9/13/07 - Tim
---
The sounds from the room could almost be considered music. With no natural talent driving his fingers across the keys, repeated measures of 'Masquerade' sound off two to three times each, stopped every eighth note or so in dreadful discord. Sometimes this is due to a misread score, mis judged timing, or clumsy fingers, but more often than not its due to the cramping fingers attached to a bandaged arm still no where near healed, even if his face is now a fair sight better. While he hasn't yet broken curfew, as the minute hand ticks down its last quarter, he's coming dangerously close.
Music lovers beware. A man who has learned to block out the thoughts and emotions of adolescents can surely find haphazard practice little more vexing. A shadow moves in the doorway of the music room, solidifying into the shape of Professor Xavier in suit and crutches. He walks, if slowly and with an ungainly lack of grace that has a dignity all its own. The hazel-eyed gaze presses on Tim, the mind behind it quizzical. "Mr. Hall." Rich and pensive, the baritone drops its notes into a break in the phrase. "The hour grows late."
The notes end in a sudden staccato, confused and surprised eyes turning from the music to the good professor. They blink once as a thought pulls them back to the page once more and his mouth cracks to answer "I'm... I'm sorry, sir. Just lost track of... of time." The harsh squeak of the stool sounds out as Tim's considerable form pushes it back away from the grand instrument and he prepares to stand.
"No apologies necessary," answers Xavier, empathy painting a faint smile on the grave reply. The acoustics of the room carry it further, pitching it far and back into the emptied seats usually filled with students and the squawk of fledgling instruments. "Practice makes perfect, as they say, although I will presume to guess that that was not your actual intention. Please," he adds politely. "Stay a moment, if you will. I would like to have a word."
Somewhere inside the boy, he really wants to give the Professor a friendly smile with bright eyes and dutiful attention. Tonight, however, he just isn't able, and a hollow facade of the expression will have to do. "Its the song she was... I want to get it right." he explains in a distracted tone, at least half the truth. "Of course, sir."
"Ah," says Xavier. It is his favorite expression of late: a sympathetic sound, meaningless -- but /something/, where words are inadequate to the purpose. He pauses just beyond the threshold, his gaze turning away from the target of the teacher's seat to the more unhappy one of the young man. "Of course. And I am sure she would appreciate the effort, Tim. The thought, I think," he adds gently, returning to his awkward progress. "I have found that the desire and the sincere attempt sometimes outweighs all the meaningless successes in the world."
It is with a deep breath and a longing look at the ruffled sheet music that pale hands pull the cover back over the keys, one being used much more gently than the other as the piano says goodnight with a wooden echo and gentle hum of every string in unison. "mmhmm" Tim sounds after his mind has a second to parse Xavier's sage advice.
Says that mellow voice, kindly, "It is little comfort, I am aware." The Professor has reached the chair by now, and he draws it out and sinks into it with the abrupt, parsimonious gestures of one uncertain of his steadiness. The thud of body hitting the cushion is not gentle; the clatter of the crutches against the desk, likewise. The fine-stretched skin at the corners of Xavier's eyes twitch in a wince, one matched by the thinning of the eloquent mouth. "Nonetheless. How are you, Tim?"
Concern betrays him. His face shifts from distant longing to cracked mouth worry as he eyes the headmaster's decent. The bench is scooted again, and the lad almost rises before tact pushes him back down into his seat and lips shift from shock to speech. "I'm doing better, I guess." he answers with the small burst of energy still present at the start of his words before eyes sink to the bandage and he repeats with less exuberance. "Doing better."
"Better is something, at least." The barest hint of breathlessness in the Professor's cadence evens out, fluttering to extinction almost before it is audible. His gaze, too, drops to Tim's bandage, and his mouth firms again -- this time with less forgiving lines -- before relaxing to a rueful curl. "It seems we pitchfork you from one disaster to another. You are too young and too inexperienced to know this, Tim, but life is not supposed to be this hard."
"I hope so." Tim responds lightly, a touch of exhausted humor and honesty inserted into his mask of a smile. With much care, flannel sleeve is pulled over the bandage hiding all but its edge from direct view, though its bulge leaves it anything but unseen. When he talks again there is the slightest touch of guilt. "I'm sorry that I..." he begins, but doesn't finish, hoping the rest would remain understood.
"I will not tell you not to apologize," the Professor says. The crutches, wedged between his knee and the table's leg, slide down for a hissing half-second until the rubber tips catch on the floor. Xavier frowns at them, then frowns at the boy: an expression less of disapproval than of distraction. And then, as hoped, understanding. "Whether you believe it or not, there is no need. You have done the best that you could do under trying circumstances, young man. Better, in fact, than might be reasonably expected of you. I may not have the right to say this to you, but nonetheless -- I am proud of you, Tim."
The sentence catches Tim off guard. His look remains on the professor for some time, green eyes seeking hazel. A blank face slowly sifts to grateful and another dash of honesty finds its way behind his smile, making it almost believable. "T-Thank you, sir." he manages to say, but remains quiet otherwise.
