Letting Go (The Stray Kids Collection: Story #1) [AMBW] ✔️

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For most of his life, Felix didn't really understand why his family could've been considered dysfunctional.

His parents had good jobs. His mom worked as a professor for a local university and his father was in the IT department of good, well-paying company. Felix himself went to a nice school and was able to indulge in many extracurricular activities. They were living fine, better than fine really, and Felix always knew that.

So, he never questioned anything. Not his father working ridiculously long hours or missing his recitals or forgetting his birthday repeatedly. Not the smile he gave to his mother whenever he was home, the half drawn, distant one accompanied with bored eyes. Nothing ever made Felix think something was going on. But things never stay stagnant do they?

~~~

It was a regular afternoon for Felix. He'd reached the stretch of his walk from school where all his friends had already departed to their homes and Felix was simply soaking in the sun before making it back to his humble abode. While passing by a park on his way, Felix stopped suddenly as he noticed a man who looked oddly familiar.

The man was running around with some child, a boy, chasing him from below the jungle gym. The boy headed down the slide and the man caught him at the other end, laughing loudly. Felix was too far to hear them speak but could see the boy seemed defeated. A woman appeared by their side, ushering them over to a picnic table. That's when Felix finally got a better look at the man. He looked almost exactly like... his own father.

Felix watched them for longer and was almost certain the man was his dad. But, who were those people? Why did his dad look so happy with them? Happier than he had seen at home? The man started to turn his head in Felix's direction and Felix quickly began walking again, moving as far away from the scene as possible.

As he finished his trek home, Felix willed to himself that maybe it wasn't his dad, maybe it was just someone who looked very similar. Felix chanted this to himself like a mantra as his mother greeted him at the front door. And when they had dinner as just two for the millionth time, Felix suddenly realized his mantra had become a prayer.

For the next weeks, Felix stopped at the park to see if he would catch the trio again. He figured if he never saw them again then it wasn't real, it wasn't who he had thought it was and they were alright, his family was alright. They had to be.

~~~

A month had passed and Felix was confident what he saw was truly not what he thought. His father had come home quite a few days in between the incident and it felt normal again. They were in the clear. That is, until Felix saw the boy from before at the park again. He was sitting on the swings, swaying back and forth as other kids ran around to the other parts of the park. Before he could really recall what he was doing, Felix had made his way to the swings and was now seated beside the boy.

The kid looked over at Felix and tilted his head.

"You're too old to play here."

Felix didn't respond. The boy looked like him. He looked like Felix. That had to be a coincidence right? His eyes were so strikingly similar Felix had to look away.

"Are you a weirdo?"

"No, I'm not a weirdo," Felix finally said with a wearily chuckle.

"You act like a weirdo," the boy told him.

Felix shrugged.

"Are you sad?"

"What?"

The boy began to swing back and forth again while saying, "you look like you want to cry."