The day was perfect. The sky was blue and deep like the depths of a human eye. The sun was too blinding to look at and the clouds vacationed elsewhere. Beneath the perfect skies, there lay perfect little neighborhoods, where the good children ran about with only a care for lunchtime and lemonade.
"Pleasant isn't it." A wife said to her husband lazily, they relaxed in the haze the sun's warmth brought. Her husband, white skin reddened from his countless hours spent outside, grunted in response.
"It'd be nicer if everyone came out to enjoy today." The wife said again, throwing her husband a pointed look. This time he shifted from his original position and glanced over. Upon seeing her look, he looked away again.
"Don't you bother that boy any more than you have to." The husband said.
"Kendrick." The wife pushed.
"Rosemary." Kendrick replied in an equivalent tone of voice. They shared a silent argument for a moment before turning back to their respected positions. Another minute of silence passed.
"All I'm saying is, it's never nice like this and maybe some sunshine would be good for him." Rosemary burst out on que.
"Fine, if you really want him out here so bad, with the little neighborhood kids may I add, then go get him. But I don't know what you expect him to do, throw a football?" Kendrick asked rhetorically.
"Maybe he'd like that." Rosemary countered quietly.
No, I wouldn't. A young man thought to himself. He was watching the driveway where Rosemary and Kendrick sat, and eavesdropping through a cracked window. A skill he learned to use whenever adults talked to quietly for him to hear, and he knew it was about him.
He knew Rosemary would win this argument though, she always did. It'd be a few minutes before she got herself off that lawn chair and into the house to fetch him.
It wasn't that Damion didn't want to go outside, his fingers were pressed up against the window practically absorbing sunlight, and his eyes were closed in pleasure as the rays leaked onto his face. Once, every now and then, they would open to drink in that beautiful blue sky.
No, he yearned to go outside with every fiber in his very cold body. But his contempt for this so-called perfectness around him kept him glued to the spot by the window instead. He didn't want to go outside, pretend to throw around a football like a dad and his kid, catch bugs with the children like they were his siblings, get Rosemary her sunhat and protect her like a son doing good for a mother. He didn't want to participate in this perfect place because it wasn't his perfect place.
Damion crashed the Rosemary/Kendrick/Rory show late. Even though Rosemary smiled at him, it wasn't the same as when your mother smiled at you. A real mothers smile holds power and sticks in your memory like it's been bolted to the grounds of your brain.
Even though Kendrick would clap him on the back and say 'atta boy', Damion didn't care when Kendrick was proud of him, it didn't fill him with the same sense of accomplishment. Even little Rory just wasn't as precious too him as a little brother might be. Damion didn't have fierce brotherly love for the child. Adoration, yes. But everyone adored Rory.
He just . . . didn't love the three of them.
Damion heard the door open and jumped off the windowsill.
"Damion!" Rosemary's thin voice penetrated to the upstairs. Damion didn't answer. Instead he made his way down their two flight of stairs and came to a floppy halt in front of Rosemary.
YOU ARE READING
The Angel On My Shoulder
General FictionThe world stole both of his perfect parents away from him, and for what? Disease and alcoholism. Now, approaching 18, Damion can't wait for his hellish foster childhood to finally be over. He plans to escape with his best friend Steph, with dreams o...
