For three hours Sebastian held the boy close to him, wiping his tears and doing his best to coax Jaxsen back to the now and bring him from whatever visions had him for the moment arrested and detained in the past. Sebastian sat up, needing to try something-anything-to snap Jaxsen out of the pits of his mind. Jaxsen did not move to move away nor did he attempt in any way to keep his balance atop Sebastian’s lap. He was completely limp and if he didn’t know better, Sebastian would have thought the boy to be sound asleep. Sebastian maneuvered the child to where he was straddling his lap. 

“Jaxsen?” Sebastian placed his left palm against Jaxsen’s right cheek. “Jack, please answer me.” Jaxsen gave him no sign that he’d even heard him speak. There was just a blank mask covering his face. Tears slowly fell completely unnoticed by the eyes that cried them. “Jack…” Sebastian whispered in a broken plea. He had to do something. Anything. He had to reach him somehow. “Jaxsen!”

Gripping the boy’s slender shoulders he gave one substantial shake as he loudly spoke his name. Sebastian didn’t know what to expect as an outcome for this action. The equal and opposite reaction took Sebastian completely by surprise. The loud, authoritative call of his name snapped Jaxsen from his pensive preoccupation. Instantly, Jaxsen began to thrash and fight and scream. Sebastian held onto him trying to break through whatever haze clogged his cognitive abilities. Jaxsen threw himself away from Sebastian, rolling off his legs and landing on his feet before Sebastian had time to react. Sebastian lurched to his feet ready to give chase when Nizhoni opened the door.  

She caught Jaxsen mid-air, dropping purse and keys to do so. He scrambled into her arms shouting and crying. It took Nizhoni a moment to translate what Jaxsen was trying to communicate, his words mushed together in that of a crying child. He clung to her, his legs and arms wrapped around her. She held him close to her breast knowing she would have to get Jaxsen calm before doing anything. She had no idea what was happening.

“Jaxsen, Yanaha, breathe, baby, breathe.” She walked him back and forth, talking calmly, her palm running up and down the little boy’s back. His hold around her did not lessen nor did his tears stop. No longer was he screaming but the hitching sobs were no less heartbreaking.

Sebastian watched her pace, cradling his son and wanting nothing more in that moment than to grab Jaxsen and run. He didn’t move. He fucked up and now Jaxsen was scared of him. Goddamn it that backfired. Well fuck, what did you think would happen? Fucking stupid… Not for the first time in the last half hour, Sebastian second guessed himself. He swallowed the lump in his throat. Jaxsen was finally beginning to quiet down, his sobs less prominent, though his tears hadn’t really started to slow yet. Sebastian could not see Jaxsen’s face, obscured as it was in the crook of Nizhoni’s neck.

“What happened?” Her eyes and question were directed completely at him. Sebastian didn’t say anything or move for a long while. “Sebastian, what the hell is going on?”

Finally Sebastian sighed and rubbed his hands over his face in a tired gesture. How was he going to explain this one without sounding like a complete ass? It was Jaxsen who spoke, his voice sorrowful and accusatory.

“Bastian yelled and and and shook me and he was scary!” The admission brought forth another round of fresh tears. Sebastian felt like a Benedict Arnold in the face of Jaxsen’s words.

“He did what?” She looked at Sebastian with anger in her eyes. “You shook him?”

“I more jostled him. I didn’t hurt him, I just scared him.”

“What the fuck could he have done to warrant that, Sebastian?” 

Sebastian’s emotions were raging and he let anger dominate, as it was easiest to feel, to expel. “Nothing. He was doing nothing.”

“What?” Her tone showed instinctive maternal protection, anger, and confusion.

“He was essentially catatonic! He wouldn’t speak…he barely even blinked. It wasn’t like the other times he quit talking-he quit doing everything but breathing and it scared the shit out of me. He’d been in that state all day and I…” He paused, the anger that had been fueling him suddenly burning out. “I was scared,” he finished in a low voice. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath before meeting her gaze. “I didn’t know what else to do and…Jesus, at least that was something. Some kinda reaction, some fucking sign of life.” He paused and looked at his son. Slowly he approached Jaxsen and tentatively placed his hand on his lower back. “Jack?” The boy did not acknowledge Sebastian had spoken. Under his hand Sebastian felt the tremors coursing through Jaxsen’s body.

