elocin1977: Aw, thank you.
bechloe-bible-49: I'm sure her and Chloe will be a riot together, and give Aubrey a run for her money.
Pixie1913: Chloe is always what Aubrey needs - in my mind, anyway.
Oranagewifi: Thank you!
LaraAelric: Detention in Kinder happens more often than you'd think these days.
Selene Elven: What? You mean I shouldn't add any serial killers? If I play Happy, would it be acceptable?
Eva: Thank you!
A/N: It's my birthday today! And I told myself this story wasn't going to get angsty, but would it really be my writing without a little bit of angst?
Something Just Like This
She said, where'd you wanna go?
How much you wanna risk?
I'm not looking for somebody with some superhuman gifts,
Some superhero,
Some fairytale bliss.
Just something I can turn to,
Somebody I can kiss.
- Coldplay, The Chainsmokers
You can text me before then – if you want to, of course.
Aubrey taps her fingers on the desk in the office, trying to block Chloe's words out of her head. She should be thinking of Charlotte, and adequate punishment for causing Aubrey to be late to work. Charlotte will be miserable enough when Aubrey tells her she's going to the dog park tomorrow without her. "Excuse me," she tries addressing the receptionist again, "How long is this going to take? I have a job that I need to be at."
The receptionist sighs and presses a button on her desk then leans forward to speak into a microphone. "Principal Briar, Mrs. Posen would really like to speak with you now."
A door along the back wall behind the desk opens and an old, greying woman looks at Aubrey in distain. "Right this way," she says tersely. Aubrey recognizes the woman's voice from the earlier phone call and vaguely remembers meeting her during her tour of the school. "We have a lot to discuss."
Aubrey steps around the desk, fighting the urge to inform the woman that she had seemed a lot more pleasant on the phone.
Briar leads Aubrey into her office – a small room with a desk and three chairs. Charlotte is slouching in one chair, kicking her feet back and forth. "Have a seat, Mrs. Posen," she says and walks around the desk to her own chair.
"Have a seat, Mrs. Posen," Charlotte mumbles under her breath.
Aubrey shoots Charlotte a look and takes a seat beside her. "What seems to be the problem?" she asks.
"What seems to be the problem?" Charlotte mimics her.
Aubrey bites her tongue. Physically bites it with her front teeth, trying remind herself to keep her temper in check. She focuses her gaze on the principal, plastering on the best phlegmatic expression she can muster.
"After Charlotte was dropped off this morning, as she was walking to her class, she threatened to nuke another student," Briar explains, "And when the other student said that he was going to tell on her, she proceeded to spit on him."
The corners of Aubrey's lips twitch and she takes a slow deep breath through her nose before she turns to face Charlotte. "Charlotte, why would you do that?" she asks, trying to keep her cool, "Where did you hear that word?"
Charlotte shrugs, staring at the front of Briar's desk. "Grandpa said that's what people do to people they don't like." She kicks the desk with the tips of her toes.
Of course. "Well, Grandpa is wrong," Aubrey states, and Charlotte's eyes grow wide at the statement. She's surprised her phone doesn't start immediately ringing from her father calling her to tell her he simply sensed she had disgraced him yet again.
"The incident brought up a few concerns she from her teacher," Briar says and places a folder on the desk.
"Why haven't previous concerns been addressed with me before now?" Aubrey asks.
"Well, you know, children will be children," Briar says. She opens the folder and spreads out a selection of drawings across the desk. "I'm sensing an ongoing theme with Charlotte."
Aubrey scans the drawings – some of them on blank paper, others attached to various projects. She has to look away. "So?" she asks, "She wants to be in the army. These drawings can't be all that different from that of the little boys in the class. Are you meeting with their mothers too?" She knows she should be asking questions – inquiring about how Charlotte is doing socially, what prompted the earlier hallway incident, does she eat all her lunch? She crosses her legs and tries to convince her foot to stop tapping.
Principal Briar sighs. "We're just concerned that someone appears to be on fire in all of her photos," she says. The words cause Aubrey's stomach to turn. "We see this often in children who don't have a lot of limits on what television they watch or the video games they play. It also strikes me that Charlotte has never outwardly shown any violent tendencies until this morning. She's a very quiet, introverted student. Is there something going on at home? I know the two of you live in a very interesting situation."
