“That you only meant well? That’s it all for the best? And you decided this?” came her shrill yell from the other room.
He shuffled on the spot nervously.
“You don’t care a bit,” she whispered. “You don’t care a bit.” He heard her begin to cry. He hated hearing his mother cry.
“What the hell is going on?” his father yelled again. At her. To her. Because of her.
“No, you don’t care a bit.” He could hear the contempt in her voice. The hate that was spilling out after years of neglect. The neglect that he’d had to witness and bear the weight of.
“The dust has only just begun to fall,” she spat at him again as she grabbed her bag. The little boy closed his eyes; held his hands against his ears. “You won’t catch me around here.”
The little boy watched as his mother walked down the hall.
“I don’t believe you.” His father said. A moment passed. She didn’t turn around. “I DON ’T BELIEVE YOU !”
He watched his father break down. The tears that splatted against the linoleum.
“All those years…this can’t be happening.”