It takes time.

TW: Mentions of substance abuse and physical abuse.

It takes time. Something he never really had for himself. His mindset turning in useless spiteful circles, chewing up the same skewed beliefs about himself and struggling to untangle from the hooks of his low self-esteem. It was something Felix couldn’t see himself escaping but he had to, deep down he knew it. Something conflicting twisted in his gut, with every meal, every walk, every second he spent where he wasn’t supposed to be, instinct told him to run.

The narcissistic grips of his parents who spewed self-indulgent crap about legacy, blood looking out for blood and how he owed them for everything, it made him nauseous. Nauseous to think that they really couldn’t see past their own noses, hear beyond their own noises and notice that maybe- just maybe they did fuck all. Maybe when they left him in that little fishing village in Cornwall with his uncle when he was little, they weren’t giving him anything but a reason to say no to them now.

It almost made him laugh and he refused to let it make him cry but when they crooned and coaxed him to play along with their pretence of a picture perfect family he was speechless. Meeting all those high profile business partners, attending over-exuberant dinners and wearing expensive clothing that made him feel wrong in his own skin. He was a doll for them, they stripped away what he had left of who he was in Cornwall, steadily replacing his clothes, ‘Oh you won’t be wearing this sort of thing to University.’ Changing his hair, ‘Only delinquents bleach their hair.’ Or his phone, ‘You’d do better with a new model and we got you a new number, unfortunately we couldn’t save your contacts though.’

He never said no, he could barely put up a fight when they were of course the reason he was alive, the reason for all the good things that were to come. Inside he knew, the six year old boy was just waiting for that hope, that cursed validation which would never come but it took time to see that truly.

Felix was isolated. He finally knew the difference between loneliness and being alone. Nothing of the freedom and independence that came from doing your own thing, following your own path, knowing that you have a safety wire tied around you to keep you from falling too far off the edge. There was no wire here, his parents had cut that cord. From the isolation came a numbness, something that bled into his skin, dulling his nerves as his parents pushed him to work at this law firm during the holidays until his semester started.

Pushing him to get ahead at life, employing countless tutors to get him up to speed for the Law degree he was being dragged towards. It was aggravating and yet his jaw was tightly clamped shut, aching from self-restraint.

And then the partying started, his parents networked him into a group of ‘friends’, a group of rich underlings who were following in their parents footsteps, each as hollow as the next and fulfilled their parents materialistic ideals. They searched for life and happiness through drinking, through drugs, through dancing in the night and losing themselves to a haze of humidity, bad music and flashing lights.

He knew they weren’t a good influence, but all that was good in his life was gone so what was the point in holding back? It wasn’t long until he was out every night, drinking his numbness away then waking up to work and or study under the crippling guidance from his parents. And then, without knowing that it could, things got worse.

His parents arrived home early one day, cutting his lesson short and his mother nagged at Felix to change into one of the nicer suits she had bought him, saying they were having guests round and it was an exciting day. He was confused beyond understanding his parents and their pompous practices so he did as she said, his father came to his room applying ‘especially bought’ cuff links and helping straighten his tie, saying everything would be perfect if they stuck to the plan. Felix was almost worried that they had found the weed brownies that one of the rich brats had given him and ate them accidentally but was also kind of finding their strange happiness hopeful. Like maybe things could get better? Maybe they were happy with his studying and the job and his social life, maybe- maybe-

He was wrong. Dead wrong in fact, the clock struck 6 and a family arrived for dinner. A picture perfect family, used to a lavish lifestyle of prestigious jobs and practically a mirror to his own family except, instead of a son, they had a daughter. He was dumbstruck, burning holes into his parents heads, gritting out replies to any questions sent his way. He could barely speak more than what was asked of him, and he could feel the tension at the table rise with his parents' disgruntled expressions towards his behaviour. The daughter barely spoke, her name beginning with a J but completely lost on him as indignant anger took over when their parents breezed past the whole ‘Oh yeah, meet your fiance’ moment.

Once the family left his parents barely spared him a glance, celebrating together over a glass of wine and he felt sick. He was sick, he threw up the entire dinner, sweating and heaving over the toilet bowl in the bathroom and it was in the white porcelain room where he caught his reflection, saw the hollowness growing in his eyes, the strain of this charade tugging at the seams of his mind, splitting him apart. He could feel the pain this was doing to him and he knew he had to do something. He went back to his parents after he cleaned up a bit, trepidation settling in under his skin and he felt the atmosphere shift when his parents saw him. He saw the way they sighed silently, sharing looks of disappointment and it was searing. They treated him as though he were wrong to be there, in the house that they so desperately wanted him to be in at the start of this whole game. Well he was done and he told them that.

It started off quiet, a series of gaslighting attempts, his parents telling him what he wanted, that he didn’t know any better. Then he raised his voice, so they stood up, his mother started screaming ‘It’s not like you have to marry her right away!’. A few curt remarks about their absence and the reality that he lived without them was the final thing. It’s strange, Felix saw it all in slow motion, felt it too, the moment when his father slapped him across the face, the blow sending him into the floorboards, ears ringing and cheek stinging.

Oh.

