“Mom!...Mom!....MOM!”, crying out in terror and fear as his body is shaking viciously and sweating profusely. The bedroom light turns on with his mother rushing in tending to his side, “It’s okay, it’s okay, I’m here, I’m here sweetie,” her voice gently saying in grief as she holds her son’s head dear to her shoulder, “It’s a bad dream, just a dream, a dream,” she says one last time. Her child is now starting to calm down and breathing heavily, but slow. His mother is looking into her son’s eyes as she leans him back and wipes away the tear drop from his eye. “It’s just a dream. You had a bad dream that’s all it was.” She places her child back in bed and lifts the sheets to cover him. The child looks into her mother's eyes with his blue eyes and sandy blonde hair mocking a neat short feathered hair, “I wish dad was here.” he says with a higher tone to his voice as his cry started to turn into a light whimper.
“I know honey. That we just can’t do though.” She starts to shutter slightly as she begins to say, “I miss daddy also,” starting to cry slightly, “I wish he was here also.”
His mother now starts to ask as she seems to take her mind off of her husband, “Are you going to be okay,” as she holds back the tears.
Her son just shakes his head no.
“Okay.” As she walks to the lightswitch and turns it off, “I’ll stay in here tonight so you feel safe, is that alright?” she looks to see her son shaking his head yes this time.
The light shuts off turning to darkness as she closes the door and lays next to her son’s bed. His mother reaches her soft, warm hand out to her son’s hand and lays it on top feeling the warmth bond between them as her child has been suddenly sleeping lost away into the night.
Moving and feeling light, he can move anywhere freely in flight. He is at the top of the pyramids, at the London Tower, Empire State building, off the coast of Alaska. He is now home, sitting on his father’s lap who has black hair and an edgy face with dark stubble covering his cheeks and chin. The living room the child is in with sunlight pouring in showing some dust suspended in air as his father and him sit in the big, red fabric rocking chair. With a smile on the child’s face and his father looking like he is about to tell a story.
“Son,” he says with a bright and enduring voice, “let me tell you a quick story.” The father repositions himself in the chair and clears his throat. “When I was your age, I didn’t know what was right or wrong as my mother was usually gone working and my father was in another state working, so I was left home alone. That gave me a chance to sneak some of the chocolate powder in my mouth and place the bag back so it didn’t seem I got into it. Let me tell you son, I’ve never had anything more disgusting in my life. So when we are gone and you’re home alone, don’t eat the chocolate powder. You got that?”
The child shook his head yes as he reacted to his father making a crunching silly face showing what expression he did when he tasted the powder.
“Okay,” his father says, mentioning one more thing, “If mom isn’t here, don’t be afraid to take a muffin. She won’t know you took it, but only one. Don’t want to make it too suspicious. Okay?”
The boy responds with a nod.
Everything went dark for the child. Like he was in another world. A scarier one. It’s dark and cold, a small group around a garbage can with a fire in it underneath a bridge in the heart of a city it seems as buildings surround him forever reaching towards the horizon. Like a shanty town, it had tents and makeshift huts from tarp and rotting lumber and skids off to the side of the road and sidewalk. The boy walks slowly towards the group as they all turn and notice him. The shanty people are wearing jackets, hats and gloves as they wait to see what the little boy is doing. Darkness. The flash of darkness came back and he was brought back to his father, this time in the garage like at the child’s home.
“Son,” he says as he wipes sweat off his forehead with his arm holding a small tire iron in his hand, “I’m gonna show you how to pull off lug nuts the manly way.” The child looked confused at his father as he doesn’t know what is happening or how he got there. “What are you doing?” his father asks, gaining his son’s attention. The boy didn’t respond and went to his father who is crouching next to the tire. “See this here,” he says, explaining as he goes along, “these are lug nuts,” pointing to them, “you know those pit crews on NASCAR, with that big power drill like machine?” The boy shakes his head yes and his father says, “They use that because they are already men and don’t need to use this,” his father shows the tire iron. “This is what makes you into a man, okay? Use this, you’ll be in good shape for the future.” The boy’s father places the tire iron on a lug nut and turns it with a grunt coming out. “Here,” he says, moving away from the car, “you try turning this.” The child crouches down next to the tire and pulls on the tire iron with all his might. His father says as he then comes in with helping hands, “you gotta grunt otherwise it won’t budge.” His father gently pulls back with one hand above the child’s hand helping out as he grunts also with his son. When pulling back, they both fall back as the lug nut comes off with one turn. “Wow,” his father says, “you are already more manly than me and I’ve been trying to become one for 30 years now.”
