Prodigal

~2.7~

Dad came over and picked me up off the ground. He then carried me into my room where he put me on my bed. It wasn’t long before I passed out.

It was late morning before I woke up the next day. I heard my dad talking downstairs. I wasn’t ready to talk to him.

Thinking he was on the phone, I took a quick look in the kitchen from upstairs. His old bandmate Michael was with him in the kitchen. Dad looked like his eyes were big, red, and puffy. Had he been crying?

I quietly walked downstairs and put my back against the other side of one of the kitchen walls, next to the door frame.

“I don’t get why you’re so upset.” I heard Michael say.

“He’s my son.” I heard Dad say. “I raised him as a boy, I raised him to become a man, and now he wants to be a girl?”

“What if you had a daughter? Would you be this upset? Michael asked.

“I failed to raise my son.” Dad pointed out, defeated.

“Please.” Michael said. “You didn’t fail.”

“And what’s everyone else going to think?”

“Fuck what everyone else thinks.”

“I was so excited when I had a boy. I had a son. And now I’ve failed, and he’s broken because I failed him.”

How could my own dad say that about me? How could he say that about me? I was weeping, sobbing, and I covered my mouth to try and mask the sound the best I could. I slowly sunk down the wall until I was on the ground. I could feel my face turn red hot as I was crying.

Covering my mouth was no longer sufficient and I started to make sound. Dad and Michael walked into the dining room where I was, to find me. Dad’s eyes were slightly red, like he had been crying. He looked shocked.

“Emmett, I didn’t mean.”

I just fell over, lying on the ground, ready to drown in my own tears.

Notes