Shelby was loading the laundry when she received a call from her son’s school.
Thinking he was sick or hurt, she knew what to do and which clinic to go to. When she walked into his school, the security guard pointed her to the principal’s office.
She walked along the corridor and on the far end was an old wooden bench. Even from far, she knew the boy sitting on it was her seven-year-old son.
“Keegan, are you sick? Are you hurt?” Shelby asked.
Keegan kept quiet.
“Are you not allowed to answer me?” Shelby tried again. Instead of answering, he lowered his head. Seeing this, Shelby knew she was called to Keegan’s school for other reason. “What did you do?”
The glass door flung open and an oversized women with short curly hair appeared. “You can go in now.”
“You wait here,” Keegan’s mother instructed.
“No, the principal wants to see both of you,” the woman stated.
The principal was in his fifties with a headful of grey hair. He wore a pair of glasses and he looked up right away when Shelby and Keegan entered the air conditioned room. They sat opposite of him as the adults exchanged greetings.
“Keegan, do you want to tell your mother what you did?” the principal questioned. He looked at his principal then at his mother. He decided to keep quiet.
“I take that as a no,” the principal concluded. He pulled out a yellow file with a photo of Keegan on the upper right side. It was a photo taken beginning of the school year. He flipped through the papers in that file and Shelby shook one of her legs out of nervousness. Even as an adult, she hated being in the principal’s office. It brought her back to when she was a teenager.
“Is everything okay?” she asked suddenly, feeling the principal was taking his time in looking at Keegan’s file.
“As I can see here, Keegan had good records in terms of his behaviour and his grades,” he stated. “Unfortunately, he has been acting differently for the past few months. I can also see that his grades are suffering.”
“Oh, that is not good,” Shelby turned to look at Keegan and then back at the principal.
“Do you notice any change of behaviour in him recently?”
“No.”
“Is there a change in his surroundings? Like is he being bullied by an older or younger sibling? Is everything okay at home? Is there a new baby?”
“No, nothing has changed,” Shelby answered, suddenly feeling as if she was once again a student. “What did Keegan do?”
“Well, today in class they were supposed to bring their favourite toy and talk about it in class. It is a show and tell day for them. Keegan didn’t bring his and he disrupted the class when one of the students shared on his toy mobile phone.”
“Disrupted like how?”
“He snatched the toy phone and threw it against the wall. Then he screamed,” the principal continued as Shelby winced at Keegan’s behaviour.
“By the look on your face, I assume you are shocked at what I am saying.”
“I am actually, my son would never do something like that,” Shelby turned to her son. “He is a good boy.”
“But he did. There is a change in his life and it is best to figure it out.”
“I understand,” Shelby exhaled. “Keegan, what do you say?”
“I’m sorry,” Keegan spoke for the first time in minutes.
Keegan was quiet in the car and when he reached home, he rushed to his room. He looked out the window and saw the neighbour’s maid playing with a baby in the garden. He watched them and smiled a little.
“Keegan, come here,” Shelby called out to her son. She sat on the single bed and he walked towards it.
“Do you want to tell me what happened in class today?”
“No.”
“You have to because what you did was wrong. You could have hurt your friends or your teacher,” Shelby reasoned.
“I didn’t mean to do that,” Keegan said sadly.
“Where are all your toys?”
“In there,” he pointed to the toy chest by the door.
When Shelby opened it, she was stunned. All the toys she bought for Keegan were still in their boxes and packages. She was sure, he loved them. Feeling something was not right she had to ask.
“Why haven’t you played with these toys?” Keegan remained quiet. “What is wrong? Tell me.”
He hesitated at first but after much persuasion, he opened up. “You and daddy are always on the phone. You don’t even look at me or my paintings from school. You always say later and when we go out both of you are always looking at your phone. I am not important anymore.”
Hearing the truth from Keegan was painful. It broke her heart that Keegan thought he wasn’t important.
Shelby apologized for her behaviour and realized that the mobile phone was the change in Keegan’s life. Both adults had been spending more time staring at their gadgets than paying attention to their son even during the holidays.
Carina Lim bears different messages through her fiction. These messages could be useful in life. She can be contacted at mermaidgal03@yahoo.com
