Peter didn’t even wait for the scenery to begin to fade before logging the hell out. His body, his real body, was tingling all over with the memory of pain. It faded quickly as he rolled out of the chair, expecting at any moment to be attacked by a wild mother.

Peter looked at the clock in the corner of his sight. Three pm. Ok, not as long as he feared but longer than he could have hoped for. He knew he had to go back to school tomorrow and had barely touched the homework that had been set. Determined to only risk one sort of punishment, he whipped the remaining food from the fridge, fetched the tablet from his bag, and sat down to the kitchen table to put greasy handprints all over the school property.

“Scratch that.” He thought, then changed his mind. “No, don’t scratch it, you’d have to pay for it.” Carefully wiping down the tablet and his hands with paper towel, he set about smashing out the maths problems the teacher had given him.

After a while his eyelids began drooping and his head was cradled in his hands. “This is soooo booooring. I can’t find X, and I don’t know Y. Maths teachers need to start solving their own problems.”

“You’re not as funny as you think you are. You get that from your dad.”

Peter screamed like a little girl and threw himself sideways from the table, banging his arm in the process. “Muuuum! You scared me!”

His mother finished closing the front door and helped him up gently. “Oh, my baby boy. I’m so sorry. Careful of the wound, we can’t afford to take you to the ER.” She inspected his work on the tablet. “At least you’re smarter than your father. If you’re going to be a smart ass, you have to remember to be smart, otherwise you’re just an ass.”

Peter grumbled, cradling his arm, but accepted the criticism. “I can’t figure out the last one though. I don’t know when I’m ever going to need quadratic equations, I’m hoping to be a writer when I finish school.”

His mother arched an eyebrow. “A writer is it now? Last month you were going to be a robopsychologist.”

Peter scowled. “Stupid AI, they can suck it. If they’re so smart they can solve their own problems too. They probably enjoy quadratic equations.”

“Peter,” the warning tone in her voice evident. “Language.”

Peter muttered an apology as he collected his things from the table, sweeping them all into his backpack and hanging it up on the rack by the front door. “Do I have to go to school tomorrow mum? I’ve got a sore arm and I still don’t feel well.”

Slowing her movement about the kitchen preparing dinner, his mother was obviously considering the question. “As much as I’d like to let you have this week off too, the school has to authorise the absence. You could go straight to the nurse in the morning and see if she’ll let you come home.”

Peter began setting the table, favouring his injured arm where possible. “Could you come with me then? That way if they let me come home I can?”

Peter’s mum knelt down and gave him a hug. “Oh honey, I wish I could. I have an appointment tomorrow at nine. If they let you come home, just grab the bus. I know your pass is good for a trip to and from there every day, no matter what time.”

Peter pouted, but then shrugged. She was right, even though it meant riding the robo-bus that had a vendetta against him. “Wow, it sounds crazy when you put it that way,” he thought to himself.

His father came home soon after, but after an perfunctory greeting to both mother and son retired to the lounge room to “work”. Peter peeked around the corner a few minutes later and saw he was spaced, somewhere in the virtual. He thumbed his nose at his presenteeist father. You couldn’t really call him an absent parent, since he was sitting two meters away, but he certainly wasn’t here either.

“Mum, how long is dinner?” Peter asked from the entrance to the hall.

“It’ll be about an hour in the oven. Have you finished your homework?”

Peter nodded emphatically.

His mother smiled. “Then you can go read, but set a timer. I know how you get with a good book.”

“Ok Mum,” he called, already disappearing down the hall.

In his room, Peter sat to his desk to look like he was doing something productive, set a timer as asked, and logged into the game.