Emergency Medical Dad

LII: mid august, present

"Afternoon, boys," I call into the basement, walking downstairs. The second Jay sees me I can tell he knows. "Jay, can I borrow you for a little second?"

"Yeah, no problem," he knows. "Conn, try to find that long piece, it's probably down here somewhere."

"Got it," Connor goes back to digging through piles of Legos and Jorgen makes his way over to me, then up the stairs after me when I don't say anything, just turn.

"What's going on?" He asks the second the door to the basement closes and we're alone upstairs.

"Mom called."

"Oh... shit."

"I didn't pick it up," I blurt. "It's a voicemail, the full two minutes, I haven't looked at it yet, I don't want to know what it says."

He winces, "do you want to listen to it now, or?"

"That's why I dragged you up here," I grab his hand and pull him toward the kitchen.

I'm hazy as I pull out my phone, too scared to pay much attention to what I'm doing. Too scared of hearing her voice again. Too scared of what she's going to say. Too scared of a lot of things.

"Hey, hey," he puts a hand on my back, catching my attention. "Breathe, alright? It'll be okay, but I can't have you passing out on me."

"Right, I-"

"Are you okay?" He asks, full honesty.

"I'm terrified."

"I would be too."

I fumble the phone, setting it down and a familiar voice enters the little space.

"Hi honey," Mom. "I assume by now you've probably gotten the email from St. B's about the tuition check. I realized a few weeks ago that sending you out on your own probably means that you haven't been able to find any resources to send Connor back to school with so I wanted to float it, just to be nice."

Jay is making a face.

"I just remember how hard being out on my own was when I first graduated college, though I found a man at record pace and I figure if you're still unstable on your feet you haven't yet and that's why I haven't heard from you. Just remember that when you figure it out you're welcome back here too, I just couldn't float letting you hang around my house for the rest of your life, you know?

"Just know that the year mark is coming up and we agreed that if you weren't settled with him for a year that I'd take him back home until you did it. I have decided to shorten that time a little just because I want him to have one stable place all school year - or most of it - so I'm giving you until the first day of October and if you can't figure out how to cover at least tuition by then, then I want him safe back home, if that's okay?"

Jay is making more of a face now.

"I hope to hear back from you soon about this, it's fair from my perspective and I hope you can see that too. I'd love to know. Have a good day honey."

I breathe out and he's just standing there, hands on the back of a chair, full big body sort of looming there. He doesn't look pleased and I figure if this was someone else, sometime else, some other situation, he'd say what's on his mind, cold and hard and uncaring, I assume.

"Tell me what you're thinking?" Is what he says instead, tiptoeing around the lines he thinks are there.

"Angry," I manage. "Really, really, angry."

That's something that I don't think he expected, a little flash of the white of his eye in the kitchen light, his hands loosening on the chair. "Do you know why?"

I pull my lip between my teeth, still staring at my phone on the granite, "I've... been talking with Dad about it, about her. This put a pin in what I thought I was feeling. She took everything from me. That's why I freaked out when we got that email. You were excited, I knew her too well."

He stands still, thinking, "can we figure out their financial aid situation? We have to qualify now, right? As adults with minimal inward income? Neither of us are filed as dependents anymore."

I shake my head, "it's done case by case by a committee of alumni. It's not an equation that they send it through, it's all opinion. Connor... I hate to say it but Connor isn't someone they want in that school so the price is staying tag price."

He winces.

I close my eyes, thinking on it for a minute, thinking through what she said, how she said it, the parameters. The chances, the gains and losses of considering other options. Jay stays quiet. He knows that he should be doing that. He knows that although he's involved in this, I'm still in charge, it's still my kid before his. My choice over his.

"He's not going back to St. B's," I blink down at the phone. "That's the solution. I'm not sending him back to St. B's."

***

not sure if the numbers stay the same through this whole thing but oh well

anyway big ask

i need a song, like a specific one, it needs to be a slowdance type of song (60-80bpm), romantic but not blantantly in the lyrics or the title, yearning in a sort of way, with piano or violin but really almost anything could work because i'm lowkey desperate. 

yes this is for a book, no i can't tell you yet

but if you know anything ballad type that would fit that description, i'd love to hear it

thanks

-rabid