The Professor gestures, an crooked little sweep of the hand: one with an oddly embarrassed quality, which fades only slightly as he smoothes that same hand over his scalp. "Yes, well," he says, with the discomfiture of a naturally reserved man. Hazel eyes twinkle slightly. "I trust we need not go into too much detail. You will do excellently, I think. I am pleased that you are back with us this year, all else notwithstanding."
It is a mirrored look from Tim, composure and reservation reasserting themselves. Fingers weave carefully with fingers in his lap as he suddenly find them of great interest. "Thank you, sir." he repeats, more formally this time before promising. "I'll do my best." And it is a promise he intends to keep.
"I cannot ask for anything more," Xavier says, answering promise with courtesy. The small hint of a smile deepens, and his hand drops back to his lap to clasp loosely around the handle of his crutch. "I realize I am not the most -- accessible of teachers in the faculty, but my door is always open to you if you need me. Have you--" Unwieldy, this method of communication. His fingers stir, restless with an inconsistent impatience before he finishes smoothly, "--heard anything from your family?"
"They aren't letting me talk to him at all right now." Tim explains with a soft shake of his head. "Maybe thats a good thing. I don't know what I would... or if I could..." Slowly, his face rises from his own hands as they find their way to the sheet music to gently fold it away. "He's um, all the family I got."
Empathy washes warm against the boundaries of Tim's mind, sympathy that makes its presence known without encroaching: like the pat on a back, or the clasp on a shoulder. "Perhaps it is for the best," Xavier murmurs, drawing his crutches up to brace himself against rising. An ugly business. Like a giraffe learning its legs for the first time, pieces of aluminum and rubber -- lengths of leg and bone -- angle every which way before finding precarious balance under the aging body. "We cannot choose the families we are born into, Tim. We /can/ choose the ones we keep. We cannot replace your father, but I hope you will think of us as family as well. Someday."
"Someday." Tim answers with a long breath, standing from the stool and waiting respectfully for the professor to leave before him. Not quite today. It takes a marked effort on his part to fight by sympathy and not to reach out and help him up and across the room.
If the Professor notices it, he does not acknowledge it. A smile bends towards Tim, reaching even those intelligent, wise old eyes, and Xavier limps his painful way to the door. "And in the meantime: it is time for us to go to bed, Mr. Hall. A growing lad needs his sleep. And his room. And so do you. --Good night, my boy."
The sounds from the room could almost be considered music. With no natural talent driving his fingers across the keys, repeated measures of 'Masquerade' sound off two to three times each, stopped every eighth note or so in dreadful discord. Sometimes this is due to a misread score, mis judged timing, or clumsy fingers, but more often than not its due to the cramping fingers attached to a bandaged arm still no where near healed, even if his face is now a fair sight better. While he hasn't yet broken curfew, as the minute hand ticks down its last quarter, he's coming dangerously close.
Music lovers beware. A man who has learned to block out the thoughts and emotions of adolescents can surely find haphazard practice little more vexing. A shadow moves in the doorway of the music room, solidifying into the shape of Professor Xavier in suit and crutches. He walks, if slowly and with an ungainly lack of grace that has a dignity all its own. The hazel-eyed gaze presses on Tim, the mind behind it quizzical. "Mr. Hall." Rich and pensive, the baritone drops its notes into a break in the phrase. "The hour grows late."
The notes end in a sudden staccato, confused and surprised eyes turning from the music to the good professor. They blink once as a thought pulls them back to the page once more and his mouth cracks to answer "I'm... I'm sorry, sir. Just lost track of... of time." The harsh squeak of the stool sounds out as Tim's considerable form pushes it back away from the grand instrument and he prepares to stand.
"No apologies necessary," answers Xavier, empathy painting a faint smile on the grave reply. The acoustics of the room carry it further, pitching it far and back into the emptied seats usually filled with students and the squawk of fledgling instruments. "Practice makes perfect, as they say, although I will presume to guess that that was not your actual intention. Please," he adds politely. "Stay a moment, if you will. I would like to have a word."
Somewhere inside the boy, he really wants to give the Professor a friendly smile with bright eyes and dutiful attention. Tonight, however, he just isn't able, and a hollow facade of the expression will have to do. "Its the song she was... I want to get it right." he explains in a distracted tone, at least half the truth. "Of course, sir."
"Ah," says Xavier. It is his favorite expression of late: a sympathetic sound, meaningless -- but /something/, where words are inadequate to the purpose. He pauses just beyond the threshold, his gaze turning away from the target of the teacher's seat to the more unhappy one of the young man. "Of course. And I am sure she would appreciate the effort, Tim. The thought, I think," he adds gently, returning to his awkward progress. "I have found that the desire and the sincere attempt sometimes outweighs all the meaningless successes in the world."
