Soul Mates (English) (Boyxboy)

Chapter 4

Dan heard the front door closing and cringed on the couch. Why now? 'Quickly, smile,' he thought, wiping that single tear off his scratched cheek. The salty water and the rough sensation of his thick wool sweater's sleeve made the light wound get crimson and burn, even if there was no blood sprouting from it.

His father walked along the hall without looking at him, distracted on his thoughts. He seemed stressed and really tired, as always his team had lost a game. In the end, Basketball was all in his life, over his lovely wife, over his health, his personal problems and even over the air he breathed but never over his only child. It was true he was quite disgusted because Dan wasn't part of his world on the court, nevertheless he loved him anyways.

"Good night, dad," Dan called, making him jump.

"Dan! Sorry, I didn't see you. Good night," the man answered, walking back over his steps and leaning on the couch. He immediately noticed the injuries on his son's face.

"What happened?"

"Oh, just a memory of today's hail. It's really nothing." The boy moved away the hand that was already inspecting on his sore skin.

"Do you want ice for that?"

"It was ice what caused it."

His father frowned. "Don't discuss me, youngster. Does it hurt?"

"A bit," he decided to say after a moment. He couldn't lie to his father, not about this when he was already lying to him since two years ago; because James Henson never heard about such a thing like his son was being molested, and that was how things should continue being, even now everything was over.

The man gave him some ice cubes packed into a towel and told him to eat something before going upstairs and just never comeback until next morning. Dan never knew how to feel about his father. He loved him, and always tried to be kind to him, but the man never spent too much time in home, so there was always a little vacuum on the boy's heart impossible to fill.

The tears mixed with melted ice fell over his knees.

Why was he so depressed? He remembered sitting down on the couch that afternoon to read when, suddenly, he found himself wiping teardrops off the pages. He felt confused, he felt angry, he felt weak. A single word was about to escape out of his lips, and he made a terrible effort to keep it in, even if that brought suffering and pain to his beating heart. He was aware that if he allowed himself to pronounce that word, that name, he would never be able to stop himself. Because that meant pushing his whole life on something silly enough to be rational, like destiny, throwing everything over his shoulder and hope for it to fall on the right place.

"This can't be..."

His cheek was red. No matter how much he waited for it to warm up again, it was frozen, thought, red. His face didn't ache anymore but his chest felt like bleeding. The boy's will was weak; the shield had already been cracked. With empty lungs, he gave up and vocalized the word silently, letting his tongue slide softly along vowels and consonants, whispering his name when no one could hear it.

'...Eric...'

Mourn no more, he fell asleep on the couch.

Dan woke up in the middle of the night with a terrible pain on his back and neck. He picked up his cracked glasses from the floor, then, made his way through the gloomy house to his room. Without turning on any light, he changed into his pajamas and got inside the covers of the bed. As soon as he felt the softness of the pillow against his hurt cheek, he slipped his hand under it, looking for more comfort, yet what he found was the unwanted paper the librarian had sent to him. Resigned, the boy dreamt while clinging the sheet against his chest.