FROM A GOOD PLACE

The number which showed up on my phone’s screen was a familiar one. A number so frequent from the last school year.

‘What now?’, I thought. It was only the fifth day of the new school year.

‘Are you Sage’s mother?’, came the question.

‘Yes’, I replied, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

‘He’s not in trouble or anything’, she quickly stated. Then continued to tell me she realises his intensions came from a good place, and that he was on the way home because of a lizard.

I was confused and half listening to her explanation. In the middle of the call, I heard a knock and my son opening the door to our apartment. He asked me to come over to the door.

I looked and was expecting a tiny lizard. Instead, I saw a large lizard in his hand. It was calm. It did not move.

On the phone, I explained to the lady that my son had just arrived. She stated that she would give him a pass to his World History class seeing that he left during the middle of it. I then listened to my son as he explained the story. It was an interesting one.

My son first saw the lizard in the school courtyard. People were all around and the lizard was scrambling along the floor in between the students. He saw a girl avoiding it and wondered what she was avoiding.

My son was curious and followed the lizard to a corner and managed to somehow grab it. He walked through the hall with the lizard in his hand. He then carried it first to his English class and then to his World History class. A total of about one and a half hours.

‘Is this your home pet?’, the teacher asked.

‘No’, he answered, but he later wished he had said ‘yes’.

Students came up to him to pet the lizard. My son tried to have him drink water by pouring water on his desk. Just a tiny puddle. But the lizard wouldn’t drink it. A girl next to my son gave him a list of foods to feed the lizard.

‘You have to let it go’, the teacher stated. My son said that he wanted to release him in a safe environment. So, he walked home to first show me the lizard and then to release him in an area by some trees.

I was glad that my son’s intentions stemmed from a good place as he freed the lizard and then walked back to school for his last class of the day.