Long Lost

By Stefan Jurewicz

Part I

Michael Atkins grew up in Arnetteville, a small, rural town in the south of Hinton, with his mother, Deborah, and his grandparents, Willie and Maisie. Their house was built by Willie’s father, Cliff, when Willie was ten years old. It had two bedrooms—Willie and Maisie’s master and the smaller room Michael shared with his mother. Willie ran a feed store in town. Deborah, who gave birth to baby Michael at fourteen, still attended high school, leaving Maisie to babysit during the week. On weekends, Deborah and Michael were inseparable, often bonding over their love of old films—or rather Deborah’s love of old films, which she projected onto her babbling baby boy.

On Michael’s fifth birthday, Deborah received a letter from the state. As part of a relatively new social assistance program, to which one of her teachers had recommended her, she was offered a full scholarship to a college in Huster. The scholarship was meant to encourage low-income students who had shown great academic achievement the opportunity to pursue higher education, and the Atkinses were overjoyed. No one else in their family had completed their secondary education.

Of course, this enthusiasm dampened slightly when Deborah realized she wouldn’t be able to take Michael with her. She would be living in a campus dorm, and even if that were an appropriate place for her to raise a child, there would still be the question of finding someone to watch him while she was in class. Her scholarship was directly tied to her academic performance, so she had very little room for error—something young children are hardly considerate of.

Many tears were shed over many sleepless nights as Deborah came to terms with the inevitable. Her parents graciously took on their roles as Michael’s guardians, but the young mother feared four years away from her son—almost twice his short life so far—would ruin the bond they had formed. Her mother assured her there was nothing in the whole world that could get between her and Michael—that in four years, when she returned home, her son would love her just as much as he did now.

On the morning of her last day at home, Deborah took young Michael in her arms, hoisting him up onto her lap. He had been briefed many times about mommy’s ‘big trip,’ and seemed to understand the implications as much as a five-year-old could be expected to.

“Is there anything you’d like to do on our last day together?” Deborah asked.

“Wonka!” exclaimed Michael.

A big grin took over Deborah’s face. For the last year, Michael had been obsessed with Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. The pair watched it every weekend. Deborah had committed every line of dialogue to memory and could recite it word-for-word with her eyes closed. She had even taken to calling her son ‘Mike Teevee,’ after the character in the show—though for no other reason than their shared name and favourite pastime.

“You got it, Mike Teevee!”

Michael giggled, parroting back, “Mike Teevee! Mike Teevee!”

“What’s all this about, now?” said Maisie, walking into her living room and the charming scene within.

“Oh, Mike and I are going to watch Wonka!”

“Mike Teevee! Mike Teevee!”

Maisie rolled her eyes.

“Again? I swear, child, if I get that silly oompy-loompy song stuck in my head again…”

Michael giggled, then hopped off his mother’s lap to go grab his favourite tape. Deborah had once made the mistake of leaving it out of his reach, and Michael had thrown such a fit she promised never again to leave it higher than his little fingers could grab. Even when they weren’t watching it, he often liked to hold the box in the same way a child might hold a stuffed animal, more than once taking it into bed with him.

***

As the credits rolled, Deborah gingerly picked up a sleeping Michael, who had dozed off halfway through the ‘oompy-loompy’ song chastising the father of Veruca Salt (who had just turned into a blueberry) and carried him upstairs to bed. She kissed him on the forehead, then pulled back just far enough so that she could take in as much detail of her son’s perfect face as possible. To say she was going to miss him was a gross understatement. The last five years of her life had been dedicated almost entirely to the wonderful little pyjama-clad boy in front of her.

Unbeknownst to Deborah, her own mother was standing in the doorway having a similar train of thought. How proud she was of her daughter! For a woman Deborah’s age—for a woman she had truly become—to rise to the challenges of adolescence, motherhood, and academia with such grace and dignity was unheard of. Maisie couldn’t help but wonder how much of that was her doing. She wasn’t under the impression she and her husband had done anything particularly special in raising their daughter, yet somehow this incredible human being had blossomed from the soil they had helped cultivate. She thanked the Lord for giving her such a wonderful gift, then quietly padded down the hallway before Deborah saw her.

***

“Debbie, your father’s waiting!” Maisie called from the bottom of the stairs.

With Michael in her arms, a red-eyed Deborah came down the stairs. Her bottom lip quivered.

“Oh, hun! He’s going to be just fine!” Maisie said in her most sympathetic tone of voice.

“I know,” whispered Deborah, “I’m just going to miss him… so much.”

“Don’t cry, mommy!” said Michael, “I don’t want you to be sad!”

This had the opposite effect on Deborah, who had to put Michael down for fear of dropping him, the way her sobs racked her body. She got down on one knee and enveloped her son in a hug. When she pulled away, she looked him straight in the eye.

“My love. My dear Michael. May you laugh and sing your life full, until we meet again.”

She kissed her son on the forehead and gave him one last squeeze before saying goodbye to her own mother.

“Take good care of him,” she said.

“You know I will, darling. You take care of yourself.”

They embraced warmly, and, with one final wave goodbye, Deborah walked out the front door.