After grabbing a prepackaged portion of his favorite cookies, he set the tablets and the water down in front of her, then grabbed the nearest chair and sat down. "You didn't have to get me anything. I forgot until just a minute ago."
She lightly slapped his wrist and said, "Oh, c'mon! It's the big one! You're too young to forget something like that. You're an adult now. Aren't you a little excited?"
"It's just another lap around the sun. It's not like it's magic or something."
She rolled her eyes but smiled playfully, "God, you're no fun, Jaeson. No fun at all."
"Sorry," he said softly.
Valerina looked at him pityingly, her pretty brown eyes and chestnut hair catching the light. He'd been told many times that his mother was gorgeous. His father had once confessed that she was the kind of woman men fought over. Tonight, she looked tired, overworked, and concerned. She reached out, took his hand, and asked, "Did you have another episode?"
He didn't want to tell her the truth, knowing it would worsen her headache. But he'd always been a terrible liar, especially to her. "Would you believe me if I told you I didn't?"
She shook her head and asked, "Did you take your medicine?"
"It doesn't work," he muttered.
"Jaeson," she groaned, "you have to keep taking it. It might take a while for the effects to show up. You can't just keep suffering."
"You heard the doctors. They didn't think it was going to work either." He looked away from her and said under his breath, "They all think I'm looking for drugs anyway."
She sighed heavily in defeat. "Have you been doing your exercises, at least?"
He nodded. "Twice a day."
"Is it helping?" she asked, already knowing the answer.
He couldn't look at her, and with his voice quivering, he said, "Mom, I... I-I don't know how much longer I can do this."
"What...do you mean?" she asked, worried.
"I don't know, it just feels like... I'm cursed. Everything hurts; I can't do anything right." He held his head in his hands. "Everyone hates me."
She frowned. "So... what? I'm just supposed to give you permission? We talked about this. You know I can't do that." Then she scoffed, "Is this about your friends at school?"
He looked at her indignantly and said, "Bullies, Mom. They're called bullies."
"Jaeson," she groaned with predictable exasperation, "labeling them bullies is poisoning the well. If you keep calling them bullies, that's what they'll always be."
They'd had this conversation numerous times, and it always ended up in the same place. It always confused him how she could seemingly be the only person to believe he was in pain, yet that pain could never come from without. As always, Jaeson was just 'poisoning the well' and needed to try harder. It was all so frustrating and pointless to him.
"I know..." he said finally. "It's my fault."
"No! Honey, please, don't do that. That's not what I meant."
Jaeson awkwardly poked the unopened pack of cookies and avoided her gaze. He didn't know what to say anymore. All Jaeson knew was that he wanted this to end. Suddenly, he wasn't hungry.
Jaeson felt Valerina's hand on his shoulder. He could hear the pain in her voice when she said, "You know that... I don't blame you, right?"
He shook his head and said, "I wish you did. It would make everything so much easier."
"No, Love," she whined. She scooted her chair closer to him and wrapped her arms around his shoulders, hugging him tightly. "What happened to your father was an accident. You didn't conjure a storm or make your father go sixty in a thirty-five."
"He was there because of me."
"And you're here because of him. We could trace cause and effect all the way back to the Big Bang, and it still wouldn't be your fault." She pulled away and held his face in her hands. "The past is the past, and we can't change it. But we're still here, and the only thing we can do is go forward." Then, she kissed his forehead and added, "Sweetheart, I know you've given up. But I haven't. Just... keep going. One day at a time, okay?"
Her sweet words were meant to comfort him, but knowing she was wasting her time broke his heart. It was always like this. Her love was as sure as the sun would rise, but it was a mother's unwavering, unconditional love. A love that she'd cling to, no matter how far it dragged her down. She was as much a prisoner of the past as he was.
She pulled away and managed a smile as she stroked his face. "Speaking of gifts. Stay right here." Then she got up and trotted to a hall closet.
He called after her, "Mom, you didn't actually get me presents, did you?"
"Of course I did, silly!" she yelled back. "It's my youngest child's birthday, and Goddammit, I'm giving him a present! Ack!" she cried as a stack of shoe boxes fell on her.
