.

“So much so that you want to quit school and come home?”

“I… I dunno.” He glanced at his mom for guidance. The tone of the man’s voice clearly said that wasn’t a good idea. It also didn’t really feel like it was to do with his migraines. Sometimes the friendlier doctors talked about you outside of your illness, like you were a person, but so far this guy didn’t seem like one of the friendlier doctors. Maybe someone had told him he should ask personal questions to seem like a human being, and he had taken it up with all the skill and warmth of a robot.

“You know that’s not an option though.” The man leant forward peering at him intently.

“Yeah, I know!” Xavier tried to quell the hot feeling that pulsed through him at feeling caught out, like the man had set him up. Why ask, why dangle that possibility, if it wasn’t a real option?

“If you could choose between your powers working properly, and coming back to live this life, which would you choose?”

“I…” He glanced again at his mother. This was weird. What was he supposed to say? “This is hypothetical, right?” he checked. The man gave a small nod. Xavier bit his lip. Having caught a glimpse into the magical world, it was hard to imagine turning his back on that. He would rather this person could fix his wonky powers than take them away completely. But if he couldn’t do the former, did he want to struggle through life in the magical world, being less than everyone else? And how could he sit here next to his mom and say he didn’t want to be back with his family? “I’d come home,” he decided. It was hypothetical. The man couldn’t take his powers, and was going to try fixing them whatever he said, whereas his mom’s feelings would definitely be hurt if he didn’t say that.

“Perhaps I will take you up on that coffee after all. If you don’t mind?”

Xavier looked up, surprised by the sudden non-sequitur but saw the man was addressing his mom.

“Of course.” She said the words promptly, but there was a hesitation in the way she stood up. Her eyes flicked to the still untouched water glass, to the man, to Xavier. She took steps towards the kitchen, but they faltered halfway. Still, she didn’t seem to think of anything to say, so she made her way through, leaving the door open behind her.

“Is that what you’d really choose?” the man asked. Xavier wasn’t sure whether his voice had gotten quieter. It had been soft to begin with, but it definitely seemed like it had dropped a notch or two.

“No. Maybe. I don’t know. It’s kind of like being pulled in two different directions. And right now it feels like I can’t really fit in properly at school.”

“Your mother doesn’t seem to like you being there.”

“No, not really,” Xavier shrugged. “It’s not really normal to have to send your kids away.”

“It’s normal for wizards.”

“Yeah. Well, normal for us,” Xavier responded, resisting the urge to roll his eyes. He noticed that the man was scratching intensely at his parchment, which seemed a bit weird for the small talk they were making whilst his mom fixed their coffee. “What does this have to do with my migraines?” he asked, figuring that sounded politer than ‘what are you writing?’

“Well, we’re trying to work out what causes them. Stress. Magic. Stress about magic. So, I need to know what might be stressing you, don’t I? Things at home, for instance.”

“Home isn’t stressful,” Xavier almost laughed at the question.

“What is it like?”

“Normal. I’d go to school, do homework—math and English and that kind of thing—skate with my brother. Go to church on Sundays.”

“Yes. That seems to be a theme.” The man nodded to the colourful Sunday school crafts pinned on the living room wall. There was a wobbly clay plaque made by Robyn which read ‘Bless this house,’ a paper craft project of hearts quoting the verse from Corinthians about what love was, and anything that had been made or decorated with rainbows, whether intentionally or coincidentally. “How do your family’s religious views compare to other people’s? Do they generally fit in?”

“Definitely not,” Xavier answered with a grin, his eyes moving across the rainbows. “But we found a group of like-minded people, so it’s all good.”

At that moment, there were returning footsteps from the kitchen. The man quickly pointed his wand at his water glass, silently draining it.

“Thank you,” he smiled, taking the coffee. He sent the empty glass towards the kitchen with a wave of his wand, causing Xavier’s mom to jump. Even Xavier flinched slightly, even though he was more used to magic. The man scratched a further note on his paper.

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