District 42-Chapter 274: Hero part 2
Ivar walked slowly toward the bed where his mom was laid on. She seemed to be breathing with difficulty, her body was shivering a little bit, and her lips were dried.
"Are you feeling that the room isn’t ventilated? Want me to open the windows a little bit more?" She nodded her head while giving him a light smile. His mom seemed to be quite restless before he arrived, but now she was more at ease. Lydia was always uncomfortable when his son wasn’t around, after all.
However, Ivar didn’t know if she was concerned about his health while he was working out there, or if she felt lonely and insecure when alone. Maybe it was both since he knew about his mother’s constant worry about him, but was aware of how her accumulated trauma and sickness made her think that she would die if she stayed alone.
He opened the windows, feeling the cold gust of air that was coming out there. District 42 was very cold most of the time, and it worsened because it was nearly winter. Soon it would start snowing harder than usual.
’I am concerned about how will I go to work so far away when the blizzards start. I won’t be able to get out of my home at all, but if I don’t do so I won’t receive even a single penny.’
His sad expression alarmed his mother, who talked to him in a shaky voice.
"Are you... okay?"
Ivar turned to her immediately, nearly forgetting about something.
"You are shivering. That’s not good. Want me to take one or two extra blankets?"
She pondered for a while before nodding to him and raising two fingers.
The youth rushed towards a cabinet where he took two thick blankets and put them on top of his mother. 𝚏𝐫𝚎𝗲𝕨𝐞𝐛𝕟𝚘𝐯𝚎𝗹.𝕔𝐨𝗺
She kept shivering for a while, but it was lessening as the heat was gathering under the blankets.
"Will you... have a blanket... for you?"
Ivar smiled while sitting beside her in the bed.
"I will make an improvised blanket with my clothes, don’t worry."
"What happened with your backpack and... and... and your shoes?" She was getting tired, it was clear. Ivar knew that she could not talk for too long, otherwise, she would worse her case.
"I was robbed, as per usual. But, don’t worry, they were my worst clothes and shoes. And today I didn’t bring anything on the backpack. Also, my underwear is the last place they will ever think in touch to see what it has inside." He gave a wide grin while laughing.
She followed him with a weak laugh, proceeded by some coughs.
"Now, rest a lot, ok? Your lips are dry, so I will bring you more water. Tomorrow is my day off of the month so we can rest together."
The woman nodded, smiling slightly.
The glass with water came in no time, and Lydia drunk it fast. Some days, she didn’t have the strength to get up by herself and take her own water, so nothing was helping it when she remained all Ivar’s shift without drinking nor eating anything.
Lydia had a lot of questions to make to her son, but she decided to keep it to herself and ask the next day. She knew that sometimes he would go too far to take care of her and that at some point he would suffer the consequences just like she suffered by trying to keep him safe at any cost.
Once she finished drinking her water, Ivar put the glass aside, then took her by the hand. Thankfully, her body was already warming up.
"Do you think that it is still impossible, mom?" She moved her eyes toward him.
"What?"
"Do you think that I can still be a hero? Do you think that, at least, I myself can be the hero that will save us both?"
That’s what they needed all the time. That’s what all District 42 folk needed: a hero.
Someone who could give them hope. A mighty person that just the presence would be enough to soothe their minds. Ivar wanted to become that strong one day.
"In the end... you... are still..." She was falling asleep, closing her eyes slowly. "Still just a little kid, don’t you?"
His face became grim. Ivar knew that he needed to wake up to reality and accept his destiny.
"No. We are commoners, after all. Let the hero thing for the Aesirs and Ridires of the Castle, ok? We gotta work to pay our bills and buy our high-taxed food. That’s how commoners should be, we are born in this world to die like this, understood?" The words of his mom traveled inside his mind and hurt him deep down. He didn’t remember when was the last time she said it to him.
’A hero doesn’t have glass bones, nor paper muscles. A glass warrior can’t beat a stone warrior.’
Tears started to flow from his eyes as he remembered those painful times at the brothel that his mom worked at before.
At first, he cried silently, but as his thoughts kept flowing, it became more intense.
"And what can you do, Ivar? Go to the castle and ask to become a guard, a Ridire, or an Aesir? Do you think they really would accept?
"When you are deep down in the well, Ivar, you don’t aim for the sky, you try to go out of the well first.
"The world is unfair with everyone. Some will have much, and others even less than they need. Just a few will have the opportunity to raise in life, and you can’t count to be among these few people.
"I am just a dirty woman who does dirty things to sustain herself and her own son. And you are just my weak children. We are not special Ivar. We won’t be getting anywhere too far away, so let’s try to settle in the mess that we are now, at least."
"I CAN’T TAKE IT ANYMORE!"
After the last scream that marked the day when his mom got mentally ill, then physically ill, Ivar woke up from his dizziness once he felt a strong grip on his hand. His mother was still asleep, but she felt that his son seemed to require support.
Her hand squeezed his son’s as firmly as her weak body permitted.
"I am sorry, mom. I gave you a lot of trouble for being so weak." He spoke. "I won’t be giving you any troubles anymore. Before, I thought that you were being just hard-headed when you always stomped my dreams, but you are keeping me safe from disappointments."
He saw that the breathing of his mom was smoother, so he went to close the window a bit more.
"It’s better to go to sleep." Ivar never looked to the grim night out there with so emptiness in his eyes. He lasted some seconds before he really closed the window and went to take some clothes to cover himself.
The youth couldn’t sleep at all, but he didn’t leave his bed, regardless.
He kept all his day off slacking and thinking about the past events of his life while crying from time to time.
One year went by, and Ivar kept striving to maintain the health of his mother. Nonetheless, there wasn’t anything much that a boy could do for a sick woman in a poor region of the district.
Inevitably, the day of her death arrived.
It was silent, painless, and sudden. Ivar just woke up someday and saw that she was gone.
He didn’t try to put her on the queue of people passing for the ritual that the folk made for the dead people. The youth didn’t even think about it.
That day, he went to work as always, without looking back. But he never came back to his house again and started to wander through District 42.
But a day that would change all his life was coming. After so much struggle, that youth would finally receive what he deserved for taking care of his mom, for trying so hard even being weak, and for dreaming high and never letting his will disappear.
That day was supposed to be another normal routine for him. His mind was aloof as always. His feet were being slightly dragged on the ground. His motivation didn’t seem the highest one.
The other workers that were waiting in the big line in front of the Castle’s entrance were all excited, though. After getting a job inside the castle, they could just feel grateful.
The workers’ GBI needed to be confirmed before they entered the Castle to go work. The Ridires couldn’t afford that any invader could step inside there.
In the line, Ivar got approached by someone unknown. She wore a green lab coat, but all her clothes were black under it. That woman had shrewd eyes, and a minute before was analyzing each person standing on the line.
For some reason, her look stopped on Ivar and she started to walk toward him.
"Hello, stranger. My name is Catrina. It’s so nice to meet you~"
