[Twice Featured Noteworthy Novel & Staff Pick on Tapas.io] ✔
[Previously featured on Tapas.io's LGBTQ+ Community collection] ✔
One night. That was all it took for Senn Reyes' life to change drastically--and permanently.
Senn Reyes is a seventeen-y...
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Monday
Senn hadn't expected Elio to find him in the treehouse, but yet there he was; about an hour—and a whole lot of whiskey—later, climbing the ladder to look for him. Elio seemed pretty... cute with his hair a bit disheveled by the wind, his eyes staring at him with worry from the moment they became visible.
Senn turned away from him again, staring out over the meadow towards the river that was hidden behind thick bushes and a lot of trees; but audibly present anyway. It was soothing to just sit and listen to the river rushing past their town, nothing holding it back from continuing it's path out to the ocean, miles and miles away.
"That question was really insensitive, and I don't think Mr. Weaver realized it when he asked—"
"I don't care, he was a dick," Senn muttered, cutting Elio's weird form of apology on behalf of Mr. Weaver short.
"If it makes you feel better, he asked Lucas to go look for you to make sure you were okay."
"It doesn't," Senn gave him an honest answer. "Because I still feel shit as hell, because I'm sick and tired of being reminded of what happened to my parents and Liam every goddamn minute, of every goddamn day. Or the fact I can't fucking remember anything from the months before that fucked up accident."
"Didn't you write that down?"
"No, Elio, I did not. How do you expect me to write memories down that I can't remember?"
"I meant; you have that notebook... I thought..." Elio sighed, sitting down next to him. "Never mind. They're only memories from your time in hospital, right?"
Senn nodded in response, and for a while, they just sat in silence, sipping from the bottle of whiskey together. Senn observed Elio while he was staring into the distance, wondering what was going through his mind whenever they were silent. What was going through his mind when he was laying in bed at night, by himself?
He wondered if Elio thought about his mom as much as he thought about his own parents, or Liam for that matter. Did Elio too try to savor every memory he had of her?
"Are they ever going to fade?" Senn eventually asked, even though he had no idea if Elio was thinking back of good memories.
"What?"
"The memories I have of them. I..." Senn swallowed, trying to blink back tears that threatened to spill, thinking about the possibility of losing more memories over time. "I'm really scared that the memories I do have will fade with time. I already have a hard time remembering as much as I want. Like how the house smelled whenever mom was cooking one of her delicious dishes. Or how it sounded when Liam was laughing or making crashing sounds whenever he was playing with his toy cars. Or dad's singing whenever he was cleaning up after dinner."
Elio took in a sharp breath, shrugging a shoulder. "Sadly, they do."
"I hoped you'd give me some comforting answer that would make me feel better."