"Are you okay, Mom? Do you need an adult?"
"I'm fine; just stay there!"
Then she put her gift bag on the table and pushed it toward him. "Here, I think my gift will be a little more fun."
Jaeson had seen this bag before, as the two of them had reused it many times since he was a young child. It depicted a star field with brightly colored nebulas and galaxies, and in the foreground was a cartoon cat riding a rainbow like a surfboard. He wore sunglasses, with a boombox over his shoulder and a slice of pizza in his other hand. Jaeson sat down and did his best to match his mother's mood. "Well, Sparklejam, what have you got for me this year?"
He dug into the bag and pulled out a thin rectangular box with the picture of the latest model of the drawing tablet he'd been dreaming of for years. A Van Gogh DX Workstation Pro. It was similar to other tablet devices on the market, but this was professional grade, with a unique interface and stylus for creating art of all kinds. It had all the extra bells and whistles, too, like a high-end camera and additional RAM. But what really set this particular model apart was its unique AI software. The program was insanely expensive by itself. The tablet, even more so.
"You like it?" she asked excitedly.
"Mom, this is amazing. You didn't spend too much, did you?"
But Valerina dismissed his concerns with a casual wave. "Don't worry, it's in the budget. Trust me."
He didn't know how that was possible, given their financial situation. His heart sank. Valerina must have gone into even more debt to get it. He didn't know how he could accept something like this. However, there was no way Jaeson could turn down a gift of this magnitude without coming off as an ungrateful wretch. "Thanks, Mom," he said while managing to smile for her.
She hugged him, pressing his head against her belly, and said, "You're welcome, Love. I know you'll make good use of it."
Indeed, there were already dozens of things he wanted to create with it. His pack of unopened cookies was forgotten. "I'm going to go set it up."
She kissed the top of his head and released him. "Well, I'm going back to bed. Try not to lose track of time. You have school, and I know how you get when you're in the zone."
"I'll be good, promise."
"Good boy. Love you," she said through a yawn. Then she left towards her bedroom.
***
Next day morning,
The walk to school was dreary and gray since the sky still hadn't cleared. It was late September, and the maples were beginning to turn red, orange, and yellow. But it was hard for Jaeson to tell on a rainy day like this one. He raised the hood on his jacket to avoid the drizzle and hiked the two miles to Stafford Regional High School. He'd done it so often that he could walk it with his eyes closed.
But Jaeson could never get too comfortable. Suddenly, a bus coming up the road behind him stepped on the gas and swerved toward the massive lake-like puddle Jaeson was passing. The tires hit the water, making a loud scuffing noise and creating a wave over eight feet high right at Jaeson. He dodged behind a telephone pole just in time and avoided the tsunami. As the bus sped by, Jaeson heard the children aboard the bus laughing and cheering and just rolled his eyes. "Not today, bus driver. Not today."
Stafford was on the smallish side but reasonably diverse, being a bedroom for the larger cities nearby, and the students of Stafford Regional reflected that diversity. There were people of all shapes, sizes, races, and creeds united by the school's reputation for athletic dominance. In just a decade and a half, a single high school athletics program transformed the once very lived-in colonial East Coast village into a boom town, and a wave of immigration now propped up Stafford's economy. Families had moved there from across the state and beyond just so their children could be a part of a legacy, and they'd brought with them their cultures, political views, and, some would say most importantly their money. There was friction here and there, but as long as the Stafford Dragons brought people together, common purpose had won the day. Some had called it a modern miracle, a shining example of what a pluralistic society could accomplish.
Jaeson had lived in Stafford his entire life. To him, it was just the place where his family had lived for generations. All he wanted was to get through the day without attracting too much attention from the masses of students flooding the corridors. While everyone else had a friend or two and a little slice of the school just for them, Jaeson felt like a zombie lumbering through the halls, moving with the pack without being a part of it.
At his locker, Jaeson caught a familiar sight. Someone had slapped a brightly colored sticky note on the door that read, "SNOWFLAKE!!"
"Two exclamation points," he mused. "Guess it really is my birthday."