Work Text:
“Look at me,” the teen pleas, staring at the man holding his mother’s hand.
“LOOK AT ME!” He yells, but it does little good.
His father does not stir, does not move from the spot on the floor where he kneels next to the teen’s mother as tears stream down her face. She is staring off into the distance, past him, past her son, as she spends some time in her own little world. The young man stands back from the mess, hands in fists at his sides, taking in the turmoil. He can always get his mother’s attention at first. And usually, she is happy to see him. But sometimes she isn’t. And when she’s not…bad things happen to her. The teen doesn’t want to cause her pain, but he has nowhere to go. Every time she thinks about the wonderful boy he could be, he’s there to be that boy.
And yet, his father never sees him. Never talks about him if he can help it. The teen wonders if he finds it easy to forget his own son. And it makes him angry, so angry, because he didn’t ask to die. In fact, he certainly doesn’t feel dead. It’s not fair.
The teen lurks in the shadows again. If his father would just say his name, if his mother could just let him go, he might be able to move on. But his father won’t see him and his mother won’t stop looking for him. So he will continue to play the fucked up game they’ve been playing for as long as he can remember.