It is with a deep breath and a longing look at the ruffled sheet music that pale hands pull the cover back over the keys, one being used much more gently than the other as the piano says goodnight with a wooden echo and gentle hum of every string in unison. "mmhmm" Tim sounds after his mind has a second to parse Xavier's sage advice.
Says that mellow voice, kindly, "It is little comfort, I am aware." The Professor has reached the chair by now, and he draws it out and sinks into it with the abrupt, parsimonious gestures of one uncertain of his steadiness. The thud of body hitting the cushion is not gentle; the clatter of the crutches against the desk, likewise. The fine-stretched skin at the corners of Xavier's eyes twitch in a wince, one matched by the thinning of the eloquent mouth. "Nonetheless. How are you, Tim?"
Concern betrays him. His face shifts from distant longing to cracked mouth worry as he eyes the headmaster's decent. The bench is scooted again, and the lad almost rises before tact pushes him back down into his seat and lips shift from shock to speech. "I'm doing better, I guess." he answers with the small burst of energy still present at the start of his words before eyes sink to the bandage and he repeats with less exuberance. "Doing better."
"Better is something, at least." The barest hint of breathlessness in the Professor's cadence evens out, fluttering to extinction almost before it is audible. His gaze, too, drops to Tim's bandage, and his mouth firms again -- this time with less forgiving lines -- before relaxing to a rueful curl. "It seems we pitchfork you from one disaster to another. You are too young and too inexperienced to know this, Tim, but life is not supposed to be this hard."
"I hope so." Tim responds lightly, a touch of exhausted humor and honesty inserted into his mask of a smile. With much care, flannel sleeve is pulled over the bandage hiding all but its edge from direct view, though its bulge leaves it anything but unseen. When he talks again there is the slightest touch of guilt. "I'm sorry that I..." he begins, but doesn't finish, hoping the rest would remain understood.
"I will not tell you not to apologize," the Professor says. The crutches, wedged between his knee and the table's leg, slide down for a hissing half-second until the rubber tips catch on the floor. Xavier frowns at them, then frowns at the boy: an expression less of disapproval than of distraction. And then, as hoped, understanding. "Whether you believe it or not, there is no need. You have done the best that you could do under trying circumstances, young man. Better, in fact, than might be reasonably expected of you. I may not have the right to say this to you, but nonetheless -- I am proud of you, Tim."
The sentence catches Tim off guard. His look remains on the professor for some time, green eyes seeking hazel. A blank face slowly sifts to grateful and another dash of honesty finds its way behind his smile, making it almost believable. "T-Thank you, sir." he manages to say, but remains quiet otherwise.
The Professor gestures, an crooked little sweep of the hand: one with an oddly embarrassed quality, which fades only slightly as he smoothes that same hand over his scalp. "Yes, well," he says, with the discomfiture of a naturally reserved man. Hazel eyes twinkle slightly. "I trust we need not go into too much detail. You will do excellently, I think. I am pleased that you are back with us this year, all else notwithstanding."
It is a mirrored look from Tim, composure and reservation reasserting themselves. Fingers weave carefully with fingers in his lap as he suddenly find them of great interest. "Thank you, sir." he repeats, more formally this time before promising. "I'll do my best." And it is a promise he intends to keep.
"I cannot ask for anything more," Xavier says, answering promise with courtesy. The small hint of a smile deepens, and his hand drops back to his lap to clasp loosely around the handle of his crutch. "I realize I am not the most -- accessible of teachers in the faculty, but my door is always open to you if you need me. Have you--" Unwieldy, this method of communication. His fingers stir, restless with an inconsistent impatience before he finishes smoothly, "--heard anything from your family?"
"They aren't letting me talk to him at all right now." Tim explains with a soft shake of his head. "Maybe thats a good thing. I don't know what I would... or if I could..." Slowly, his face rises from his own hands as they find their way to the sheet music to gently fold it away. "He's um, all the family I got."
Empathy washes warm against the boundaries of Tim's mind, sympathy that makes its presence known without encroaching: like the pat on a back, or the clasp on a shoulder. "Perhaps it is for the best," Xavier murmurs, drawing his crutches up to brace himself against rising. An ugly business. Like a giraffe learning its legs for the first time, pieces of aluminum and rubber -- lengths of leg and bone -- angle every which way before finding precarious balance under the aging body. "We cannot choose the families we are born into, Tim. We /can/ choose the ones we keep. We cannot replace your father, but I hope you will think of us as family as well. Someday."
"Someday." Tim answers with a long breath, standing from the stool and waiting respectfully for the professor to leave before him. Not quite today. It takes a marked effort on his part to fight by sympathy and not to reach out and help him up and across the room.
If the Professor notices it, he does not acknowledge it. A smile bends towards Tim, reaching even those intelligent, wise old eyes, and Xavier limps his painful way to the door. "And in the meantime: it is time for us to go to bed, Mr. Hall. A growing lad needs his sleep. And his room. And so do you. --Good night, my boy."