Aubrey tilts her head. "I'm sorry?" She knows exactly what the woman means, but she's dying to know what she has to say.
"Well, you know, you live with two men…" Principal Briar suddenly looks very uncomfortable in her seat.
"Mhm?" Aubrey raises her brows, feigning ignorant. Next, the principal will be asking if they have any nuclear weapons in their home, and she'll be responding that she'll have to go home and check.
"Who have chosen a very divergent life style." Briar pauses. "Is Charlotte's father in the picture?"
Charlotte sits up in her seat. "She means they're gay, Mommy," she says, looking at Aubrey like she's stupid for not understanding. She turns to Briar. "Being gay means you like people who are the same gender as you," she tells her matter-of-factly, "And you get to wear a lot of glitter if you want to, but you don't have to. Brian never wears any glitter, but Conrad…" She snaps her fingers and seems to do an impression, but of who is questionable. "That bitch sparkles more than a drag club during a Rupaul Season Premiere."
Aubrey claps her hand over Charlotte's mouth, turning whatever else she's saying into mere mumbles. Her cheeks flush a deep shade of red – a sure sign that her entire body is suddenly burning from the inside out. It would be perfectly fine with her if she just burst into flames and died right there on the spot. Maybe Charlotte could draw a picture of that for her teacher. "What are you insinuating?" She cringes as Charlotte licks the palm of her hand and squeezes her cheeks as a warning before letting go of her mouth.
"No insinuation," Principal Briar says, taking a sudden interest in the things on her desk, "I'm just saying, it must be difficult to be different in a new place. Maybe Charlotte feels she's having a hard time fitting in."
"Or maybe we just accidentally chose a school that labels their kindergarteners as 'different'." Aubrey gets to her feet. She isn't sure if she's overreacting when she says, "Charlotte, we're leaving," but she is sure that the past few minutes spent in this building have been more than enough for her. "Let's go."
"Ms. Posen," Principal Briar says, and Aubrey notes the change in title, "This Academy is one of the top in Queens. Leaving would be a mistake."
"Then we'll just have to find the schools that prevent it from being number one." Aubrey grabs Charlotte by the hand. "Thank you for your time." She leads Charlotte from the office straight to the front door, accepting that she will have to go out shopping for a new backpack and lunchbox for her later.
xxxxx
"So, I'm not in trouble?" Charlotte asks after a few moments of walking in silence.
"You are in so much trouble," Aubrey growls through her teeth. "Why would you spit on somebody?"
"I didn't mean to," Charlotte mutters.
"Oh, so the spit just flew out of your mouth while you were threatening to blow the kid up?" Aubrey stops herself. Takes a deep breath. Starts counting backward from ten. 10. 9. 8...
"No!" Charlotte comes to a dramatic stop and pulls her hand away from Aubrey's. She kicks a rock, sending it ricocheting off a nearby metal gutter without a loud clank.
Aubrey halts and folds her arms. Her eyebrows arch high on her forehead, an explicit demand for an explanation.
Charlotte mirrors her – posture rigid, lips drawn taut.
7. 6. 5…
"Did his actions at least warrant being spit on?" Aubrey asks.
"What?" Charlotte asks, and Aubrey has to remind herself that she's speaking to a five year old.
3.
"Was he mean to you first?" Aubrey rephrases the question. Charlotte had better say yes, because if the answer is no, Aubrey has plans to ground her for the rest of Kindergarten. No more pizza. No more Saturday morning cartoons. For a year. Maybe forever.
Charlotte draws in an exaggerates breath, puffing out her chest as she tries to stare Aubrey down.
"Was the other kid mean to you?" Aubrey asks again.
Charlotte swallows thickly, her resolve to win in a battle of wills against Aubrey faltering. "He was kind of mean…"
Aubrey tilts her head.
2.
"He was a big kid, and he was in the way!" Charlotte exclaims, "I asked him to move, and he said, 'Wait a minute, Shorty.' I, I told him, 'Don't call me that or I will nuke you'. And, and he still didn't move, and he said he was gonna tell on me."
1.
"And so you thought that spitting on him would change his mind?" Aubrey feels like crying in sheer exasperation.
"No!" Charlotte shakes her head. "I just spitted on accident!" She stamps her foot. "Not on purpose!"
