The End of the Son

For some reason, I decided to take my child to a park. I knew it seemed a bad idea… that this fall was very chilly, but something kept telling me to do it…

We sat on a bench. We were under the shadow of an immense tree… and my child’s eyes glowed with relief. A faint smile appeared on that worn out face and I think that I heard a soft whisper.

I felt the tension on my chest slowly disappearing, even more than when the kid first appeared. And a soft smell, like incense, drifted in the air…

After coughing a little… My child hummed my silly song… I hummed with him, I think he smiled when I did... but a sharp pain silenced him. He clutched his chest, his face wincing with agony... He stopped singing and returned to his usual, distant self, shuddering after the episode.

After some awkward moments, my little child broke our silence... "Why?" He said, his voice hoarse from so much coughing. "Because I... don't want it to happen again." I replied, trying my hardest to not cry. The little one started distancing from me when I said that... tears bubbling in his little gray eyes... "Me too" He said as he tried to gather strength... but the pain was too much for him.

I didn't feel the chains on my chest anymore... but I still felt hurt... For a minute, I was tempted to leave the kid there and actually, I nearly did. The kid was expecting it... he wiped his tears and a particularly powerful coughing fit overtook him. I felt ice crawling inside my veins as I went farther from the bench... as I walked away, I started to forget... and for a minute... I dismissed my own flesh and blood as just another hobo kid.

But there was this pain, this grief, as if I failed at something... I saw my child, he was crying... I realized that I failed... After some minutes, the cold faded away... and I remembered my little soldier... There was a soft weep in the cold air, as well as a smell of tobacco, neither disgusting but not too pleasant... and I rushed to my child, like any concerned father would do.

My little one was getting tired... I sat on the bench and he leaned closer to me, eventually falling asleep on my arm. I could hear a faint "thank you" coming from somewhere... and I noted that the incense, the tobacco... even the cold... were gone. There was sadness in the air, not grief... only sadness. I didn't know from where it came... but I felt pathetic... impotent... and the chains returned.

“His name was Tim” A voice told me…

Tim was fast asleep… he was so tired… the little tree branch scratching his face didn’t trigger any reaction. It was getting cold, so I took my jacket and gave it to him… little kids shouldn’t be cold…

“I know you were hurt… by someone else… I see it by the way you carried yourself… if you had let me… here’s what I’d do… I’d take care of you… I also have lost…”

I know he listened… even when it has been one hour since he fell asleep.