Brighter Days
“[F/n]... How could you do this to us?” she cried into her hands. She was beautiful in her white night gown. Her perfectly messy brown hair fell over her shoulder resting on her knees, just in front of her elbows. The shadow of a man stood tall and overbearing above her. His back to a large window with moonlight pouring into the room. His arms crossed and a look of disdain on his shadowy face.
“After everything we have done for you, your whole life. This is how you repay us?”
A feeling of helplessness fell over me. They wouldn’t listen to me, no matter how many times I tried to tell them...
“LIAR! You evil wench! How could you possibly think we would believe that?”
It was silent. I was on the ground with a throbbing pain on my cheek and uncontrollable tears did nothing to soothe the pain.
“Oh honey. You can still make this right.”
I looked up to see the beautiful woman’s shadowy face turned up to me with a sinister smile. I shake my head. What she wanted was inconceivable. Her smile turned quickly into a scowl and she reared her hand back
“You bloody whore!” she screamed, and I squeezed my eyes shut waiting for the impact. When it never came I opened them. I found that I wasn’t in the same moonlit room but in a room illuminated by the sunrise through the curtains. My son, Charles, was kneeling by my side holding my hand. When he saw my eyes open, he shifted so that he was leaning over my face. He wiped, just below my eyes, the tears.
“It’s okay mommy. I’m here”, he whispered. His sweet voice brought a smile to my face,
“I’m sorry my dear Charlie.” I propped myself up on my elbow and wrapped my other arm around the child bringing him to me and pressing a kiss to his forehead. He wraps his arms around my neck and I sigh. It was a recurring nightmare. It tormented me to no end and every time I have it is just as worse as the last. Charlie had grown accustomed to wiping my tears just as I wake up. The poor child, I couldn’t imagine how he felt every morning. I sit up and set Charlie on my lap. The smell of breakfast foods wafted into the room by way of the cracked door.
Last night, Charlie and I were invited to spend the night in the home of Charles Xavier and Raven, whom he claims to be his sister despite her American accent. They were very kind to us from the moment we met them. We entered the house and Xavier took our coats from us to hang up; it was the last time we saw him as he had some business to attend to in his office. Raven then offered us some sandwiches and I paired mine with water. I was still parched as my untouched glass of water from the pub was probably being poured out by then.
Charlie and Raven hit it off nicely. He would usually spend his time close to me, holding onto me, but he was comfortable with her, quick to smile and hold her hand, he was even a little talkative. Eventually she showed us to the room that we are in currently and bid us good night. A warm welcome that, hopefully, I could extend until I can figure things out for little Charlie and I.
“Darling, why don’t we get washed and head downstairs?” I smooth his hair and he nods.
After getting cleaned and changed, we made our way downstairs. Following the chatter led us to the kitchen. Raven stood next to the stove and Charles leaned on the island just across from the stove. Both wore pale peach colored aprons, both a little frilly, both quite fitting.
“Ah, there you two are. I thought I heard a bit of stirring upstairs.” Charles smiled at us warmly and waved us in. Charlie made his way over to Raven who had swiftly picked him up with a good morning. I walked in nodding a good morning to the both of them and wrapping my arms around my torso, “It smells really nice.” I had stopped along the other side of the island. Charles moved to take Ravens place as she moves to set Charlie down on the island. “I hope the food will be alright for you both.” She says smiling at me over Charlie’s head. “I’m sure it’s all wonderful.”
“Yes and lucky for you,” Xavier busies himself with putting the food on the serving plates, “it’s all finished now.” He looks over his shoulder at me, “[F/n], will you take those plates there and set the table.” He nods to the four stacked plates just in front of me. I pick them up and walk towards the table, a rather large one. It seems lonely, just the two of them at a table that can fit ten plus. Raven and Charlie come up behind me with napkins and utensils. We set four spots just across from each other and Charles came over placing plates of food in the center of the set up. I walk over to the other side of the table to sit down. I was slightly surprised when Charlie chose to sit beside me instead of by his new best friend though I knew I shouldn’t be.
