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Logan felt ridiculous sneaking into his own home. It was Friday afternoon, and Patton was working until 6. When Virgil had gotten home from school, Logan had told him he had errands to attend to, had put the dog in the kennel, and had driven away in his car. Then, he had parked the car a few streets away, given it about 20 minutes, and walked back. Now, he was quietly opening the front door and letting it click softly closed behind him.
He felt somewhat uneasy with lying to Virgil, (At least by omission. After all, he hadn’t said what the errands were or where he was attending to them.) but there had been recent concerns. Patton and he had been fostering Virgil for a little over three months now and while it hadn’t exactly gone without any hiccups, that was to be expected, and he was starting to settle. His grades were slowly going up, and he seemed marginally less cautious around them, though Logan noticed he still snuck food and hid it for later as though expecting the supply to be cut off abruptly. The transition had seemed to be going well if slowly.
Yet, in the past couple of weeks, he’d been exhibiting odd behavior. Patton had noticed it first, of course, but Logan could see it clearly as soon as it was mentioned.
He was being secretive. He opted more often to stay home by himself when Patton or Logan offered to take him somewhere. He’d even rejected an offer to get lunch with them both the past weekend which was probably the most concerning aspect as Virgil was not known to deny offered food. There had been nervous skittering when Logan got home from teaching last Wednesday and Patton had come home early one day only to hear him running upstairs, but he had pretended nothing had happened when Patton went up to check on him and refused to answer to any inquiries.
It was worrisome especially because they didn’t know what it meant and with his recent history of abuse, there were many bad possibilities that could explain his actions.
Patton was starting to fret. He was worried he might be doing drugs or self-harming or something else equally bad, and while he hadn’t seemed to exhibit symptoms of any of these things, clearly something was going on. Logan was not one to willfully ignore such things.
Thus, making the teenager think he’d be alone in the house and then sneaking back inside to check on him. It was not something that made Logan particularly comfortable, but it was better than a harmed or dead child.
He paused and listened. He could hear what sounded like faint music coming from upstairs. That was odd. Virgil never listened to music except for in his headphones. He ascended the stairs on soft feet listening to the muffled sound. It cut off abruptly and Logan paused until he heard it start up again, but somehow shaky this time. There was a sudden loud squeak that only a reed instrument could produce, and Virgil cursed.
He was.
He was playing his clarinet?
The music started up again back to the same place it had before, a little less shaky this time, but still hesitant. He managed to make it further along than he had before and then stopped and restarted even more confident this time. Logan listened for a few more moments before creeping up to the door.
Parents were not supposed to go into their teenager’s bedrooms without permission, were they? The same few bars of music began again, and Logan grimaced at himself as he turned the bedroom doorknob and pushed the door open.
Virgil was staring hard at sheet music propped up on his desk by a stack of books while he played. He seemed to sense intrusion because his eyes flickered away from the music toward Logan. The music cut off as soon as he caught sight of Logan in the doorway. He went perfectly still for a moment before he slowly lowered the instrument.
“I…” he tried but couldn’t finish.
“This is this what you’ve been doing?” Logan asked.
Virgil cringed, curling in on himself and Logan realized that his tone could probably have been taken as angry instead of just flummoxed. The arm with the clarinet inched behind his back, shielding the instrument from view. Like he was hoping to protect it from harm. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I didn’t know you were here. I didn’t mean to be loud.” Oh, Logan thought, I see.
“You can make as much noise as you wish in this house,” Logan informed him. “You don’t need to make sure we’re gone to practice your instrument.”
“It’s loud though,” Virgil said quietly.
“We don’t care Virgil,” Logan replied. “In fact, it is a good thing that you practice at home frequently if you wish to improve.”
He bit his lip. “Okay.”
Logan thought for a moment. “How about we set aside a few hours a week for you to practice. That way, both Patton and I will know beforehand that there will be noise and you don’t have to worry that you’re disturbing us.”
“That… that would be really nice,” he agreed.
“We’ll talk when Patton’s home,” Logan said smiling and got a small one back. “What were you playing?” he asked nodding at the sheet music propped up in front of him.
“Oh, uh, Jubilateo: Fanfare and Allegro,” he said squinting at the title to read it. “It’s a song they’re playing in the senior band this semester. Miss Ellington doesn’t usually let people switch bands during the year, but she said she’d seen me improve a lot ever since I came to live with you guys and is willing to let me audition before the spring semester for one of the higher bands. So, I’m learning it. I probably won’t make it into the top band, but if I practice enough, I think she might be willing to let me into the middle one with most of the sophomores and juniors.”
“That’s wonderful Virgil. I’m very happy for you.”
He ducked his head and blushed a bit.
“Go on,” Logan said.
“What?”
“I’ll just be working on organizing some files and won’t be disturbed so go ahead and practice.”
“I don’t have to,” he said biting his lip.
“I insist Virgil. It will be good to have some background music. Besides you seem to be quite a proficient player.”
“Oh, I’m not. I mean, I screwed up pretty bad a bit ago.”
“And that is why you practice, is it not?”
“Yeah,” he replied, trying to hide in his hoody. Logan smiled at him and gave him a quick pat on the shoulder before retreating from the room, leaving the door open a crack. After a few minutes, the music started back up.
Logan pulled out his phone. ‘He’s fine. No reason to worry,’ he texted Patton. Then after a moment’s thought while listening to the music from down the hall. ‘We may consider investing in a better clarinet for him.’