[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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Wednesday
Senn had spent his entire Tuesday evening over at Elio's, after dinner with Tessa and Dean had been extremely awkward and made him think back of old days. Elio had even allowed him to change his entire room to put every piece of furniture in the same spot Senn had them in when it was still his room. The desk was now back in front of a window, and the bed was back against the opposite wall, offering a view through the windows on the other side of the room. The TV was back in place, and Elio—after Senn had described it—had agreed he needed a sofa to sit on and play games, instead of sitting on his bed.
After they were done, and Senn lay down on the bed, staring out of the window, he felt at peace for a little while. Elio had allowed him to lay there in silence, not wanting to break the bubble Senn was in.
It wasn't enough to vividly remember fading memories. The room was still simply too different, and Elio's family made completely different noise. There were no sounds like Liam made, simply because there was no toddler running around the house hyper and happy, from room to room to show everyone whatever it was he discovered.
There were no sounds of a woman singing, or his dad's muttering voice, asking questions to a magic 8-ball. There were little sounds in the house at all.
Elio's father had been out, and even though Elio had 4 siblings, only one of them still lived at home permanently. Elena, which was the sister who still lived at home and used Killian's old room, had been studying.
Senn only knew that because over the course of the evening she had come over three times to ask them to be quieter while moving around furniture.
But spending an evening there, trying to remember as much as he possibly could of happier times, caused him to feel homesick so badly, that he couldn't get himself out of bed in the morning. He couldn't get out, face the world, and pretend he was fine. He lacked the motivation to put on a mask that day.
Tessa had repeatedly tried to get him out of bed. At first she was friendly, then she got annoyed because he was running late, and eventually she got angry because she wouldn't allow him to skip an entire day of school while he hardly had been in school for an entire day so far.
But all throughout her pleads, her angry words, her sighs, Senn stayed in bed and didn't reply to any of it, rather trying to sleep some more because he felt like he hadn't had a decent night of sleep in for ever.
Tessa had evidently gave up, and called him in sick.
Until around noon, Senn actually believed she was just going to let him be. That she had actually left for work and wouldn't be home until later that day, giving him the entire house to himself. A house he hated but offered him some privacy—and apparently some alone time.
But before he had gotten out of bed to grab snacks and a drink, the door to his room opened and Tessa walked in with exactly what he wanted. As if his prayers had been heard, she walked in with cookies and two big glasses of fruit juice.