Darkness. Again the darkness comes in a flash. The young child is back in the scary, cold place, the shanty town underneath the bridge. The people are closer and talking out loud, but aren’t talking to the young boy. They seem to be talking to someone else behind him. The boy turns around and sees a dark figure in the distance not too far on the sidewalk. The figure comes out to reveal itself as a person. In a suit and tie holding a briefcase. The man, tall, clean and stubble making a dark appearance on his face walks out looking just like the boy’s father. A flash begins and ends quickly. Darkness again.
The boy has reemerged into light and sees his father outside with a small football in what seems to be the backyard underneath the maple trees with red, brown and yellow leaves falling to the ground. “Come on son,” he yells out, “gotta show you something.” The boy looks back and sees his mother in the window waving to him. He waves back. He doesn’t seem that nervous now that he is used to the flashes and the change of scenery. The boy ran towards his father who looked just like the man that came from underneath the bridge. “Son,” he says with that familiar tone, “to be the coolest kid in school, not only do you need respect and responsibility, you also need to learn how to throw the perfect spiral.” The father holds up the small football. “Okay,” he says as he slaps the football in between his hands, “go back towards the tree and throw me the ball, show me what you got.” The young boy runs back towards the tree and stands underneath the descending foliage and looks into the window. His mother watched through the window waiting for him to throw the ball. “Son,” his father shouts towards him, “throw like they do on T.V. alright? Give it a try.” The boy holds up the ball on it’s side and throws the ball into the air. It vigorously wobbles in the air going about 15 feet until hitting the ground. “Good job.” says the father as he runs towards the ball and tosses it back towards him. “Try holding it on it’s side where the lacing is.” The boy holds the ball and also shows it waiting for his father's approval of the placement. “That’s good. Now throw it like you just did.” The young boy throws the ball with all his might, soaring in the air without a wobble and lands right in his father’s hands. Both father and mother were cheering as I just threw a spiral.
Darkness. All the boy sees is darkness until the fire crackled and the people came to view again. He turns around and she's the man who looks like his father coming out as the shanty people were yelling towards him, “You have any change you can spare?” The man who came closer walking underneath the bridge said in a tone the boy is familiar with, “I don’t have any change on me, sorry.” The people who were once around the garbage can fire now started to walk towards the dressed man. Darkness. All it is, is darkness.
The light came suddenly and showed that the boy was at the kitchen counter staring at a book. His father came in giving him a pat on the back, “what ya reading son?”
The young boy picks up the book and shows him the cover as his father walks towards the fridge. “Harold and The Dragon,” his father responds, “Is there a dragon in there or did the book title lie?” The young boy shook his head yes. “Cool.” his father said shaking his head in delight. His father opened the fridge and crouched down looking inside and staring, “Hmm,” his father said as he closed the fridge door, “looks like we are gonna have to go grocery shopping. But that doesn’t sound like fun doesn’t it?” He looked at the young boy waiting for his response. The child shook his head no in disgust. “Yeah, that’s what I thought.” His father then says, “Would it be fun if we got ice cream on the way back though?” The boy shook his head yes in enjoyment with big eyes and a big smile. The father says in excitement and joy “Yeah, lets go do that. Get your shoes and coat and get out of here. Oh, and don’t tell mom. She doesn’t have to know about this or do you think she deserves one?” Looking back at his son when he opened the door to the outside that is just white out there. The boy shook his head yes. “She does?” his father says in a fun way, “let’s get her a small cone though right? Then we can have large ones.” The boy again shook his head as he zipped on his jacket. “That’s what I thought. Remember, don’t tell mom. Otherwise I get in trouble though and you don’t.” The boy laughs and his father chimes in on it, “Yeah, good for you, but not for me. I’ll be sleeping on the couch. Can you believe that, sleeping on the couch because she got small when we got large.” The boy laughs again. “Yeah,” his father says as the boy exited out the door into the white blank space, “wait till it happens to you.” and the door shuts leaving only darkness.
