The Iudex's day off

Short Story 4 - Happy birthday, my sweet child

Claude's long-awaited vision story!

Preparing tissues in advance is advised.

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Claude's POV

 As long as I could remember there were always rumors about me going around Meropide.

 At first, it was something along the lines of:

 Where was he from?

 Why is he here?

 He's so young. What could he possibly be in jail for?

 But these questions always came from the new inmates and soon they would find out the truth.

 Even I only found out about this after I turned 16. Only then did His Grace think that it was time to tell me.

 Apparently, my mother had gone to jail for killing my father during a psychotic episode.

 His Grace offered to show me the complete file, but I refused.

 I didn't feel the need to know.

 I had never known my biological mother anyway as she had passed away giving birth to me.

 After I was born there was talk about sending me to an orphanage or foster family on the surface.

 This, however, was delayed due to some matters I'm not aware of. It was delayed once and it was delayed again. Over and over again till almost two months had passed.

 It was around that time that a woman took me in and started taking care of me more than the other inmates could or wanted to.

 Her name was Nadine. A name that means hope, I later discovered.

 She was the one I would later call my mother.

 My name wasn't given by her.

 The inmates gave it to me long before I fell into her hands.

 Claude.

 It means lame.

 It was a way to make fun of a child who could not move one of their legs.

 But my mother cared not for those words.

 She raised me gently, guiding me as I slowly learned to walk as time passed by.

 I learned slower than normal, but low behold, by the age of three I was running around Meropide on my own, worrying my mother half to death for my safety.

 Fortunately for her, she didn't need to run after me all day. Many other inmates took it upon themselves to help her in keeping an eye on me.

 I was given much freedom. Too much perhaps, as it was this freedom that allowed me to overhear a certain conversation.

 "Well, that name didn't age well."

 "Which name?"

 "Claude, that brat. They named him Claude because they thought he would be lame when he grew, but look at that kid now, running around like there is no tomorrow."

 That day I went back to my mom crying. Sobbing about how my name meant something like that.

 It was then that she told me that while Claude might mean lame in one language, it means something different in another.

 Strong-willed, she said.

 She chuckled about how it was fitting. They called me lame but my strong will allowed that name to earn another meaning.