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Daryn looked at Adam. “How long has he been gone?”
Adam looked at his watch. “Fifteen min–woah woah!” He dropped his silverware and swooped in to stop their five year old from pouring the entire thing of gravy all over his plate. “There you go, Sam, just a little bit.”
“Can I put gravy on yours Daddy?”
“Sure, let’s do it together.”
After they set it down, Adam looked at Daryn. “You should go check on him.”
Daryn ate a bit of stuffing and thought. “Yeah he should be back by now.” He wiped his face with his napkin and set it down. “Be right back everyone.”
Daryn padded through the kitchen, socks making muffled footfalls on the hardwood floors. The house was old and it creaked around him, from the snow heavy on the roof to the grunting of the furnace. He looked around the house, and his concerns were beginning to rise. The lad’s shoes were still by the door though.
Daryn eventually located Jason in the basement they were currently refinishing. He heard him before he saw him, sniffling. “Hey Jason are you down here?”
“Ah fuck,” he said to himself. “Yeah.”
“You ok?”
“Yeah I’m fine, sorry, I’ll be up in a minute.”
Daryn stopped on the stairs. “You don’t sound fine. Was it the food? You barely touched anything.”
“No, food’s fine. It’s fine. I’ll be up in a minute.”
A pause. “Do you want to talk?”
“No.”
“Well is it ok if I come sit next to you for a bit.”
“I guess.”
Daryn clicked his tongue. It was so hard to be 17. He stopped in the half finished bathroom to grab a box of tissues. They had put them down there cause of all the dust which kept making them sneeze. He sat down on the floor and pushed the box to Jason.
"Thanks,” he muttered.
Daryn nodded and bumped him with his foot. “What’s going on?”
“Nothing.”
“Are you homesick?”
Jason pulled his knees up and rested his arms on them. He wouldn’t look at Daryn. “A little.”
“Is it your first Thanksgiving not at home?”
Jason sniffled again. He didn’t answer right away. “They didn’t call.”
“What? I can’t hear you.”
“They didn’t call,” Jason repeated a bit louder.
“Ooohh.”
That seemed to break the floodgates. Jason couldn’t push the tears off his face as fast as they were falling. “They haven’t called me. We do Thanksgiving every year. I always peel the apples for the pie, and they always made sure I was in the picture we take. But they haven’t called. It’s like they already forgot about me.” He began to sob.
Daryn exhaled. “Shit.” He slid over until he was next to Jason and put his arm over his shoulder. “There, there. Cry as much as you need to.”
“Why haven’t they?”
“Well. Jason. I don’t really know your parents. But I do know that when you bring a child into this world – or adopt, like we did to Sam – that it’s your responsibility to love your child no matter what. And to take care of them, so they turn out to be a good member of society. And your parents kicked you out for being gay and "going against the church”. And I’m sorry, that makes them shitty people. They didn’t call because they suck.“
Jason raised his head and stared at Daryn as if he had grown horns.
"Shitty people don’t kick a 16 year old out in fucking January in MAINE, and make live in a shelter while he finishes school. And shitty people don’t not care about your grades. And shitty people don’t ignore their only son on Thanksgiving. I’m sure they have nice attributes, and can be nice, but what they did? Shitty.”
Jason blew his nose and hiccuped. “You know, I’ve talked to a lot of adults about this…at my school, the therapists at the shelter. And they always say ‘I’m sorry’.” Jason mimicked them in a whiny voice. “’Oh Jason, I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m sure they didn’t mean it. I’m sure they regret it. I’m sure they miss you.’ But you’re like the first adult who had said that they flat out suck.”
“…Should I apologize?” Daryn hesitated to ask.
“No,” Jason insisted. “Cause you’re right. They ARE shitty. It was a shitty, mean and cruel thing to do. I could have DIED being homeless in January. In Maine. And like, fuck, that means they’d rather have a dead son than a gay son. And who would want parents like that? Fuck, Sam is lucky.” And then he started crying again.
Daryn pulled him into his arms and let him soak his sweater. “There, there…aww it’s alright. It’s going to be ok. Maybe one day they will look back on the photos without you in them, and regret it, and apologize. But it’ll be up to you to accept that or not. And maybe they’ll call one day. Maybe not. No matter what happens, you’re always welcome to spend the holidays with us.”
“R-really?” Jason hiccuped.
“Yep.”
“I’m glad you guys particpiated in this match program the shelter has. I like Adam’s guitar class a lot.”
“Oh don’t tell him that, it’ll go right to his head. He thinks he’s Eric Clapton.”
That got Jason laughing a little. “He kind of looks like him, a bit.”
“Oh definitely don’t tell him that either.”
That lightened the mood, broke the spell. Daryn let Jason finish his reserve of tears, and then clean out his nose. He also waited for Jason to wash his face. As they were walking up the stairs, Jason’s stomach growled. “Was that me?”
“It was.”
“Fuck, I just realized I’m starving.”
“You’re 17, you should be eating everything.”
“I want to eat everything.”
“Permission granted.” Daryn saluted. Jason smiled.
When they got back to the dining room. Adam gave them a “welcome back”. None of the 14 people there asked questions. Jason was just folded back into the conversation like he’d never left. He dug into his plate, and then took seconds.
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Captions are 100% fictional. Do not remove this disclaimer. Happy Thanksgiving.
