A
Pretty Boy
by Empry
I was a pretty boy they said.
Not intelligent, talented or cute like the other ones but… pretty.
I guess they were too fascinated with my face that resembled my mother's so much that they couldn't see past it.
They couldn't see that I was hurt, afraid and that I was feeling anger because she had left me to be alone.
"You were lucky to have Meiko as your mother, Ren", said one of her admirers that had come to her funeral.
When drunk, which became a habit when my father suddenly died, she was barely aware of my existence. Wallowing in self-pity because of her sudden career-end she became absorbed in her own world, not noticing that I had my own way of dealing with the pain.
She didn't see the bruises that my body bore when I was coming back from the brawls with the other boys. She also didn't hear the screams that I let out when I was tired of that everlasting silence in our house.
She may have even forgotten me at all in between all her drug-cocktails if she hadn't caught me once watching one of her movies.
She had been young then and at the beginning of her career. Playing a young orphan that had managed to overcome poverty in her life. It had been an award-winning performance that opened up many doors for her.
Nowadays only her roles when she was playing beautiful and powerful women are remembered but this movie was the one I liked the best because I was feeling like I knew her at least a bit. She didn't comment on me watching it but her gaze lingered on me for a while till she returned to the whiskey bottles in her room.
I thought she had forgotten that day but shortly after her death her lawyer visited me and gave me the screenplays of the movies that she played in and that were full of her notes.
We may have been mother and son but the only thing we shared, were our faces and the contentedness of portraying other people because it was the only way we could properly express our feelings.
Author's Notes: FYI, I wrote this one-shot back in 2006 when it was not known who Ren's parents were and that's why this story does not really fit to the actual manga storyline.