The second year after Wilbur’s induction, Phil Soot receives an email from pandascanpvp@gmail.com with the subject line Wilbur and Tommy.

The grief is not a surprise, exactly. He knew what his chances were when he had kids. That doesn’t make it any easier.

Terrence doesn’t move out. He stays home, cracks jokes, makes sure they all eat three meals a day and sleep or at least lay in bed every night. That does make it easier, eventually. Phil doesn’t know how to mourn the loss of his son or the boy who was not quite his son, but he knows how to feed the crows and groom the horses and walk the dogs and weed the garden. Phil doesn’t talk about it, mostly, except once a year, when they get letters. (Wilbur is still dead. Tommy and Toby aren’t, not for their sophomore and junior years, despite what the email had claimed. Despite themselves, Phil and Terrence wait half-expectant and hopeful on graduation day; when the two boys do not come out, Phil resigns himself again to the grief, goes back to work.)

Instead, they talk about the books that have begun piling up on the counter. Emma Goldman, Noam Chomsky, Pyotr Kropotkin. Terrence is passionate, giving speeches to his audience of one; Phil’s not sure he understands all of it, but he understands enough to know he doesn’t need to. People are people, mundanes as well as wizards; that’s all he needs. He sets aside most of the food from the garden to drive into town, mails his and Terrence’s letters to their prison pen pals, does magic healing free of charge for other wizards. He doesn’t know exactly what Terrence is up to but he’s suspicious from the tenor of complaints that any prisons in the area are going to get broken into soon and their conditions improved if they haven’t been already. The dead are still dead, the scholomance still cruel, that doesn’t and won’t change, but it’s easier to live with it when they can give someone a couch to sleep on where the cops can’t find them. It’s not perfect, but it’s not nothing, either. 

The second year after Wilbur’s induction, Phil Soot receives an email from pandascanpvp@gmail.com with the subject line Wilbur and Tommy.

The grief is not a surprise, exactly. He knew what his chances were when he had kids. That doesn’t make it any easier. He forwards the email to Tommy’s parents. (It’s funny; Terrence had been the only one of the kids Phil knew to write a will before going in, a carefully itemized list of what to to if he didn’t come back. Maybe if Wilbur had written one, Phil would know what to do with himself.)

Terrence doesn’t move out. He stays home, cracks jokes until Phil laughs, makes sure they all eat three meals a day and sleep or at least lay in bed every night. That does make it easier, eventually. Phil doesn’t know how to mourn the loss of his son or the boy who was not quite his son, but he knows how to feed the crows and groom the horses and walk the dogs and weed the garden. Phil doesn’t talk about it, mostly, except once a year, when the letters come. (Wilbur is still dead. Tommy and Toby aren’t, not for their sophomore and junior years, despite what the email had claimed. Despite themselves, Phil and Terrence wait half-hopeful on graduation day; when the two boys do not come out, Phil resigns himself again to the grief, goes back to work.)

Instead, they talk about the books that have begun piling up on the counter. Emma Goldman, Noam Chomsky, Pyotr Kropotkin. Terrence is passionate, giving speeches to his audience of one; Phil’s not sure he understands all of it, but he understands enough to know he doesn’t need to. People are people, mundanes as well as wizards; that’s all he needs. He sets aside most of the food from the garden to drive into town, mails his and Terrence’s letters to their prison pen pals, does magic healing free of charge for other wizards. He doesn’t know exactly what Terrence is up to but he’s suspicious from the tenor of complaints that any prisons in the area are going to get broken into soon and their conditions improved if they haven’t been already. The dead are still dead, the scholomance still cruel, that doesn’t and won’t change, but it’s easier to live with it when they can give someone a couch to sleep on where the cops can’t find them. It’s not perfect, but it’s not nothing, either. 

The second year after Wilbur’s induction, Phil Soot receives an email from pandascanpvp@gmail.com with the subject line Wilbur and Tommy.

The grief is not a surprise, exactly. He knew what his chances were when he had kids. That doesn’t make it any easier. He prints the email to give to Tommy’s parents. (It’s funny; Terrence had been the only one of the kids Phil knew to write a will before going in, a carefully itemized list of what to to if he didn’t come back. Maybe if Wilbur had written one, Phil would know what to do with himself.)

Terrence doesn’t move out. He stays home, cracks jokes until Phil laughs, makes sure they all eat three meals a day and sleep or at least lay in bed every night. That does make it easier, eventually. Phil doesn’t know how to mourn the loss of his son or the boy who was not quite his son, but he knows how to feed the crows and groom the horses and walk the dogs and weed the garden. Phil doesn’t talk about it, mostly, except once a year, when the letters come. (Wilbur is still dead. Tommy and Toby aren’t, not for their sophomore and junior years, despite what the email had claimed, despite the corroborating notes in Toby’s cramped handwriting. The next two years of notes read we’re still alive, and so despite themselves, Phil and Terrence wait half-hopeful on graduation day; when the two boys do not come out, Phil resigns himself again to the grief, goes back to work.)

Instead, they talk about the books that have begun piling up on the counter. Emma Goldman, Noam Chomsky, Pyotr Kropotkin. Terrence is passionate, giving speeches to his audience of one; Phil’s not sure he understands all of it, but he understands enough to know he doesn’t need to. People are people, mundanes as well as wizards; that’s all he needs. He sets aside most of the food from the garden to drive into town, mails his and Terrence’s letters to their prison pen pals, does magic healing free of charge for other wizards. He doesn’t know exactly what Terrence is up to but he’s suspicious from the tenor of complaints that any prisons in the area are going to get broken into soon and their conditions improved if they haven’t been already. The dead are still dead, the scholomance still cruel, that doesn’t and won’t change, but it’s easier to live with it when they can give someone a couch to sleep on where the cops can’t find them. It’s not perfect, but it’s not nothing, either.