Long Division and Fernando the Overly Adventurous

I was headed back into the bedroom this morning to get dressed for work when I happened to glance over at the fish tank, and there, to my dismay, was Fernie lying stiff as a board on the floor. A quick survey of the scene revealed that sometime during the night he must have had one of his freak outs and knocked the lid straight off the aquarium, landing himself squarely on cold hard floor. I rushed to his side and attempted to perform CPR. And by CPR, I mean that I picked him up and for lack of anything better to do, I dropped his cold stiff form down into the fish tank. And low and behold, he wasn't quite dead. At first, I couldn't be sure if the movement I detected in his gills wasn't just caused by the water circulating in the tank, but eventually, I was sure that there was still just a tiny bit of life in him. Unfortunately, I'm still not sure if he's going to make it. As I said, he was stiff as a board when I dropped him in, and he actually ended up on his back in the tank. I propped him upright so at least he was oriented correctly. Since that point, he has started working his gills much more normally, but he's laying on his side on the bottom of the tank and almost appears to be growing fungus. He might just have been a little too adventurous this morning.
Daulton is a little overwhelming. Since discovering his connection to Anna, he's wanted to come over and say hello to her, first thing every morning. He's obsessed with the animals, calls Edith "the rat," thinks Chief is a girl, and is terrified the cats will bite him. And the whole time, he just keeps talking.
We had agreed to take Daulton fishing tomorrow, but we learned that he was grounded by his father. As I understand it, Daulton actually reported (falsely-I hope) his father for abuse, which brought a visit from Child Protective Services. That seems to be the biggest thing he did to precipitate this grounding, though apparently he's also been lying and stealing and has stopped taking his medication.
In light of all of this (not to mention the whole reason he's in the Restart program), Anna and I have been discussing just how much we should trust the kid. We're both of the opinion that we should trust him, within reason, until he gives us a reason not to. But the key to that might just be the "within reason." The last couple days Daulton has only wanted to use the bathroom in our apartment. It occurred to me a little too late the first time that he might be looking to steal pills or something. Fortunately, Anna and I aren't old people yet and don't have any drugs worth stealing, but I'm definitely not going to let Daulton alone into a resident's apartment. I guarantee there's some big bucks lying in some of those medicine cabinets.
Without being overly picky, I can't give Daulton enough work to occupy him the three hours he's here. Should he get himself into trouble with us, I will get overly picky and make sure he works constantly, but as for now, I think this may be a good thing. Today, this allowed me to help Daulton with his math homework. First of all, he's doing long division. He's fourteen and a freshmen in high school. When did you do long division? He told me his dad can't help him with it, and from the sounds of it, his teacher is pretty indifferent, so I might be his only chance to actually learn it correctly. He was showing me his homework today and said that the teacher's instructions were to round to the nearest hundredth. I looked at the two problems that the teacher had done for him as examples. Neither were right. In both cases, the teacher should have rounded the last digit up, but he didn't. This worries me greatly. I started checking Daulton's answers. He didn't have a single one right. So I started watching him as he worked on them. He's actually really good at the basic arithmetic, but he has a huge problem working out what happens once he gets to the decimal place. I don't think he's stupid, at all. I get the sense that at some point, amid all the turmoil of his childhood, he struggled in math, and that caused the school system to dramatically hold him back on the math front. And once he in those remedial classes, he probably ran into teachers who just didn't care. I've seen kids who just can't get it. Daulton can get it. I just don't think he's been taught how to get it. And the thing is, he actually seemed really glad I was helping him with it. It's depressing.
Bobbie came by today for more quarters. She wanted twenty dollars worth of quarters to "finish up [her] warshin'." Now, I was being facetious when I said that I thinks she spends as much money on "warshin'" as Katie and George do on cigarettes, but in all honesty, she must stop by at least once a week asking for quarters. I know I've given her at least fourty dollars worth this month alone. That's twenty loads of laundry washed and dried. For one old lady. And she always says she's "finishing up." Does she ever get finished? If she does finish, does that just mark when she starts again? I really don't know. I don't know if she's crazy or she really does that many loads of laundry. I'm leaning towards crazy. Karen told me that she thinks Bobbie's got some form of dementia. Her family denies it, but clearly, she's not right. She comes by and tells me the same thing every day. Today she asked me twice in a row if the "mail has run yet." I don't know. It worries me that her family doesn't seem to think anything is wrong. Most of these people have someone to check in on them, but she seems to be losing it all on her lonesome.
I'm getting kind of hungry. I might go eat something. Hopefully that will remedy the situation.