XAVIER

We lost our second child today. With so many others still around clamoring for attention you wouldn’t think that one less would make that big a difference, but it does. His name was Xavier, and he came into my world just a few months ago. There were complications from the beginning. He wasn’t like the others. He arrived late. He never cried, but he rarely smiled either.

Xavier came into our fourth grade class as a transfer student from another school. He was a handful. He didn’t want to work and rarely finished anything. He was disruptive and easily distracted. He would have been a challenge for anyone. But I was a new teacher and he’d already found out how to push my buttons to maximum effect.

Yesterday, I found out why he’d been absent the past few days. His parents had moved unexpectedly. Sure there are worse fates than moving. It happens every day. But this is his third school this year - and it’s only November. How many other schools has he been in so far? I can’t say because his files have gotten lost somewhere along the way.

This afternoon while I sat quietly congratulating myself for another successful day, I had one of my students empty Xavier’s desk. Jammed in it among textbooks and notebooks and a book about Dracula we found his most recent library book. It was called “Alexander; Who’s Not (Do You Hear Me? I Mean It!) Going To Move!” It was happening to him again.

While I had been silently grateful for having one less body in our already overcrowded classroom and one less mind to feed, his life was being boxed up again. One less student will make my job easier. One less student means I can devote more time to everyone else. But what about Xavier? It was a struggle having him. But I never got to know him. All I know is that he loved WWF Wrestling and singing to the Temptations. A little boy moving again. Let’s hope he doesn’t get lost somewhere along the way.