“Alright then, dig in.” Charles announces as he wipes his hands on a plain hand towel and sits down. I thank them and help Charlie with his food before helping myself.
“Where are you both from?” Charles, as he works to transfer some food to his plate.
“You’re going to interrogate them, this early in the morning?” Raven looks over to Charles with disbelief in her tone.
“It is not an interrogation.” He states then turns to me and defends, “This is not an interrogation, just friendly conversation.”
I laugh and Charlie moves to kneel on his chair, “We live by the water. It’s really pretty there when the sun sets.”
“Is that right? And do you like to swim in the water?”
He nods and sticks a piece of fruit with his fork, “but my favorite thing to do is to lay with mommy on the grass and watch the water.” I smile at him as he puts the fruit in his mouth.
“You know, we have a small lake around back,” Raven speaks up, “I could show it to you guys later.”
“That sounds lovely, Raven.”
“Quite a lovely idea indeed. I would love to join you, but I have to head over to the college right after breakfast.” He places a forkful in his mouth. I had really hoped to have some time to speak with him before we burdened them another night. He looks at me knowingly, “But I’ll be back sometime after lunch and before dinner. We can have our chat then.”
The side of my lip pulls up into a half smile.
“Hey Charlie,” Raven crosses her legs and leans into the table with renewed interest, “why don’t you show us that trick of yours now?”
Charlie turned to look at me timidly but in his eyes was an excitement. No one had asked to see his gift before and he trusted them. I place my hand on his head cupping it and look over towards Charles. He was the one who objected to it yesterday, so I wanted to make sure it was alright. He noticed all of our eyes on him and he leaned back giving a little shrug and gestured for Charlie to go ahead.
I remove my hand and lean back to watch him. He comes off of his knees to stand on the chair with his fork in his hand. It still had a piece of fruit attached to it. Raven watched curiously. Xavier had crossed his legs and his arms but it was easy to see the hidden excitement in his eyes.
Charlie had eaten the fruit off of the fork and immediately his body started to change. His soft skin had become a hard metal, as did his eyes and his hair. Because of the dull complexion of the fork, the light shining through the curtains just behind us wasn’t made to blind us, but, instead, it illuminated the surface of what was once his skin with a myriad of rainbow colors depending on the curvature of his body in certain places.
“Oh my... Charlie that’s so cool!”, Raven exclaimed as she quickly made her way around the table, passing behind Charles and then me to get to Charlie. He gave the biggest smile as raven reached up to gently touch him.
Charles uncrossed his legs and gave an amazed smirk, “Brilliant. A boy this young...”, he trailed off seemingly lost in thought.
I look up at my metal boy just as Raven asked if he could do anything else. He put the fork down and immediately reverted back to look like a normal human boy and leans down to touch the chair. He then changed to take on the wood material of the chair. He giggled and talked animatedly with the amazed Raven. Xavier leans over to address me, “So, he takes on the material of whatever he is touching?”
My eyes turn to him with a feeling of pride. I nod, “Yes, but only as long as he is touching the object.” We both look over at the pair trying new materials like the porcelain plate.
“How much have you tested his ability?”
“Not much. I didn’t want to risk him getting found out.”
He looked at me curiously, his cheek was resting on his hand and his index and middle finger were pressed to his temple for a second before he curled his fingers back into his palm, “It was never once because you were ashamed or embarrassed.” It was a statement more than a question. I shook my head. Since the moment I realized that he was gifted, the want to shun my child had never once crossed my mind. Just the fear of how others might treat him or that he could, one day, be taken away from me by people who only want to do him harm for the sake of research.
Suddenly, Charlie catches my attention by climbing into my lap, “Raven is going to show us her trick too.” I laugh and wrap my arms around him, turning my attention to the lady. She took Charlie’s seat facing us. Charles sat back again watching us with amusement.
