Chapter Text
Dee bites at his lip as he looks out at the dreary landscape outside of his new room through the window, anxiously passing his phone between either hand every few minutes. He would never admit it, but he’s desperately waiting for a buzz to snap him from his reverie, would give anything for it.
After his mom walked in on his dad demeaning him, nothing had felt right. In retrospect, he couldn’t remember ever being happy with the way his life was, but the change had hardly been an improvement. In the weeks following leaving their house, they’d moved into one of his mom’s biker friend’s rental homes, and it was shit. More shit than anything he’d experienced before.
The rental had only two bedrooms, and he was forced to share a room with Heavy, and hearing him play video games throughout the night drove him half-mad. His only respite was that he had the side of the room with the window– perfect for half-heartedly distracting himself from his suffocating angst.
He let his head hit the cool glass, finding an amount of respite in the dull thud it made when it made contact. Giving in, he unlocked his phone and looked desperately at his text history with Lif, disappointed but not surprised when he was greeted with the fact his message hadn’t even been opened yet. All the same, he released an irritated groan and hit his head against the glass harder in response.
“You’ll break through it if you do that much harder,” Heavy interjected from his side of the room with levity. “Though, maybe jumping out the window is just what you want.” They were separated only by an over glorified bed sheet strung up with fishing wire, and the sound of his voice traveled easily. Dee only dignified that quip with another groan, melting into the window bench seat and swiping around on his phone.
Dee had already struggled to talk to Lif, and moving to the opposite side of town absolutely did not help. They didn’t share any classes, and texting her since Heavy added her felt like pulling teeth. Inside, he knew he was reading into it too much, he wasn’t stupid, but he couldn’t help the flare of jealousy it sparked in him.
But he had more reason than that to be jealous of Heavy. Across his section of the room that he was allowed to call his own, he could see the guitar his father had unceremoniously granted him. He hadn’t touched it since the move, but his mother had packed it for him, unknowingly. All she knew was he wanted to play it and that Glam belittled him for his efforts. She didn’t know, couldn’t know, that it meant so much more than that to him. The way it made him feel. His grip on his phone tightened.
Suitably agitated by his own train of thought, he pushed through the curtain partition and stumbled out of the room, ignoring the tittering Heavy offered at his exit. He didn’t know where he was going, but he didn’t want to stew in there with his thoughts anymore. Not with him.
Before he really knew it, he was outside, slamming the front door behind him. He was faced with his mother at his right, toying with her motorcycle in the faux-dusk offered by the poor weather. She looked up and acknowledged him with a good-natured smirk and a little wave before returning to her business, not wanting to push the subject of her first son’s evident temper flare.
To both of their surprise, he voluntarily walked towards her and sat under the lip of the roof to protect himself from any potentially worsening weather. He simply leaned down the wall of the rental, finding himself in a squat that was supported by the fixture.
“Bad day?” Vicky offered shortly, but with no aggression. It was an olive branch, but she tried to disguise it.
“Something like that,” Dee gave in response, not feeling particularly cooperative.
Sensing a more difficult conversation than she had the attention span to multitask, Vicky set her tools down carefully into her toolbox and leaned onto her motorcycle, secured with her sturdy kickstand. “Need to talk about it?”
Dee grimaced openly, turning his head away. Ever since Vicky discovered the way Glam spoke to Dee, she went out of her way to check in with him. It made his skin crawl, but it was his mom. And it was a breath of fresh air compared to the relationship he had with his now-estranged dad. He offered her nothing.
She stared blankly for a moment, her face belying her frustration, but also belying her concern. Sensing she was talking to a brick wall, she simply offered, “I know how hard it is to be your age. I know how hard it is to have a tense relationship with your parents. I get it. And…” She paused, considering.
“I know you probably don’t want to talk about that–” Dee’s face contorted even more, knowing she was referring to him, tears staining his face, his sense of self shattered under his father’s scrutiny–”But you can talk to me about anything else, too.”
“You’re a… complex kid, and it’s probably hard for you to find people to talk to who get what you’re sayin’.”
She concluded her statement without fanfare, and Dee realized he was bracing for more that didn’t come. He let himself exhale, but didn’t offer any input.
Vicky stared, and sensing her son had concluded this conversation on his own, allowed herself to continue her project on her bike.
He didn’t move from his spot on the wall, just watched his mom work in silence until the sun went down.