No safe place

My should have started kindergarten yesterday-er and my second grader.

The last two days, which have been the first two days of 2nd grade for my oldest have been Hell plain and simple. He has always struggled with anxiety. He has always wanted to be perfect.
Over and over again people tell me about their little worrier trying to reassure me that all kids go through this. The doctor thinks a therapist and maybe medicine will help. Is there pill for paradise lost? Can I have a dose, too?
I watch him writhe in his chair at lunch. 
More than anything I wish I could lift the burden that reality is that slumps his shoulders and droops the corners of his mouth. Worry is etched in his every angle and I try not to think of people, adults who have crumbled under less.
We truly take for granted the foundation that security gives us. The profound ignorance of our mortality becoming the basis of our ease. An ease my 7 year old can no longer enjoy. 
When Ben died his perfectionist characteristics obsessed over what the cause was. "Did Ben die because he wouldn't take his medicine to make him better?" "Did Ben die because he didn't wash his hands?" Round and round his mind went clinging to an idea and then rejecting it and then clinging to it again. Desperately searching for a way to keep himself and his family safe. 
That was last year. 
Now here we are. 
Our first time back at school since Ben's death and it is bringing us to our knees. 
Raised eyebrows every time I walk into the office. I know what they're thinking. I worked in school for years. I am amazed now at how judgmental I was then as I watch them smirk as I sign in and put on another visitor badge.  
He asked me to come have lunch with him again today. 
I'd give him Hope if I could. 
Instead I give him a juice box just like I used to back when that was enough. He smiles and relaxes for a second. Then he returns to his agitated stance. His eyes dart everywhere, frenzied. He talks to no one. Stands. Sits. Stands. Sits. Over and over. I sit down and strike up a conversation with the 2nd grader next to me about sharks. He slowly eats a few bites. Better than yesterday. Yesterday he ate half a cracker and stood up the whole time. Yesterday was worse. Soon the whole table is talking, "My cousin's dad wears make up!" "My brother is going to skip a grade." "I went to the beach and there were sharks!" "I saw on TV that sharks are attacking lots of people right now." My son stops darting his eyes around long enough to comment to me how the large majority of sharks are not that dangerous. Victory in my book! We are headed in the right direction! He may not have spoken to someone else but he spoke in their presence. My son is not shy, he is anxious. He is afraid to say the wrong thing or do the wrong thing.
I wish I could lie to him. 
I wish life wasn't so hard at 7. 
Mine wasn't. 
He came home more upbeat than yesterday but tonight cried himself to sleep again. Isn't there some better way to fix a broken heart? If only there was a corner of the world or of our hearts that didn't remind us that we are empty. If only it wasn't such a long way home. 
He wants Heaven. 
I will bring him a juice box instead everyday until the World ends and becomes a safe place for him again. Its the least I can do since I failed so much sooner than most at keeping his world safe and his heart whole. Let the office staff think what they will. I will be his 20 minute oasis that helps him make it to the end of the day. I am his mama. And a mama is shelter when there is no safe place and even when her own heart can't take much more. And I can't take much more.