Father and Son Talk

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Vesper

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"What do you mean?" Vesper acted as if he didn't understand his father and sipped on water.

"You know what I mean," Cillian said with one eyebrow up and a little smile on his lips.

The son peeked at his father sitting in front of him but he was caught, "Stop looking at me like that. I said I'm fine in the morning."

"Unfortunately, you did not say that. In fact, you said, and I quote, 'Honestly, I don't know with a tear in your eyes."

"I didn't cry."

"Never said you did," Cillian smirked. It was fun teasing his son like that. "But let's be real. Tell me how you feel. Spill everything. I won't tell mum."

Staring into those jewellery eyes of his father, Vesper felt like he was under a spell and wanted to let out everything he had in his heart. Those feelings he didn't know existed until she was snatched from him.

His father patiently waited for the boy to compose words as he sipped on his cup of water while staring at the walls. There was nothing but the sounds of soup boiling and fire burning the pot.

After gazing into the water in the glass for more than ten minutes, Vesper finally spoke in a whisper, "I want to believe that I'm okay."

Cillian rested his head on his hand and watched his son doing his best to say what he has in his heart in words.

"Ever since day one of meeting her, she was always the one leading me and helping me with everything. I was following her without thinking much and now that she is gone, I'm trying to take this as a sign to develop myself. We were connected with a rope and she was the guide. It's time for me to guide myself and when she's back, I want both of us to feel equal, and on the same starting line. No more leading."

The father asked, "How did you come to that conclusion? I know that you didn't feel like that always."

"I've been thinking about it lately but after you two were gone for the day and had time to think through, I realised that I can't be like this forever."

"Mmm." Cillian smiled.

"I used to think that God was cruel for letting us apart but now that I think about it, he gave me an opportunity to grow and I am thankful for that. So yeah." Vesper finished his drink after talking from embarrassment. He sounded like he was in love with Helia which didn't sit well with him. Their relationship was not romantic but platonic.

Cillian stood up to check on the meat and once he was done stirring the pot, he came back to find his son still with a slight frown. "C'mon. Spill it out."

The son tried to say something but stopped himself then took a deep breath, stood up from the chair and said firmly, "Wait here."

Cillian served another glass of water while he waited for his son to come back.

Vesper came back with a white phone in his hand. The phone had a picture of a golden flaming ball in the middle which was a picture of the planet Venus. It was a match with his best friend. Helia's was a black one with a blazing sun.

The boy scrolled through his phone and took another deep breath before showing it to his father, ready to see all the conversation he had with Helia.

Cillian read the interaction between the two teenagers and saw nothing out of ordinary in those. It was mostly the girl talking about her day and his son listened to what she was saying.

"Is there anything that I'm supposed to find weird about?" The father asked after he was done reading what his son pointed out.

Vesper looked at his father with scrunched eyebrows as if Cillian was so dumb that he didn't see it.

"What did I do?" Cillian asked with confusion but his son ignored him and asked him to read again. This time, he read them carefully but he still couldn't spot anything weird in the conversation.

"Dad..."

"What?"

"..." Vesper gave a look at his father before pointing out the dates of the conversation. "That's the date of the day before yesterday. And that's the date of today. She hasn't talked like she used these days."

Cillian checked the texts again when he was finally told of the problem. Indeed. At the beginning of starting of the new school, she would send long messages as if she was trying to write a novel series but nowadays, it had drastically shortened to a novel length.

The boy chugged down the water as if it was alcohol and said, "She doesn't pick up calls these days and she was the one who used to call me nonstop. I have a bad feeling about this like something has happened to her."

Seeing that the situation was no longer funny and serious, the father asked, "Have you tried asking her what's up?"

"I did." The boy pointed at the screen without looking at them and showed the part where he asked the girl if there were changes in her life.

Helia replied, [Nothing much. Just school stuff, you know. Language barrier and relationship issues. Nothing else. I'm doing fine. How about you?]

Cillian once again tried to decipher which part sounded bad and not clicking in but he couldn't point it out until his son spoke behind him.

"She doesn't say 'I'm fine'. Never in a million years, she would say 'fine'. She always says 'I'm okay'. Something must have happened and shes not telling me." Vesper said and walked into the kitchen to randomly stirred the chicken as if those chickens deserved it, "I think it's ready."

"Oh, okay." Cillian stopped scrolling through the texts and prepared a trivet on the dining table so that his son could keep the burning pot on top.

There was no chatting from there on because the two were preparing the place and ready to eat.

"Are we going to wait for mum?" Vesper asked once the table was set. The twisted macaroni, simple salad, sweet cone soup with herbs and last but not least, the main dish, the Tuscan chicken that sat in the middle of the small rectangle table.

Cillian looked at the clock and grabbed his coat hastily, "Yes and I'm supposed to pick her up. Do you want to come?"

The boy thought for a second before saying, "Why not." It had been a while since he went outside. He was an introvert, to begin with, and didn't have many friends that he could go over to. And now that the Knight family was gone, there was no reason for him to go outside.

"Okay. Then just change your pajamas and we are leaving in two. I'll be in the car." The father stormed out of the room to the entrance and the son walked to his room like a turtle to change his clothes.

The boy came to the car and he appeared the same. A T-shirt and a pair of sweatpants. "Let's go." He said after getting into the shotgun seat and putting on the seat belt.

The father, still in a white stainless shirt and black trousers, checked the boy up and down before stepping on the gas and going to his wife's workplace.

The whole ride, Vesper just stared outside and occasionally checked the past conversation he had with his best friend. He didn't know a month could change a person this much. Something was definitely happening to her to act like this. Or someone.

He, of course, did some talking with her parents but he could get nothing out of them. They said all of them were doing well and Helia was extra cheerful these days.

From experience, he knew. He knew that the girl would smile more and laugh more when she was in a bad state. But even if he asked her, the girl was too stubborn and wouldn't even spill a tiny part of what was going on.

"We arrived early..." Cillian murmured when he parked the car and checked the time. People were coming out of the small building in front of them, a dentist. Twin Clouds Dentist was where Aura worked as a dentist since she moved and half of the week, Cillian came to pick her up.

"Dad."

"Yeah?" Cillian diverted his attention from the building and turned to his son, facing the window.

"Could you not tell mum?"

"Sure." The father understood without the son explaining.

"Thanks," Vesper said and opened the door to exit the car.

"Where are you going?" Cillian almost jumped out of the car if it wasn't for Vesper pointing at the building. Aura was coming out of it she was fast walking to the car once she spotted it. "Ohh."

Vesper moved to the back seat and let the couple sit in the front.

"Ahh, it was cold today. Hey." As soon as she got into the car, she spoke and Cillian turned the ignition.

"Hi. How was your day?" The son asked and the mother replied,

"It went good." And from there, she began talking in detail about how her day went.

Vesper just stared outside as he did on the way and let his mind wander. Was Helia really fine like she said? Was he just being hysterical and overthinking?

He unlocked his phone and left her a message in hopes of her replying to it the next morning.