Picture Me & You- The Perfect Two

60. Beam (Part 1)

(This chapter will put some light on Beam's past, his whole life, his pain and his love for his dad and his brother. It may answer some of your questions or may give you more questions. I will do my best to fit it all in one chapter.

His story may seem a bit rushed here but to me, after all this boy has been through, he only deserves it

And as I've said before, I will not go into the details of the horror incidents that happened to Beam and Kao. I can not. So sorry in advance if the story felt incomplete or incoherent)

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He sat quietly on the bench, watching the little kids playing around the playground of the park, remembering the times he was just like that.

Little, happy, without a moment of worry, eating snacks and sweeties and chasing after Kao chasing cats and dogs and thinking that getting to hear a bedtime story from dad and eating his favorite ice cream and getting picked up or kissed first by dad was all that mattered and all that he needed.

His dad and his brother were all that he needed. He still thinks so but the times and the world around him has changed so drastically. His dad was no longer with him and he did not even have his name left with him and it was his fault. His baby brother was like this only because he left him behind. Only because he left him alone and unprotected. Again and again and again. He'd failed to protect his Kao. To protect himself, to protect his heart, to protect his dignity. He had failed everything.

Every single event that happened in his life... it all had done the job. It all turned him into who he was today, it all had killed him. Slowly, with each event, he'd died inside. Those events that still haunted his nights, that darkened his soul and soiled his sanity.

That day sixteen years ago when his mom left. He'd found a bandaged Kao crying so he just got himself on the bed and hugged his baby brother, till both wailed themselves to sleep. They were toddlers after all. They needed their mother. But even then he just needed his baby Kao to stop crying. It didn't even take them much time to forget the woman even existed. He had to grow up to find out that their mother left them to run away. But they did not care. Their dad and mom Lyla enough for them. They went back to the happy family they were, not even giving that woman enough worth to be remembered. But suffering wasn't quite done with him.

The day eleven years ago when he fell sick, so sick and dizzy and weak that he was in hospital for days, getting treatment after treatment and seeing his mom Lyla and dad heartbroken and gloomy and his baby brother always beside himself, wailing for him to get better and always stay by his side. Then one day grandpa Dean Vongviphan paid him a visit at the hospital and his dad sat by his side, kissing his head and tearing up and telling him he loved him the most in the whole world and that it would never change. That was when he found out his dad, the best and coolest dad in the world was not his dad. He'd cried his heart out in his dad's arms.

And though, his dad had patiently explained everything to him, though his dad's love and Kao's blind adoration for him never faltered, his life swung like a hurricane stroked. His whole life, his identity, his sense of belonging, though grandpa Dean genuinely loved him but the old man stole it all from him. He was deprived of the meaning of life. He was taken away from his home, from his friends, and his Kao. Though, he made new friends in Pha and Kit, it did not take him long to find out they were no Emma or Rome, that they were not those silly and loud and quirky kids he grew up with,

He was smart, too smart. And his dad was a great teacher. He kept his head down and his eyes and ears open, he became more and more refined in the art of staying invisible. And he often always succeeded. He managed to stir clear of the old conglomerates and the trophy wives and their talks and whispers that grandpa Dean did not seem to care for a bit. He managed to fight back the snake of a step mother who didn't lose a chance to jab at him and he dealt with the eyes of family and friends and whatnots of the Vongviphans as he was announced as the sole heir out of nowhere.