It’s Koschei’s birthday!          

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 HIS BIRTHDAY PRESENT is one big box filled with all kinds of accessories and goodies; essentially an oversized care packaged, wrapped up neatly in gold wrapping paper (gabriel insisted, as he is the self-proclaimed “king of wrapping”). it has all of his favorite snacks, which may or may not be a subtle way of encouraging him to eat more. some very expensive jo malone cologne is also nestled in there, as well as a new laptop case because she can’t stand looking at the one he’s used so much he’s worn a hole in it. all this, and a velvet box, which contains a very tasteful watch, with an elegantly simple style that matches her own. rolex, of course. more significantly however, the watch is engraved with his initials: K.L.P. the same initials as her father. because all that time ago, she gave him her father’s middle name of “lucien”, in some small effort to start some kind of family tradition after her mother died. they are the initials on his adoption papers, and they are the initials that mark him as hers forever. a note in her familiar script reads sweetly.

          happy birthday, pup. i’m so grateful to have finally gotten the chance to see you grow. you make me so proud with each passing year, and even though you’re away at college putting everyone else to shame, you’re still, and always will be, my baby boy. love, mum.

The prodigy who’s finished his undergraduate theoretical astrophysics and engineering degrees in two years, and is now well into graduate school at the age of (as of today) 20, can be felled immediately by goodies from mum. Because mum is his hero. Mum is his model of greatness: merciless, ambitious CEO of the largest scientific corporation in the world.  And mum is just, well, the coolest.  

The years they spent separated by the circumstances of war were the worst of his life: survival in and out of psych wards and foster care homes that found his manifold mental health woes too great a challenge, on the streets becoming alarmingly proficient at major felonies, and constantly high.  Being rescued just after his seventeenth birthday those three Christmases ago, and reconciled to Dr. Pichiner … . he may never be able to articulate his gratitude.  He did try, just a few weeks ago, on her birthday.

Still, with eagerness, and a bit of greed, he opens the gold foil he recognizes as his adoptive father’s work.  He rolls his eyes good-naturedly.  Gabe’s grown on him.  Slowly.  Mostly because he’s so good to mum.  Even though he’s decidedly uncool.

He’s munching on some sweet and sour gummies while he opens the watch.  Dark clever eyes dart over the data provided: a Rolex like mum’s, with his initials.  He squints, and then his eyes widen with epiphany: has he ever learned his middle name?  Curiosity overcomes him and he hops up while distractedly reading the note. 

He dials Seraphina on his mobile. 

     “MUUUUUUUM!” he cajoles, when she answers, with the endearing entitlement of a child who has finally found a home in which asking for something, needing something, needing someone, is not a crime.  “What IS me middle name, ey?! Oh, and THANKS, it’s brilliant!  This cologne is WAY better than Dad’s!”