This time faster, the people surrounding the fire are now visual and are walking towards the man passing by me briskly. When the man reached closer, the boy realized that it was his father. Only in his work suit as the young child has barely seen ever. The boy never knew his father had to walk through this part of a town. The shantiers are closing in on him. The father shouts back, “what are you doing? Hey, stay back!” His shout echoed into the night going underneath the bridge. The shantiers now hunt down the boy’s father as he turns around and starts to run. But, there was another person right in front of him as he turned away from the shantiers. The boy’s father hunched over as the person in front of him reached his arm out towards the father’s stomach. The young boy rushed to his father, but just as he was about to reach him, darkness fell upon him and made the boy lose sight of his father and everything else.
The light came again showing a bathroom with the young boy in there with his father and mother. Father said, “Hold still. This is gonna hurt, but hold still.” The young boy had a dislocated shoulder and father knew best what to do. The boy has seen his father do more damage to himself than a bird flying into a clean window.
“Wait,” the boy’s mother said, “open your mouth,” as she grieved about the idea father has made
The boy did as told and had a rag put into his mouth to muffle the scream.
“Okay, this isn’t that bad, this is very minor,” his father said surely, “little swelling, little difference in shape, you won’t feel a-” He shifted his son's arm spontaneously and the problem was solved. The boy was in pain, but didn’t show it as he looked at his mother and father in awe as to how the problem was solved. He looked at his arm that didn’t look like it was even hurt at all. The young boy’s mother left the room in relief nothing bad did happen while still muttering in anger as to that her husband wouldn’t have a doctor look at it to see if it was broken.
“Son,” his father said, “when you are in pain, physical or emotional, know someone is going to be there to help you. Never will you be alone and never at this time will I leave you or your mother when either of you are hurt. Okay?”
The boy nodded his head yes.
Darkness. Mother and Father are gone and he is back at the bridge. He sees again his father hunched over as the person standing there with their arm out into his stomach retracted it back holding something in their hand and ran away. The young boy rushes over to see his father laying on the ground with suit on and briefcase near. His father spoke to him, as if he could see his son, “don’t forget, I’ll be there always. I will never leave you when you are hurt. Your mother, you, I won’t leave.” The boy’s father was holding his hand over his stomach and lifted it up. A red stain was growing larger and larger by the second on his clothes. When the boy looked around to see what was happening in his surroundings, everyone was gone and no sound was made nearby. His father again says something. “Don’t be afraid. Don’t be sad. I will always be there.” His father breathing heavily, reaches out towards his son’s heart, “I’ll be inside there. No matter what, no matter when, I’ll be inside there.” His father now lets his arm drop as he lays on the ground, with the red stain now overflowing hitting the ground. With one last breath, his father says in light breathing as in exhaustion, “never will I leave you.” The father’s eyes grow loud and then silent as his lungs take its last breath and the red stain now pools like a puddle on tile.
Darkness comes and the boy wakes up in the night as his mother lays on the floor sleeping still with her soft, warm hand on his hand. The boy then wakes up mother with whispers out loud,
“Mom,... Mom.”
“What, what is it?” as she tries to come to reality still having her hand on top.
“I saw dad.” he whispers joyfully.
“What?” she says as if she didn’t realize what he said at first.
“I saw dad.” he says one more time with joy in his voice and eyes.
“No honey, daddy is gone.” she says with no emotion.
“Here’s here with us. Right now.” trying to convince his mother.
“What do you mean he’s here?” Mother says now coming together.
“He’s here?” The boy says again.
“Well, where?” His mother asks, trying to follow along.
The boy responds, “He’s holding our hands.”
Author Notes: Please rank and comment on this story. Tell me what was good, bad, right or wrong (first time trying something of this nature). This story ties in with Queensryche's "Silent Lucidity". Much Love. Keep on Rockin'
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United States • 21 years old