Raven looked directly at me, “Name someone you like.” She paused before specifying, “Someone famous.”
I took a second to think, then Charlie touched my arm. I looked down at him, “You like Elvis, right?” His eyes were shining. He’s the one who adores Elvis. Some of the few things we owned were an Elvis record, among five other records, and a record player. It’s his favorite by far. He’ll hold the record album and look at Elvis while his suave voice played in the background. Elvis wasn’t my favorite, but how could I disappoint that sweet face.
I kissed his head, “Sure, we’ll go with Elvis.”
She gave a smile and sat with her legs crossed, hands folded on top of the part of the peach apron resting on her lap. We watched her attentively as she transformed into Elvis. While Charlie’s transition was a more smooth, gradual change, hers was more abrupt. Some blue matter overcame her and then disappeared revealing Elvis in the flesh, technically. His legs were crossed and his hands folded on his lap, just like Raven’s previous form.
I had no clue what to expect but it surely wasn’t that she would change into him. I was speechless but Charlie gasped in surprise and jumped up to stand on the chair, between my legs. I placed my hands on his legs to steady him but I watched them.
“You’re Elvis!” he exclaimed excitedly.
The chuckle that came from her throat was a light manly one.
“Can you sing something?” came out of my mouth before I could even process what I was asking. I was too amazed, however, to feel embarrassed.
She gave that famous Elvis smirk, with glimmering blue eyes I had no clue he had, and stood up getting into his stance. Without a pause, as if with his confidence, she began rocking like Elvis and singing the first verse of Hard Headed Woman:
Well a hard headed woman, a soft hearted man
been the cause of trouble ever since the world began.
Oh yeah, ever since the world began
a hard headed woman been a thorn in the side of man.
Once she was finished, Charlie, Xavier and I applauded her and cheered. It was completely amazing what she was able to do. Before long, Charlie had hopped to the ground and started practicing his Elvis moves with her. It was honestly the cutest sight you could ever see. Charles and I sat back and watched but not two minutes later the large grandfather clock in the hallway began to chime. It was 9 o’clock. It seemed to startle Charles out of some type of daze.
“Oh hell... I’m going to be late.” Charles had paused a moment and looked at young Charlie who was looking up at him curiously, “Pardon my language.”
He stood quickly and began cleaning his place, taking his things to the sink. Raven laughed and changed back to her original self. “He’s not used to all of this.”
Raven, again, took Charlie’s seat and Charlie settled on her lap. Charles, in a rush, heads out of the dinning room and rounds the corner, but quickly pokes his head back in.
“I apologize for having to leave so abruptly. I’ll be around later.” He nods to us then looks to Raven, “Treat them well.” He rounded again and after a few minutes the front door was opened then shut.
I look at Raven and she smiles at me. “How about we go see the lake now?”
Charlie jumps up excitedly and I nod and look down at the child, “Charlie, let’s help clean first.”
He agrees and we all grab things off the table. Charlie was in charge of throwing things in the trash and Raven and I worked at the sink, though she tried to tell me I didn’t have to help. It was a lot more fun than cleaning should have been and it looked like Raven thought the same. We all tried the Elvis twist and singing songs that we knew. The dishes were cleaned and the table was wiped down in no time it seemed.
Finally, she takes us on an official tour of the grounds and we end the tour at the lake, slightly bigger than I imagined, but not so much. It was a gorgeous day out. Very few clouds were to be seen in the sky and the soft spring breeze was a welcome companion to the warm heat of the sun. Charlie and Raven played a bit but somehow we all ended up laying in the grass, looking up at the sky. Charlie insisted on lying down between us and holding both of our hands. There was the sounds of our voices, moving water, small animals, and the grass in the wind. It was so serene and we hadn’t even been here a whole day. I silently prayed that whatever it was that Charlie and I stumbled upon, this peace, that we could keep it for a while longer. All I needed to do now was finally have that conversation with Charles Xavier. Just a few more hours.