Max was sitting at the dock, he knew it was late but he didn’t want to be in his tent now. He was shaking with tears running down his face, the nightmare that woke him up still lingered in the back of his mind. He hated it. “F-fuck…” was all he could muster out as he stared into the lake.
(( I’m not good at writig starters yet but I’m working on it 🙂
“I know,, it’s just-“ Max sighs. “I’m scared…”
“I know, Max. I’m sorry.” Carlos rubbed his back some more. “Do
you… wanna talk to David? I’m sure he’d be more than willing to help put your
fears aside.”Max shook his head. “I’d rather just forget about it and move on..”
“It’s a little hard to move on from something that you’re
still scared of,” Carlos told him. “Max… I’m sure David would want to help you.
He’s… well, he’s your parent now, right?“ Carlos thought so – unless he misheard it.“Yeah… he is… “ Max was staring into the lake, he seemed somewhat calmer after talking about the dream.
Carlos nodded. “Then… I don’t mean now, but when you’re
ready, I’m sure he’d be happy to be trusted enough for you to go to him.”Max nodded, he was pretty tired now. His chin was rested on his knees and he started nodding off.
Carlos looked down at the kid. He smiled slightly. “It looks
like you’re tired… wanna head back to your tent, Max?” he asked.Max nodded. He stood up a rubbed his eyes.
Carlos took up his flashlight and stood up again. He offered
his hand to Max. “Hold my hand – at least until we’re away from the lake, okay
buddy?”Max nodded, he spared almost no hesitation taking Carlos’ hand, normally he would outright refuse but he felt as though showed enough weakness that Carlos wouldn’t notice.
Carlos shined the flash light in front of them as he led Max
away from the docks. He was glad Max decided to take his hand this time – being
by the lake, he didn’t want to risk the boy falling in.They made their way in the dark toward the tents and Carlos
listened, trying to hear if anyone else was awake as well.“You remember which tent it is right?” Max yawned. “Farthest one from the mess hall.”
“Alright,” Carlos said as he started heading for that tent.
“Careful, we can’t wake Nikki or Charlie up. That’d be a mess…”
“Okay,” Carlos said softly. He kept the flashlight low so it
didn’t shine on the tent wall. He found the door and waited for Max to let go of
his hand and go inside. “Here you go, buddy… try to get some sleep. And explain
to David maybe that you had trouble sleeping – you don’t have to tell him why
if you don’t want to, but he’ll understand if you’re tired tomorrow, okay?”
The Perfect Scientist 