Charlotte's Law

"Maybe, just maybe, he could come to terms."

Camden woke up with a headache the size of Landyn's family home. He groaned and rolled over, squinting his eyes shut against the piercing light.

"Up already?" Landyn's voice sounded amused, but Camden simply grunted in response. "Don't mind me, just enjoying my afternoon tea."

"Afternoon?" Camden asked, sitting up straight slowly and clutching his head. The gauze was wrapped tightly.

"Yeah, you slept pretty well," Landyn shrugged. "It's been three days."

"What?" Camden exclaimed, his eyes wide in panic.

"Kidding," Landyn rolled his eyes and sipped at his tea. His hair was perfectly messy from sleep and he had bags under his eyes.

"You look awful," Camden noted.

"I could say the same to you, mate," Landyn said, indicating the gauze and the large, hand-shaped bruise on Camden's cheek.

Camden laughed bitterly and wiped his hand across his mouth, which was swollen. "Yeah, whatever. I 'ave to check me gauze."

"Oh, don't worry about that," Landyn waved it off. "I changed it earlier. You were still asleep."

Camden raised an eyebrow, but decided not to question it. Landyn stood up and started walking toward the door, and such a startling fear rose up in Camden that he launched himself forward, his eyes wide and his headache much forgotten for the moment. He caught Landyn by the fabric of his shirt, stopping him in his tracks.

"Yes?" he asked, turning to the reddened boy. Camden gulped and opened his mouth to respond, but found he hadn't a clue how.

He didn't know what had made him so afraid in that moment, that had made him stop Landyn from leaving. He found that he really just couldn't bare the thought of being alone at present.

"Will you read to me?" Camden asked finally, meeting the younger boy's eyes innocently.

In that moment, Camden's eyes shined so brightly and innocently and like a scared child's that Landyn wouldn't have dared refuse him, and realized that he wouldn't have wanted to.

And so he read to him all afternoon, and checked his gauze for him every few hours, and even brought him a tray of food round three.

~~**~~

Camden felt a lot better the next morning when he awoke. He and Landyn had stayed up rather late, looking at one of Landyn's picture books and laughing about all the ridiculous adventures and decisions the characters had made. He looked over at Landyn's bed to see that the small boy was still fast asleep, and so was Finnly (who spent most of his time either asleep or reading, really).

Camden stood up a bit shakily and stumbled to the bathroom. He checked his gauze and decided it'd be fine if he simply left it off now. He couldn't even see the cut on his head, though it was probably just covered by hair, and he no longer felt dizzy or nauseous when he moved his head too fast. It still hurt a bit, but his mother had always said a little hurt does one good from time to time.

Camden shook the thought from his head and left the bathroom. It made him sad to think about his family now. He hadn't expected them to accept it, but he hadn't expected them to react the worst out of all the other families there. No other fathers had reprimanded their children like that, without remorse. He began to think that maybe it wasn't normal for a father to beat his children, at least not in the rich world. He had always thought it was just what happened, since it was all he'd been exposed to. Now he supposed that maybe he'd been wrong, and that maybe, just maybe, his father wasn't a very good person at all.