Xavier Lundstrom
January 19, 2022 3:26 AM
One step forward...? by Xavier Lundstrom
Xavier sat on the stiff, wooden chair, his body mirroring those same characteristics. Beside him, Professor Skies was keeping up a gentle flow of soothing reminders about what the day would consist of, and what she wasn’t going to let happen. Once this was used up, she made occasional stabs at small talk, and offered him a book, which he took, just to spare her the effort of having to think of things to say to him.He had mechanically turned over five pages without reading them when the door opened. He jumped up, hope and relief swelling inside his chest for just a second.
“Dad!” he cried, throwing himself into the waiting hug, letting himself be held. He could feel his dad’s heart hammering where his own head had come to rest, and the hands that were holding onto him were shaky. But Xavier smelled the familiar aftershave and soft cottony smell, and even with everything else, it was still a comfort. For a moment. “Where’s mom?” he asked, as he realised she wasn’t swooping through the door to join the hug.
“She didn’t feel well. She’s so, so sorry. She wanted to be here to support you, but well… She needs to be resting.”
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“She was all fevery, and fuzzy headed. She’s having a nap.”
Xavier tried to swallow the feeling of panic and betrayal. Yes, of course, when he had a fever, mom let him stay off school. But this was different. She was a mom. She just kept going when she was ill. And this was important! He’d noticed his dad hadn’t said ‘You’ll see her when you get home.’ Because there was no guarantee…
“What if this is it?” he asked. “What if this is the only chance she’ll get to see me all summer?”
“Let’s not think like that,” said Professor Skies quickly. “And let’s not talk about it now,” she added, giving a pointed glance to their surroundings. “But I told you—there’s no way you’re staying here for the summer. So, whatever it ends up like at the end of today, you’ll have a say,” she promised, keeping her voice low.
*
It would be exaggerating to say that the interview process was like torture. Xavier had a good idea of the things these people could do which were a much closer fit to the definition. The interview was just talking. Even when they asked for proof that he’d really (scraped a barely existent and very generously marked) pass in his exams, Professor Skies had been ready with these little bottles of silvery mist that showed him doing it, like a really bad, tiny but three dimensional video. Or like he was a little ghost in a bottle, if he was thinking wizardly.
They had taken the ghost bottles, and done lots of questioning. They had raised a few eyebrows at his mother’s absence, and he was pretty sure they took notes about it.
But then, they let him go. Home. With his dad.
There were a lot of strings, and terms and conditions, and he wasn’t totally free because they were going to come regularly to check on him throughout the summer. But he could go home.
When they got back, he bounced through the door, finding his mom on the couch, nursing a cup of coffee. She leapt up to greet him, stumbling slightly like her feet had gone to sleep under her whilst she was waiting. There were hugs and tears, and they settled back into a comfortable heap on the sofa, Xavier snuggled up to her shoulder.
“I’m so sorry I couldn’t be there,” she said, stroking his hair. “I had an awful upset stomach. You know I wouldn’t have missed it if it wasn’t impossible?”
“Yeah,” he confirmed, feeling like that made more sense, but shooting his dad a quizzical look.
“I figured your mom might not want me to say she had diarrhoea in front of Professor Skies,” he shrugged. Xavier got the feeling they were having one of those conversations with their eyes that parents sometimes had, but he tuned it out, content to just be back.
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Xavier Lundstrom
One step forward...?
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