"Heartbreak After Daybreak"

In Need of A Hero

The room was quiet, serene. Light refracting in miniscule beams across the walls and over the stout bookcase, flat screen plasma television, and the fern-like plant in the far corner. The light carried the delicate and rather innocent sound of a young boy’s voice as it permeated throughout the air, filling the empty expanses of the large room.

“Daddy, where did mommy go?” the little boy asked his father as his father cradled him into the crook of his arm. “When is she ever going to come home?” The boy peered up at his father with bright green eyes pooling with angst and naive curiosity; his father stroked his son’s short auburn hair with his left hand as he hugged his body closer to his with his right.

“I don’t know when she’s coming home, dear, but I can promise you she’ll be back,” he soothed his son, giving him a gentle peck atop his forehead. He glanced at his silver wristwatch on his left arm, hoisting his son up into his strong arms, gazing into his son’s eyes. “But you have to promise me something,” he told him.

“What would that be, daddy?” he asked as he wrapped his slender arms around the nape of his father’s neck.

“Promise me you’ll sleep tonight,” he answered him firmly. “That means staying in your bed throughout the entire night. No getting up to look around for mommy around the house, you understand?”

“Yes, daddy,” he murmured, tilting his head downward as he gazed back into his father’s eyes from the tops of his eyes, “but can I sleep with my blanket?” He stared pitifully up at his father. “Just for tonight?”

“Of course you can,” he told him, setting him down onto the spiral Persian rug which they were standing upon and watching him retrieve his baby blue blanket from the back of the black satin couch where it laid there, folded, his bare feet sinking into the carpeting like boots on snow-covered ground.

“Thank you, daddy,” he smiled, holding his now unfolded blanket close to his chest as he walked abreast his father. His slipped his tiny hand into the clutch of his father’s hand as they ascended the wooden staircase together. They trudged down a long hallway adorned with their family photos, halting. “Daddy, where did mommy go?” he queried as he stared into the eyes of his photographed mother once he had spotted her.

“She’s on a business trip, honey,” he replied,” in Hawaii, and she has to be there for a while until she can fully support her company.”

“Daddy, does she still love me, though?”

“What?” he was rather alarmed and frazzled at his son’s remark, and he knelt down on one knee so that they were face to face. “Of course she does, and she always will. Why would you ever question that?”

“It’s just that she’s never home anymore, daddy; I don’t know why,” he cried, tears streaming down his round cheeks and falling rapidly onto the hardwood floor.

“Look, the reason why she can’t be here now is because she’s establishing businesses across America. She would love to be here, honey, but she’s doing what she can to support us. She’s doing everything she can to support you,” he informed his son as he poked his chest when he enunciated the last word, and then, he wiped his tears from his face with the reverse side of his right hand. He glanced at his wristwatch, hoisting his son back up into his strong arms. “Now it’s time for you to go to bed,” he said as they rounded the corner and entered his son’s room. He placed his son down gently onto his bed in the far end of the room after he had pulled the covers back for him, and he flicked on the light on his nightstand. He pulled the covers over himself as he snuggled into his warm blankets, his dad seating himself next to him. “Are you serious about sleeping with that blanket of yours?”