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The boy sat with his father at the dinner table.
It was an old furniture made of the finest mahogany imported from the Woodchip and Paper District. Age did not place its curse upon the stubborn thing, save for one short foot – the shiny lacquer still accentuated the table’s rich, varying shades of brown. By morning and by night, stacks of newspaper and mugs filled with preferred drinks of the family make their presence known atop its surface. And so it performs its role adequately, imposed upon its creation, not moving an inch from its intended position in the house while being the unanimously agreed gathering point of the home’s inhabitants.
The boy remembered that his father once mentioned that it was a hand-me-down from a family friend. When he was in 4th grade, the table was a gift from their neighbor (conveniently a family friend) as a welcome gift when his fathers moved into the neighborhood. When he was in junior year, the table was obtained from a garage sale held at the front lawn of a young couple’s house (also conveniently a family friend) down the street. When he was in college, the table’s origins do not matter anymore. It’s just there, resting in the middle of the combined dining and living room. Its factual origin is something the boy does not wish to uncover.
The three cushioned chairs surrounding the small table were from family friends, too. And so was the vase. And so were the cupboards.
What family friend? Redd dared to think one day. Does Redd know of a family friend? Does father have a family friend? Or dad? Father told him plenty about his and dad’s wedding day, but hardly about any best men. He would’ve caught wind of anything pertaining to their family because he’s Redd Wing.
Then again, there’s a reason why Atticus Wing was appointed as the Chief Justice’s stopgap.
It didn’t take long for Redd to realize that their family stood atop the fragile makings of a proper one – two Lawbots shot out of the factory assembly line and a skelecog baby they found cog knows where – living a white picket fence life like how all those high-end models do, complete with a clean cut front yard and the neatly rolled garden hose. And yet, this discovery will not shake Redd’s faith. He would never call it a facsimile, a tearjerkingly pathetic attempt at building something that belongs to them, that is theirs, as it is nothing short of shameful. This is not a semblance of normalcy because it is normal. In fact, this is honor. Honor befitting for a Wing.
Father, Atticus Wing, is not a drone built to parrot the pre-programmed ideologies and hackneyed beliefs of a man who had betrayed his nation. Father is not a facsimile. That’s why he survived. That’s why he is a person.
Redd Wing is a person because Atticus Wing is a person.
The dining room is filled with comforting lies. The doorway leading up to the outside world is a yawning maw.
Once more, Redd pretended to not notice his father’s wistful gaze. Atticus’ expression, teetering over his peripheral vision, could not be seen as anything but a tired, jaded one – Redd will never admit it, but that place is slowly killing him.
(This, too, is honor.)
“I’d like to ask you about something urgent, father.” Redd began, back straightened and head held high, a posture he’ll always maintain with utmost diligence. “It has been bothering me for quite some time now.”
“Redd,” Atticus sighed as he rubbed the back of his hat, “can this conversation wait for another time?”
“What “another time”, father?” He dared to raise his voice.
Had his father still bore the shell he proudly discarded long ago, he would be sporting a pair of deep eyebags.
“We shall talk about it when your father is awake.”
Redd harrumphed. “Very well, then.”
Atticus Wing will walk out of the door tomorrow morning at six-thirty sharp, leaving the mahogany table on its own. And to that table he will return at night, with Redd being the dutiful son he is leaving another stack of newspaper and a mug of cogfee, considerably more exhausted than he was when he left the house. They won’t talk about anything else other than two-sentence conversations about cog insurgents or attempts at tearing down the Lawbot HQ lobby from toons, but the fire continues to flicker inside of Redd.
This does not bother him one bit.
The boy sat with his father at the dinner table.
It was a classic lazy Susan – its size far too grand for the amount of patron it hosts – with its slightly off-white polyester tablecloth and once squeaky clean rotating glass center, bravely holding the father’s orders without a groan from its bearings. Atop the revolving circle lies plates upon plates of food to be gorged senselessly by the father and to be prodded thoughtlessly by the boy, in which one phone call will be all it takes to make them end up dumped inside eight-by-eight styrofoam boxes at the back of a COGS Inc. brand smart refrigerator.
The takeout boxes have to wait. Not for long, the boy hoped. Cathal couldn’t wait for the takeout phase of dinner to come already, his most anticipated part of his outings with his father – for Allan to call it a day and ring the employee button and pull out his trusty credit card without so much as a peek at the ridiculously long receipt. This is really pointless, Cathal thought, as he drove a fork through a single pea, sine waves between his disinterested eyes oscillating ever so gently.
I could’ve been at home finishing that pizza I ordered two days ago, Cathal thought.
This lukewarm dinner could amount to two months worth of the pay an entry-level Cold Caller would receive through grueling nine to fives. 60 hours a week. Consumption budget portioned two by seven for heel deli slices sandwiched in between stale slices of bread and half a cup of watered crude oil. So Cathal doesn’t do jobs. That’s what Allan had basically said, anyways.
You don’t have to understand things, you see. Or need to. You just gotta be seen there. In the suit. Okay? Everything’s gonna be handed to you on a silver platter, dont’cha worry, but don’t put all your eggs in one basket yet, boy! You gotta show ‘em who’s boss! The Bravecog!
His father likes his soliloquies served with a 5-star smile, but that’s beside the point. Cathal won’t turn away a job offer delivered to him on a silver plate, cause that one requires work, too. All he’s gotta do is eat. Feast. Gorge. Chew on the meat that had fallen off the bone. Take what is rightfully yours, what is rightfully your kin’s. And if he cannot eat anymore, Allan will do it for him. He’ll just sit on his nest like a helpless baby bird as his father spoonfeeds him his favorite slop, ground up into brownish-grey mush when his body, eventually followed by his mind, fails him. Because his father has always fed him. That’s what living is to him now. That’s besides the point, too. What’s the point, then? The point is that they’re having dinner in Gear County right now, and what he feels later, tomorrow, or for the unforeseeable future do not matter.
