Desolation

He’s admittedly agnostic, terrified to
believe in what he
can’t see. Terrified about
a lot of things, actually,
but he doesn’t talk about that; doesn’t talk
about much. He’s a pure genius,
which his father fails to notice, or fails
to care. The odds of it
being the latter eclipse the hell
out of the first. He doesn’t have many friends;
I suppose one is enough.
She told him to get away, she’d
give him money and he could just
leave. But he couldn’t,
he said, whatever was
holding him down and
deranging his thoughts was something he
couldn’t let go of. She didn’t
understand; he didn’t either.
They bonded over sunsets that
were sunrises in Australia, little bits of
“interesting” he found in books he read
and books he never got around to but
always planned to read. They took turns
diagnosing his father;
He’s sad, lonely,
frustrated with his own life.
But the boy stated ever so simply: No,
he just doesn’t like me. ‘Like father,
like son’ never even
crossed his mind, but it crossed hers. He wasn’t
too fond of himself either.