When Shadows Rise | I

Ch. 37 | The Tie That Binds

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Raph

Raph started to make his way back to his room. During the fifty second duration period, he thought nothing other than what he and his father talked about. He didn't realize how almost difficult it was to mention his mother; his father usually had to be the one to do it first. After her passing, his father did whatever he could to make sure Raph and his siblings didn't drift away from their mother— that included talking about her (especially that), praying at her shrine together, and keeping pictures to look back on precious memories. It was hard, of course, knowing your mother's existence was now intangible; the only way to 'see' and 'feel' her was either through photos or watching old videos from a camcorder.

Throughout these years, Raph felt like he was running into guardrails, like something was preventing him from moving on. It was beyond frustrating— knowing why those guardrails kept appearing, but also realizing the solution was quite literally out of his grasp. Close, but no cigar.

When he arrived upstairs, he found something he wasn't expecting: a plate with a delicious-looking toasted sandwich placed on the floor directly in front of his bedroom door. Raph could tell it was made just recently. But why would anyone leave this for him?

As he wondered, he saw Mikey leaving his room, wearing headphones and lip-synching to whatever song he was listening to and dancing his ass off— all at the same time. Mikey must've had the volume turned all the way up because Raph could hear the lyrics and in a matter of seconds, guess what song was playing.

"Mikey?" Raph said. Mikey was doing some feet shuffling. Raph approached his brother and snapped his fingers. "Mikey!" Now Mikey was twerking. Oh, geez. Since nothing was working, Raph tipped Mikey's headphones back; no more pretending to be Beyoncé. No more pretending to be one of her backup dancers.

"Hey!" Mikey exclaimed. He picked up his headphones, glaring at Raph. "You cut me off at the best part, dude!"

"I just saved you from catching a bad case of tinnitus," Raph said. "You can thank me later."

Mikey stuck his tongue out. "You're just jealous because you know you can't shake it like you're supposed to."

"Shake it? I assure you, my ass outranks yours."

"Oh, yeah? Prove it. Right now."

Raph rolled his eyes. "I didn't come to you for a dance battle."

Mikey scoffed. "Just as I thought."

"Did you leave that there?" Raph asked before Mikey could resume what he was doing. When Mikey blinked, Raph groaned. He pointed to the sandwich.

"Oh," Mikey realized. "Is that supposed to be for you?"

"Well, it was left at my door so. . . I guess so? But just answer the question."

"If you're asking if I made it just for you, then no. I mean, not that I wouldn't ever make anything for you, but I definitely didn't put that sandwich together. . ." There was a sparkle in Mikey's eyes, the same sparkle that appeared whenever he stared into the eyes of his three main food groups— crust, custard, and cone. "Say, if you're not going to eat it, though. . ." He slowly outstretched a hand in the direction of the sandwich.