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I have not heard her raise her voice towards anyone but myself in the time she has been here, and although this may not be a bad thing—it must be admitted that she seems to have the best handle on Asili of anyone he has yet come across, and he indeed seems to be growing quite fond of her—I still find myself remaining out of view, taking several quiet steps forward so that I might watch through the reflection of a mounted mirror while remaining out of sight myself.
There are three people in the hallway: Asili, Miss Martin, and one of my maids.
The maid is gesturing calmly towards an absolute mess of scrawls painted across the wall at Asili’s eye-level, black smears of what look like shoe-polish, and she murmurs something I can’t quite hear as she looks between Asili and the wall.
Miss Martin steps between the two, blocking my son from her view, and jabs a finger against the black-uniformed chest of my maid.
“Don’t you ever say that about him again,” she snaps, loud and angry. “He is a perfectly normal, healthy young boy and he doesn’t need to hear your vile words.”
I can see how the maid’s brows draw together slightly, and she says something else in an even quieter voice, which has Analina’s body language instantly intensify as she steps forward. “He’s just a boy! Stop treating him like he’s some kind of insane criminal! There is nothing wrong with him! You’re the one with a disgusting, horrible attitude, and you’re the one who should see a psychologist for your clear inability to see beyond yourself!”
Asili stares, wide-eyed and shocked, as the two females exchange their words. When the maid eventually shakes her head and walks away, leaving Analina behind, heaving with her anger, he reaches up and tugs on her sleeve.
When she looks down at him he opens his mouth, and in a meek voice that I can now hear clearly in the silence, he says, “Do you really think there’s nothing wrong with me? Or are you just lying?”
“Oh, honey.” She instantly drops to her knees before him, both hands coming to rest against his shoulders. The way he stares at her with wet eyes has my heart clenching. “Of course I mean it, Asili. You’re one of the coolest kids I’ve ever met, and you’re perfect just the way you are. Don’t you ever listen to anyone who says otherwise, okay?”
He nods mutely, several tears leaking from his eyes and running over the black polish marks smeared on his cheeks. She pulls him into her embrace, and he lifts his arms around her neck and presses his face into her hair. From here, it looks like he is squeezing her tightly.
“Now, come on,” she says after several long moments. “You’ve made a mess, and together, you and I are going to clean it.”
I take that moment to backtrack down the hall I came from, feeling something shift inside my chest and settle in a definitive way as the scene plays through my mind once more.
I have a maid I need to fire.
***
That night, I cannot sleep. And it’s for none of the reasons it should be.
Political strife? A conniving ex-wife? Continuous assassination attempts? None of this is hindering my sleep any more than an inconvenient meeting would.
No, tonight glossy brown curls and fierce green eyes float through my minds eye, and I am restless in my sheets. I have not felt the emptiness of my large mattress for years, but the hollow space beside me is more conspicuous now than it ever has been.
And Analina’s is the face that I keep thinking about.
I cannot pull my mind from the scene I witnessed earlier today. The maid was no doubt making the same observations about Asili’s anomalous behavior that people often do, and yet the fierce way Analina reared up in defense of my son still echoes through my thoughts. Her face was animated with her anger, her body placed protectively before my offspring as if she might physically shield him from the words of the other.
I have never seen anyone else so protective of Asili, and I am still trying to interpret the pull in my chest that this thought brings me.
I roll onto my back and drop my fingers to the skin of my stomach.
And still, I cannot sleep.
Her scent, her figure, the shine of her hair… Analina has captivated my thoughts tonight, and I am not sure I have the power to banish her from my mind.