It was the silence that was the worst thing though, they said nothing and he couldn’t either. His parents left him there in the living room, heading to their rooms for the night and he didn’t know what to do. So he left, right out the door and found the nearest beer, he drank until he ran out of cash that he had on him and then he stumbled home. The hollow fear and daunting insanity that his mind slipped into sent him fumbling in this closet for reminders of home. Photos he’d stashed away of his friends, a copy of William Blake's sonnets where Dylan and Abel scribbled satirical comedies with stick figures, Signe's busted lighter and the lavender pressing Hermia had given him.

The insecurity as a child of wanting to be wanted had drowned him, falling into living only from being needed. He had looked into the eyes of his parents, strangers, hollow, heartless and felt nothing. He felt nothing. Not need, not want. He had no desire to have anything from them because he realised now that they had nothing to give, they couldn’t complete him, they couldn’t fix him. This family wasn't what made him happy, what made him whole - Cornwall did, his Uncle did, his friends did, Hermia did.

It took some time for his eyes to catch sight of his suitcase, wedged in the corner of the wardrobe, the crumpled tag from his trip making him reach out and turn it over, examining his uncle's handwriting. His vision became misty and he slid down against the door of his wardrobe, finding small sad comfort in the items he traced his fingers over. It was when his eyes came to that tag again, that he noticed the pattern of numbers smudged on the contact info. His breath caught in his throat for a moment, hope sprouting uncontrollably as he fumbled for his phone dialling the number, a chorus of please please please erratic in his head. Or maybe that was just his heartbeat.

He dialled and it rang and he felt his eyes flood with tears as his uncle picked up with a sleepy, “Hello?”

He was embarrassed from how much he cried, stifling the sound so as to not bring any attention from his parents and he heard rustling from his Uncle’s side of the phone.

“Felix?”

He didn’t know what it was about hearing his name be spoken by someone he missed but it didn’t ease the staccato of panicked breaths that distorted his response.

“Uh. Hi,” he could barely get through the sentence.

There was another pause and Felix felt the burn of shame coil in him. How could he do this to him now? Calling him up out of the blue, what was he thinking? He shouldn’t be bothering anyone with this now.

“Kid? Are you okay?” Jim’s voice came down the phone clearer, more awake than before and all he could do was sob quietly down the phone.

Jim said nothing, letting him cry to him over the static of the phone call, waiting patiently, as patiently as he had ever been. It was when he finally calmed down that his Uncle spoke.

“I’m buying you a plane ticket. Get your ass back home.”

Anticipation kept him on edge for a week leading up to his flight. He didn’t tell his parents, agreeing with Uncle Jim that it wouldn’t be a good idea to give them time to trap him anymore that they had tried. He managed to find the hiding place where they put his passport, in the cleaning supplies cupboard and pretended for the rest of the week that everything was fine. The blow out they had was swept under the rug, neither parent approaching the subject and for the most part they just ignored him and got on with their day. He planned to leave with the clothes on his back and whatever valuables he had brought with him when he first entered the country, he wrote a note - which was more than his Uncle thought they deserved but the choice was his and he wanted them to know, for the final time, that they had no power over him anymore. It was going to plan until his father returned home early, the two standing across from each other in the doorway. Felix had shuddered at the look on the man's face, cold and furious. The fist met him quickly, toppling him down against the wall and he scrambled past his fathers legs, knocking the older man to the floor and raced to the elevator. He heard the man yelling after him, heard doors opening across the apartment hallway where curious and concerned neighbours poked their heads out. He didn’t look back, not when he left the building, not when he got into the taxi, not when he arrived at the airport. He had every reason to keep going forwards, and no reason to go back.

The return was quiet at first, as were most things in his life. His uncle picked him up with a warm hug and hot chocolates ready for the journey from the airport to home. It rained on the way, blue grey clouds hanging overhead and trees bending to the will of the wind. It was comforting, like everything that had happened to him was being washed away and when he got there, the car winding up the hill to the house he grew up in, he saw Signe standing under a broken umbrella, perched under the tree where the old tire swing was.

They didn’t say anything to each other, her grey eyes wandering to the fading bruise on his cheek before offering a watery smile and a hug. Tight, almost painful like she had to make sure he was real. They stayed inside, three figures sitting on the sofa watching telly while the rain did what it did best. Nothing had changed since he’d left, only a small build up of empty bottles in the hall and an increase of ready meals in the fridge. It smelt the same, looked the same but he felt different, worn out, bruised and lost. It was understandable that nothing much had changed at home over the two months that had passed but for him he felt as though he’d been stuck in that glorified snow globe for an eternity.

Sleep didn’t come easy some nights so he spent that time outside, wandering around the little town and sometimes he’d find himself standing on the edge of Hermia’s house. The lights were off and completely still, the wind chimes hanging from her window sill but her parents' cars were gone from the driveway. It felt like he couldn’t breathe some nights and that's when he would go down to the beach, watching the horizon and waiting, like if he hoped enough she would show up.

He just wanted to be there with her, sitting on the beach, in the park, in Hermia’s garden reading their books and lifting their heads to read a line to each other, sharing the magic of another world or to figure out who was going to go to the corner shop to get the ice creams that time around.

A girl who asked too many questions, a girl who put him in her poetry and spent sunsets staring at him instead of the view. He had never been sure if he wanted to be seen, feeling out of sorts in this life already, always between the step forward and the step back. But if she were to look at him maybe that would be all it would take to make him feel real again.