"You know, Daddy talked to you about the difference between standing up for yourself and being mean to other people, Charlotte Posen-Braam," Aubrey reminds her, her airways clenching as she speaks. "He told you that not everyone is always going to make the choices that you want them to make, and you can't pick a fight every time you don't like something. You fight when someone is actually hurting you or hurting someone else; that's it."
Charlotte growls at her. Actually growls at her. Like a dog.
People are starting to look at them as they pass by, and this isn't the place she wants to have this conversation. She gently grabs Charlotte by the arm, and finds that she has to half drag her toward the apartment building – earning them a few more stares from strangers who are no doubt judging her parenting skills almost as hard as she is.
"Grandpa said that you just never hit first," Charlotte said, "He said you wait for the other person to swing, and then you hit back twice as hard! He calleded me a shorty, so I said I will nuke him!"
"Well, Grandpa isn't here." Aubrey pulls her along, setting her focus on their destination. The moment they get inside, she can look for a better school. Maybe she'll even find one that can enroll Charlotte on Monday so her education doesn't suffer.
"Neither is Daddy!" Charlotte hits back. And it's twice as hard. She turns herself around, trying to twist out of Aubrey's grip. "It's just you!"
Aubrey drops her arm and stops again, just staring at her, feeling like she's been punched in the stomach. Because it's true; he's not here, and it's just her doing a terrible job at navigating on her own. She draws in a breath and refolds her arms, hugging her midsection as a wave of nausea rushes through her. She had asked Charlotte if she had wanted to stay behind. Her parents had asked (re: threatened) to take her while Aubrey was out 'wallowing in self-pity and throwing her entire life away'. In the end, Charlotte had insisted on moving to New York City – especially after she saw the skyscrapers and the Central Park Zoo on Google. It would be too late to take them both back now – her pride couldn't handle how crushed she would be under the 'I told you it wouldn't work out' of her mother and father. They would probably take Charlotte away from her and kick her out on the streets.
Charlotte growls again and kicks at the pebbles on the sidewalk then looks up at Aubrey, her features fading from the rough edginess of anger into the stiff frozenness of fear. She clamps her hand over her mouth, and for a moment, Aubrey panics that all of her nervous habits have been passed down through the evils of genetics. But Charlotte doesn't gag. She just starts vigorously shaking her head. "That was a accident too," she mumbles into her palm and takes baby steps toward Aubrey until she's pressed up against her leg. She throws her arms around Aubrey's thigh, tucking her face into the fabric of her pants, and lets out a drawn out whine as she jams her thumb between her lips.
It takes a moment of controlled breathing, but Aubrey composes herself for the most part. She ropes her anger in under control, but no amount of breaths can take away the feeling of being hit in the gut. Even though Charlotte's grip is tight, she manages to pry her from her leg and kneels down in front of her. "I'm sorry that he called you a shorty," she says, pulling Charlotte's thumb from her mouth so she can hold both of her hands, "I know you don't like when other kids call you names."
"And he wouldn't move," Charlotte adds.
Aubrey nods. "But it's still inappropriate to spit on people," she says, "You tell them to stop. If they don't stop, you either tell a teacher or you come home and you tell me, do you understand?"
"I told you I spitted on a accident!" Charlotte shouts, tears welling up in her eyes.
"Spitting is not appropriate," Aubrey enforces, refusing to back down from this matter, even if tears are involved. "Do you understand?"
Charlotte draws in a deep breath through her nose and steels herself, responding with a stoic nod.
Aubrey waits.
"I understand, Mommy." Charlotte sniffles and nods again.
"Good." Aubrey releases one of her hands and stands up, "If you threaten somebody or spit again, there will be serious consequences. Right now, you're only grounded from pizza and cartoons tomorrow morning."
Charlotte slides her thumb back between her lips and pulls away from Aubrey's hand to grab her shirt sleeve, rubbing the fabric between her fingers. She pulls Aubrey's arm closer, using her sleeve to wipe her eyes.
There is a certain exhaustion that rushes over Aubrey the moment she no longer has to continue with her lecture. She pulls out her phone with her free hand, texts her boss that she won't be at work, because she had to pick up Charlotte, and starts trudging them the rest of the way home, thoughts of her morning with Chloe long forgotten.