“I’m sorry, Jack. I didn’t know how else to get through to you. I didn’t mean to scare you and I wasn’t trying to hurt you. But understand that I was scared, too, Jack.” Sebastian’s eyes watered and his throat constricted. He laid his head on Jaxsen’s shoulder, placing a small kiss on his upper arm.

“I’m sorry, Jack.” And with that Sebastian turned and walked away. He hadn’t known or anticipated what might happen but he was beginning to think maybe he shouldn’t have tried fighting fire with fire. He walked out the front door, made a right and circled back to the side of the house.

The air was cold and crisp and unusually snow free for mid-December in the mid-western United States. He slid down the brick outer part of the house, his knees pulled up to his chest. He covered his head with his arms as if trying to protect his face from projectile objects. Tears slowly rolled down his cheeks as he berated himself for his ill-conceived previous actions. He really hadn’t known what else to do.

Somewhere in the distance a lone bird crossed the skies, squalling to companions who weren’t in attendance. The wind picked up and gusted, pushing him unrelentingly to the left. In the back of his consciousness he noted that he was cold, and noticed the prickly feeling as goosebumps made their way across his skin. He didn’t care. At some point later, he wasn’t sure when Sebastian heard the front door open. His tears had long since dried, the cold, gusting wind creating crystalline trails down his cheeks. Nizhoni sat down beside him, her posture relaxed. When she spoke her voice was calm, smooth.

“Bastian, come inside. Come on.” She kissed his arm by way of apology and stood. He didn’t move. Nizhoni knelt down in front of him again, her hands lightly grasping his arms as much for balance as for feeling the physical connection. “Sebastian, look at me.” He did. She saw clear the torture in his eyes. “Come inside. Please? Jaxsen is asking where you went. He thinks you’re mad at him.”

Sebastian shook his head. “I’m not mad at him.”

“Then come inside and tell him that.”

He nodded and stood but made no immediate move toward the front door. “Sebastian.” 

Sebastian held up a finger halting whatever it was she was about to say. “Don’t, Nizhoni. Just don’t. I’ll come back in, okay, but give me a minute.” Wordlessly she nodded and returned to the house.

Jaxsen listened to Sebastian’s words. His apologies, how his voice cracked. Without doubt and second guessing he was in tune to the despair and even the fear in Sebastian’s voice.  Then Sebastian rested his head against the boy’s shoulder. “I love you.” He whispered this so quietly Jaxsen almost didn’t hear. Almost. “I’m sorry, Jack.” 

Jaxsen turned his head but all he caught was Sebastian’s back before he ran outside. Nizhoni stood by the coffee table holding Jaxsen. When the front door closed she took the few steps and sank down onto the couch. Jaxsen straddled her lap still leaning into her. He felt empty and he worried about the ramifications of this day.

“I hate today,” he lamented. He did not cry following these words, simply hung his head. “I wish I could just sleep through ‘Death Day’ so I wouldn’t have to ‘member.” Nizhoni looked at him, deciding not to comment or inquire about today’s morbid title. She understood well enough and instead asked something else.

“What happened today, Yanaha?” Jaxsen dropped his gaze and began nervously playing with the front of her shirt.

“I went stupid again. I…I don’t really remember much until Bastian shook me.”

“Did he hurt you?”

Jaxsen looked incredulously at her. “Hurt me? No. Bastian wouldn’t hurt me. Scared me. But he didn’t hurt me.”

Nizhoni nodded. “Jaxsen, baby, I want you to do me a favor, okay?”

“What, Zhoni?”

“Stop saying you ‘went stupid’. That’s…” She sighed. “You shouldn’t say that about yourself. You’re not stupid, Yanaha.”

He shrugged. “That’s what he always said it was.”

“When you say that…when you tell me you went stupid again…how do you feel when you say that?”

Jaxsen looked down again and shrugged. “I don’t know. I don’t like it. It…makes me feel bad.”

