It had been with a grim face that Selene had repacked Parker’s bag and got him settled into the back of her car. He had been crying ever since the sun had broken over the horizon and now as she looked at him through the rear view mirror, snot and tear stained face scrunched into a painful grimace, his trustful teddy bear forgotten at his feet, she found she wanted nothing more than to pick him up and take him back into the house--whispering promises that she knew she couldn’t make.
She spoke to him the whole way back to the hospital, trying her best to sooth him, her right hand permanently clutching at his thrashing leg, but it seemed that today Parker Blakely was not to be pacified. Her son hated the fact that he had to go back to hospital just as much as she did, if not more.
Carrying his flailing body up to his floor, a sympathetic looking nurse pushing his green wheel chair behind them, she kissed him soundly on top of his head before she passed him over to Janelle and watched solemnly as the boy went limp in his favorite nurse’s arms. Nodding her thanks to the Mexican lady who reached out and clasped Selene on the shoulder lightly before turning and disappearing into her son’s room with a whimpering Parker.
She had headed to work after that. Snapping at her students and reducing a few to tears. She finished up her grade, having to through out her red pen after the ink had dried up on her. Nobody was safe today, especially herself.
The professor hadn’t even thought about Katelyn once during the day, her mind completely and utterly wrapped up in her son and his actions that morning. It had killed her to watch her son behave in such a way and it just got worse and worse every time he came home and had to go back. She really did wonder whether it was better to just stop his home visits all together, it was obviously not doing either of them any good.
Twelve hours later Selene found herself sitting on the steps of her patio, a bottle of nearly finished red wine clasped tightly in her hand and her head bowed painfully. She had yet to eat or change out of work clothes, her normally pristine pants suit wrinkled beyond repair and her face, when revealed, would tell one of the hard day Selene had been through.
She wasn’t really surprised, not really, to hear the blonde voice behind her, but it sill made her jump, her neck snapping around to gaze at Katelyn puzzled before she shook her head, cleared her throat, and shook her head again.
“No, wait, no-I...stay.” Standing, or rather stumbling to her feet, she placed the wine bottle on the flower bed table lip, before taking a step forward, “I apologise for not coming...I had a rough day.”