HELENA (18+)

The call came early in the morning with news-the kind of news that doesn't wait for a more convenient hour. It didn't surprise me. It should have, but it didn't. I don't know why, but the only thing I felt at that moment was the cold press of the phone against my ear, a lifeless object relaying lifeless news.

"It's your mother, son. She passed away." There was a pause, just long enough for me to hear the faint static of the line and the distant murmur of his breathing.

Her sickness was a permanent fixture in our lives. You learn to live around it. But knowing something is inevitable doesn't make it any less strange when it finally happens. No amount of bracing prepares you for the jolt of the fall when you finally hit the ground. She was sick, then slightly better, then worse again. It was the rhythm of her existence and, by extension, ours.

୧‿̩͙ ˖︵ ꕀ⠀ ♱⠀ ꕀ ︵˖ ‿̩͙୨

In the early hours of the morning, he receives a call from his father informing him that his mother, who had been battling cancer, has passed away. Despite his love for her, he feels oddly unaffected, more annoyed by the disruption to his life than anything else. The thought of returning to his hometown to face his cheating father and his mistress fills him with dread. He knows people will pity him, expect him to grieve, but he isn't sure he can summon the emotions they want. The funeral, the forced sympathy-it all feels like a performance he never signed up for.