Winged

Chapter 10.

"You know, Timmy. You'll not be able to do everything right all the time. And that's alright. Don't go hard on yourself, my love." Her green eyes were once again looking at him with love and affection, her young features gaining a pearl of wisdom as she said those words to her son.

"If I don't do everything right, I'll go on waste mum!" Timothee snapped aggressively rolling his eyes at the young woman who wasn't even mad at her son's unreasonable reaction.

"What? Wow. Timothee Ferox, did I go on waste?" She asked him, patiently waiting for an answer as the sixteen-year-old boy shook his head in desperation, feeling as though he wasn't understood.

"It's not the same, Jane." He rolled his eyes at her, actually mad that she could keep her cool while he was boiling on the inside.

"It's exactly the same thing, Tim. And my case it's actually terribly worse than yours. I did almost everything wrong, but here I am, aren't I? With an amazing son who right now is just being a little shit." Jane, his mother, told him, offering him a cookie which he didn't take as he scoffed, irritated.

"Your case is actually not terribly worse than mine. You had your way, you had it easy!" He snapped at her, his words coming out angrier than he intended, regretting them instantly as he saw her eyebrows arching in a way he very damn well knew.

"Oh. I had it easy now, huh? Oh you bet I did. Especially when I left at sixteen and pregnant, and started a life from scratch with a newborn and nobody to fend for me. That was hell easy." She told him surprisingly calm.

"Oh c'mon! Don't play the 'I left at sixteen with a baby' card on me. You chose to do it! You chose to leave your house because you found it a perfect excuse to ditch the EXCELLENT life grandma and grandpa could offer you. You for real had everything and you chose to ditch it. So don't pull that bullshit on me."

"Hey. Watch your tone, Timothee. And don't bring this up because you know nothing about it. You don't get to tell me that I chose all this. You don't get to talk about the things I've gone through when you don't know anything about it." She said, her green eyes filling with tears. Timothee hated that. He hated seeing her crying. Better off just rip his heart directly out of his chest. But he couldn't help it. He knew there were things his mum wasn't talking about it. She was a pretty open person. Discussing everything with him, talking to her about her past. But there were certain topics she didn't bring up. Never.

"Well you don't give me anything to know about though, do you?! You say you had it hard, and yes you did, but you chose to have them. Your parents said they would support you and dad wanted to marry you. He said he'd-"

"Don't bring Charlie into this." His mother shortly interrupted him at the mention of 'Dad' as though you had clicked a magic button inside her head.

"No, no. I will bring him into it you know. I will! Because you say you love him, and you say he will always be a part of your life and other bullshit but you chose to keep him out of your life, out of our life back then!" Timothee shouted at her, thinking that he indeed was right, and that she had a paranoid decision.

"No, no! You, can never bring up the matter of your father into this, okay? You don't know everything, Tim. You don't know even half of it. So you don't get to tell me that I made it all hard on myself. You don't." She shook her head, now mad at his son's behavior. She was used to him having a really short temper, saying things he doesn't always mean but now he had crossed a line.

"Gods! Then what did you do, if you didn't do what I say you did!?" Timothee held his hands up in desperation as his mother's jaw practically dropped to the floor. She just stared at him, eyes full of hurt and Timothee stared right back, his eyes pure with pain. But she didn't tell him. She didn't say a word. And that was all Timothee needed to explode. "I thought so."

"You're being terrible at the moment, Timothee. You are not like this. Just end this ridiculous thing here." She calmly told him, and even she was surprised by the calmness.

"This ridiculous thing? Oh gods..." Timothee's eyes filled with tears as she stared at his mother. "Okay you know something? I'm going to leave this house right now, and I'll be back in two hours because if I stay I'll say things I don't like saying, and we'll fight. And I don't like fighting with you. When I come back I hope you'll be in the right shape to tell me all the things you don't. Because right now I am so mad at you I can't even put it into words."

"Don't be mad, Tim. Nothing's worth being mad."

"You make me mad, mum! You are the only one who can make me this mad! And you never fail to do it..."

Timothee's eyes shot open, sweat dripping over his shoulder, his shirt as though he had dived into a pool. He found it hard to breath, it felt like he had gotten punched right in the chest, his own words replaying in his head. This fight, replaying in his head. He felt her eyes looking at him, full of hurt and pain. The pain he caused her with his words. The person she loved more than anything. And he. He had hurt the person he loved more than anything.

He didn't even realize when or how but he could feel hot tears streaming down his cheeks, sobbing at the dead of night, regretting every bit of what he had said. Praying that Evan at the armchair next to him wouldn't wake up.

He got up and shrugged off the wet shirt, leaving his torso exposed at the pale moonlight that was making its way inside from the windows. At the back of his mind he could hear Evan groaning in his sleep, mumbling incoherent words, fighting someone that was never really there, but he couldn't bring himself to pay attention to it. It was as though for the first time since he had gotten at Bivium his heart had taken control over his mind and was letting out all those emotions he was suppressing, as though his heart had finally brought itself to grieve. Forcing Timothee to go along with it. To feel this terrible emotion. To hear it over and over again. His last conversation ever with his mum.

He once had asked her how must have been feeling the saddest person on the planet. And she had just laughed it off, and had said one of those jokes she always did.

But Timothee now knew. He knew that this feeling must have been the saddest to have ever existed. What he was feeling at this moment. Regret and pain and loneliness and desperation. He had this need that he knew he could never fulfill. He wanted to tell her how sorry he was and how much he loves her. He wanted to tell her that he was a complete douche. But he would never have that chance. He wanted something that was sure he couldn't have. And this thought cut him deeper than a knife.

So he paced away from the living room and went and sat down at the little booth with the pillows which were surrounded with books and partitures of all kinds. He sunk deep into the pillows, hugging his knees closely as he sobbed and cried, mumbling 'sorry's' under his breath, in hope that his mother would hear at least one.

After a while he fell asleep, tears staining his face and his expression the saddest it had ever been. He was sleeping deeply, as though his sleep was taking away all the kind of negative emotion, making him able to rest for some moments in peace. It was as though he had been sedated by sleep and couldn't realize a thing of what was going on around him.

That's why he didn't realize Evan shooting up from his armchair the moment he heard Timothee's rapid breathing slowing down at a calmer rate, as though he was never really sleeping. Or why he didn't feel Evan rushing at his side, holding a blanket, carefully dropping it over him as he knelt beside him. Or why he didn't feel Evan brushing his sweaty, sandy hair away from his forehead. Or why he didn't realize that Evan stayed next to him all night, eyes scanning over a book as he listened to Timothee's breathing, making sure he stayed calm all night long. He didn't know all that.

But Evan knew. He knew what it was like to be having nightmares. He knew what it was like to feel as though your own mind is playing tricks on you by replaying the most painful experiences of yours over and over again, like an unending tape with exclusive purpose to make you suffer. He knew what it was like to be crying alone, sobbing on your own with nobody there with you. To hold you, to sit with you, to make sure you were alright even if you couldn't see it. He did know all that.

And that's why he stayed. All night long, next to Timothee, taking care of him. Even though Timothee would not know in the morning. He did it. Because he didn't want Timothee to feel like he was alone. He didn't want Timothee to suffer alone – all at all for that matter. He had told him after all, he had told him this very same moment 'I'll be waiting for you."