Allan reached for the wine bottle resting on the turntable. The bearings let out a nigh-inaudible creak. Cathal noticed the red, sticky ring it left behind on the glass. It’s too much of a hassle to remind him that the ice bucket is right between them.
“One day, my boy,” Allan Bravecog, the Senior Vice President of Sales, turned his face (the happy face, of course, no other sight is reserved for his son) as he poured himself another glass of wine, “all of that shall be yours.”
Allan then gestured towards the windows opening the scenery overlooking the neighborhood. They are seated at the center of the restaurant, far from the windows calculated from any wall, but it’s not a bother for Cathal who had seen such sight every week. Constructions postponed due to the city’s lack of funds, scaffolding left untouched after disputes between shareholders, newly-built cafes with eyestraining signs promoting overpriced trending food as if they’re warehouses churning out edible fast fashion.
In a weak attempt to match their father’s enthusiasm, Cathal halted poking at the pea, now a barely-recognizeable mush, and tilted their head in the direction Allan wanted him to see.
The father remained silent. Ten exact seconds passed before Cathal opened their mouth again.
“All of it?”
“Why, yes, of course!”
The whirring stopped. “Everything?”
Allan’s teeth, straight and pearly-white, appalling and monstrous, continue to gnaw at the meal.
“Everything, son.”
Cathal could not look even more downcast.
“Okay.”
This does not bother him one bit.
The boy sat with his father at the dinner table.
It’s a thick, glossy one, appearance like polished rock slabs with sanded corners and edges, made from the finest marble you’d only hope to see on home renovation short form content on video sharing websites. The sickly warm lights did nothing to deter its cold nature, and it snugly juxtaposed itself against the seats that look like a weird mix of barstools and armchairs, soulless attempt at avant-garde architecture, fitted with leather padding and an adjustable height crank. The ribbon window wrapped around the observation deck of one of Cog Nation’s greatest skyscrapers the boy and his father were dining at. One might find it appetizing to feast upon a plate of puck-sized steak with a drizzle of beryl shavings worth an arm and a leg, since now dinner is a fleeting flaunting of one’s indescribable wealth.
These virtues were of no concern to the boy. He would not be able to understand anything even if one were to describe the weight of being a Cyger in the place he’d set foot on through mere five-word sentences with two syllables each. He does, luckily, understand the literal view of the world surrounding him – grey, overwhelming, and deprived of joy – and that it was suffocating him. Nevertheless, the iPad his father tactically brought tethered the boy to the ground, away from the dullness of the world that will soon await him.
The poor thing had to be placed on a booster seat. With a cushion.
He is five years old.
“Don’t make a fuss, sport,” Robert gently reprimanded Bobby Jr., who’s currently teaching his teddy bear how to hold a fork properly, but the boy is too young to take his father’s words seriously. Robert, on the other hand, was juggling a buzzing phone in one hand and a COGS Inc brand notepad in the other. His dinner, the size of four quarters, has gone cold.
Even with his speaker off, a feminine voice can be faintly heard barking over the phone, screaming something about “insufficient funds” and “Rolex not in the safe” as Robert’s eye twitches every now and then.
Bobby Jr., despite his naivete, was not stupid. His father was his hero. He always took him to dinners on Saturday evenings, and his presence was enough to make Bobby Jr. feel less alone, even with the cacophony of some slop going on autoplay in that tacky device of his. That’s what boys do, after all – idolize their fathers, hug them by their ankles while they’re still tykes, then learn how to dominate the grand scheme of society. And if his father is happy, then he is happy. His father is a parent, too, and what is a child’s job if not to make sure they remember it?
So he did what was necessary.
“I don’t like rust sticks, dad.” Bobby Jr. frowned. He gathered the uninvited guests of his dinner and shoved them towards the edge of his plate with the back of his fork. His other hand rests on a leg, for the marble table was getting too cold for him to bear. The more Bobby Jr. thought about the disgusting meal, the more he had to suppress the nausea inside his gut. The overhead lights continue to shine in defiance of his malady. Despite this, the boy hoped his father would “get the memo”, as the adults say.
And his father did. And a poor waitress did.
“Hey, you – come here for a sec, will you?” A sentence and tone familiar to Bobby Jr. reached his ears, much to his delight, and for a moment he snatched his attention away from his iPad. His victory was a short-lived one, sadly, because right after Robert finished another question about the verity of their dinner’s order, the clueless waitress tried to explain that no specifications were made about the kids’ meal, only to be harshly cut short by a flurry of insults and enraged ramblings of a man who, until that point, had managed to make himself look presentable in front of the impressionable boy.
As the waitress apologetically scurried away with Bobby Jr.’s meal in hand, Robert turned to look at the boy, seemingly having calmed down, if his strained smile was not obvious enough.
Bobby Jr.’s iPad lied face down on the dirtied marble table.
“Sorry, son. They always forget that us Cygers here are a regular, you know? Common folks here don’t know how to respect us properly. I’ll make it up to you later, okay?”
Bobby Jr. held back his tears as he fiddled with his teddy bear’s loose stuffings. His father apologetically turned back to the cellphone.
“Yeah,” he sniffled, resting his arms on the marble table, “serves her right.”
This does not bother him one bit.