Their Prophecy

Tutor

Roused from her sleep by the sound of Eve's alarm, Analise rose from the bed and changed into a fresh pair of clothing which had been set aside in an organizer in the closet. Each pocket of the organizer was marked with a day of the week to keep everything more organized and, since it was Wednesday, her outfit was made up of jean shorts and a white blouse.

Her outfits, she'd noticed as the days had progressed, were of a finer quality than the other children. Adorned in frilly dresses, blouses, and brand new shoes, she saw that the other children wore regular t-shirts and pants that either seemed a size too big or one too small. "They're hand-me-downs," Eve had explained, leading her down the familiar corridor to her tutoring session. "They're clean and we try our best to make sure they fit them appropriately but the children often have to alternate clothing sizes because they grow fast. We usually start them at a size above their own and try to change out their designated clothing when it's visibly getting snug."

"Why do mine fit?" Ana wondered.

Eve smiled. "Because you have a sponsor."

A sponsor? "What does that mean?"

"Someone is providing the funds for your stay here," Eve explained.

Ana thought of her mom and dad, both of whom had been deeply upset when she'd had to go with her grandfather. "How long will I be staying here?" she wondered aloud, glancing up at the woman.

Eve's smile tightened a bit. "I'm not sure. Cliff will know the answer to that."

She thought of the dark-eyed man she'd been left in the care of, the one who had handled the controls of the helicopter they'd ridden in. They hadn't had the chance to talk much, not really. He'd asked her a few questions while up in the air and she'd told him a bit about how mom insisted that she wear shoes and dad often tossed her high in the sky. She rambled about how Unc didn't like being jump scared and Chieftain Brentik always had a very stern face, and told him matter-of-fact that the jaguar taught her lessons not found in a book and always took her swimming in the river. He'd listened to her go on and on about how much she liked to dance and how excited she was to be in the air, above everything just like a bird, and never changed the subject or shushed her. He also never said a word about himself.

All she knew was what mom had told her about him in the past. That he was kind and strong. But mom wasn't always the best judge of character, Ana knew. And she hadn't seen her grandfather since she'd been brought here.

As Ana took her designated seat, Eve turned to leave and Ana caught her hand. "Is Cliff a good person?"

Eve's smile was warm, authentic. "He is the best kind of person." There was something telling in the woman's expression, something that made Ana frown. How could she take the word of a woman who was obviously in love with him?

Left alone in the classroom, Ana tapped her feet, waiting impatiently for the tutor to arrive. He was late again. Tap, tap, tapping, she was unsurprised by how the teen bustled into the room, books tucked under his arm, panting as he slid into the seat across from her at the table. "Hello again," he said, pushing his glasses up on his nose. Glancing down at his notebook, he read off her name aloud, clearly having forgotten it. Again.

He had a thin face, some noteworthy acne. She didn't care how he looked, she just didn't like that he was late for every single tutoring session. She hadn't said anything the last few times but she felt the need to address it now. "You're late."

"And you're early," he stated briskly, rearranging his papers. His binder was a bit of a mess, the handwriting illegible.

"The early bird gets the worm." Mom had said that to Ana many times.

"But the second mouse gets the cheese," he rebutted distractedly.

Ana stared at him for a long moment, lips parted with shock as she thought about what he'd just said. "I've never heard that before," Ana grumbled. Had her mother gotten the saying wrong?

"I'm here to teach," the boy said, taking a seat. Then, glancing back at the name on the paper, he sighed. "Ana, right?"

"And you're Tim," Ana said, frowning. "How are you supposed to teach me if recalling a name is beyond you?"

"I've met ten new pupils this week. You'll have to be patient with me," was his unapologetic response. Slapping a packet down in front of her, he held out a pencil which she unhappily accepted from him. "Fill out what you can." He'd done this with every subject so far. Math, English, Science--today's topic of choice was History. Pulling out a laptop, she watched him start working diligently on some kind of wild-looking math problem and frowned at him. "Do you have a question about the test?" he wondered without looking up.

"How old are you?" she wondered, eying him curiously.

"Older than you," was his blunt reply.

Tim wasn't one to mince words, it seemed. He was a terrible conversationalist and Ana found herself wonder aloud something she deemed obvious: "How is filling out this packet going to teach me something?"

"That packet is meant to teach me something," he said poignantly, "about you."

Frowning, the girl didn't think she liked that answer. "Like what?"

"Like what grade level to start you at," he stated, even as his hands moved quickly over the keyboard. "So far you're all over the place. Fifth grade Math, tenth grade Science, graduate level English. At your age, you should just be learning your ABC's."

Humming, the girl began looking at the packet questions, frowning as she recognized many of them. "What if your answers are wrong?" she asked, stopping at one question in particular, one she knew the answer to and felt certain would be marked wrong even if she wrote it out.

"They aren't," the boy said with certainty.

Frowning, the girl flipped the page, stumbling into the same situation on another problem. "Would you like me to put the answer I know you're looking for or the one that is correct?" she asked, frowning down at the paper.

The boy finally looked up from his screen, making an inscrutable expression. "Both," he decided., "but make sure to mark which you deem correct as you go."

Ana flipped back to the front with a sigh, muttering, "Shouldn't that be obvious?" before starting on question one.