“You’re not “going stupid” when those episodes occur, baby. You could never be stupid, my love.”

“Then what is it?” His blue eyes held so many questions and fears and uncertainties. 

“Our bodies and minds find a way to deal with the stress of a situation in any way that it can. Whether it’s not talking, or staring blankly and zoning out, or crying yourself to sleep…you haven’t been taught how to cope with what’s happened, so your mind has to do something to keep from overloading. It’s not a bad thing to zone out sometimes, my love.”

Jaxsen nodded. “Okay. I won’t say that anymore. I promise.” He looked to the closed front door, his eyes misting over slightly. “Zhoni, am I bad?”

She frowned. “No, you’re not bad. Why would you think that?”

“If I’m not bad, why did he leave me?” He sucked in his lower lip, his brow pulling downward.

Nizhoni smiled sadly. “Oh, baby boy, he’s not mad at you. He didn’t leave you, either, my love. He’s just upset.”

Jaxsen’s eyes watered and his chin trembled. “I didn’t mean to make him sad.”

She wiped his face. “Baby, it’s not your fault.” She looked at the broken boy in her lap pondering how much she could or should divulge without giving away a confidence.  She sighed. “Jaxsen, Sebastian is much more feeling and much more sensitive than he’ll ever let on. He’s not upset or mad at you, but at himself.”

It was clear by the look on his face that he didn’t understand, so she tried again. “He’s not upset or mad at you for zoning out,” she began, opting to keep “going stupid” out of the conversation. When she said ‘zoned out’ she watched his face. He didn’t get that same look of utter devastation in his eyes, for which she was glad. His former foster father’s choice phrase left a bad taste in her mouth and she was glad that Jaxsen accepted this new phrase in its stead.

“What upset him,” she continued, “is that when you zoned out, he couldn’t reach you and it very much scared him. He also thinks he hurt you which is something he won’t let go of easily. He probably feels like he betrayed and disappointed you, and the thought of you being afraid of him, of not feeling like you can rely on him, is something that…well, he can’t deal with it very well and he just doesn’t want you to see him upset. But it’s not you he’s upset with, Yanaha.”

Jaxsen nodded as he absorbed her words. “W-when will he come back?”

Nizhoni glanced at the door. “I don’t know, baby. He didn’t go far, though. I promise.”

“Will you find him?” She watched his eyes tear up. “Please, Zhoni?”

“Let’s give him some time to calm down and collect himself first. He needs his space right now.” She petted him and wiped his eyes gently with her fingertips, trying to keep him as calm as she could keep him.  

“How do you know he didn’t go far?” Jaxsen buried his head into her shoulder and she gently played with his hair.

“Trust me. I always know if he’s close by.” Jaxsen nodded and deflated against her completely. When he spoke again his voice was thick with emotion but no tears fell. 

“I hate today. I hate it. I hate it.”

She held him quietly on the couch, his head against her chest, keeping him at peace with light, loving kisses, and soft fingers through his hair. Whereas normally this action would put him to sleep, this moment his full focus was on the wall clock. With each passing second he wished harder for Sebastian to return to him. After an hour passed he sighed and, glancing once more at the clock, asked Nizhoni to go find him. Nizhoni frowned, noticing now that an hour passed since Sebastian’s hasty departure.

“Yeah, baby, I’ll bring him in.” He climbed off her lap onto the center cushion and watched her stand. 

“Zhoni?”

“Hm?”

“Are-are you sure he’s not mad at me?”

She smiled trying to be reassuring and knowing by his sad eyes she failed. “No, my love. I promise he’s not mad at you. You gonna be okay here for a few?”

He nodded but didn’t otherwise respond. As the door shut behind her he couldn’t stop the overpowering loss of both their presence. Jaxsen sat hugging his knees to his chest trying to ignore the deafening silence of the house. A few, short minutes later Nizhoni returned alone and Jaxsen felt his heart crumble and the storm raging inside finally broke free. Nizhoni gathered him in her arms, his cries too loud to try and explain he’d be right in. 

All Jaxsen could think was that Sebastian didn’t love or want him anymore. Why else would he not come inside?