Cherry sales : Chapter 1

Just one more sale, that's all he needed one more sale, then his house would be clean of this shit. The powder, the uppers, downers and even speed all of it will be gone. He's meeting some fine art students from the nearby university who needed a final push to inspiration for their final projects and then his house would be clean again. Fenna and Sacha were one of his first buyers when he started pushing drugs out of his house not more than a year ago, they were skeptical at first considering his young age but were impressed by the quality of his (father's) product that they've been calling him up whenever they needed anything.

At 16 this was not how Damien used to spend his nights, his little business plan was never even part of what he thought living in Antwerp would be like. When he first heard of his father's plans to move the family to the much livelier city three years ago, he was absolutely excited to finally get out of Bruges. He stayed on that cloud of fancy parties and relatable friends for months till he noticed that things in his house were not as good as they were before. His parents were always somewhat distant, a distance he grew around and understood, but now the distance mutated into a wall that he could not get through no matter what he tried. His father increasingly absent due to formal social engagements with his "friends", his attempt at gaining political support and his mother attending the social events organised by the wives of said "friends". This silence stayed and went on for years.

There had been times that he would go weeks without seeing them, it was a quiet time but Damien just let the time pass by building model ships. He was attempting his first tall ship, a 14 inch Danmark, he was still gluing together the hull when his life took a dark turn.

It was a Thursday afternoon, he had gotten home from a French test which he barely passed, and he could never pronounce his vowels correctly to the frustration of his private tutors. He didn't have any friends due to his quiet and awkward nature, no one saw him as interesting enough to talk to. The hull was finished and Damien was to start work on the sails when his maid Helma came into his room crying, stammering in Dutch about his mother and an accident. He didn't need the details to know what happened. He just stared at the piece of string in his hands which was supposed to tie the sails to the masts but he could not remember how it was supposed to do that. He could not remember what he was doing; he couldn't remember much of anything other than the crying and the words "mother" and "accident".

Before Damien could make sense of the reality that had just fallen upon him he was already in his father's town car on his way to the private hospital his mother had been taken to. His father was talking to a Doctor about her condition in the hallway when Damien arrived. A nurse told him he can see his mother is he wants; he just lets her take his hand.

All he could see was his mother covered in stitches and bandages, tubes and wires going around her keeping her alive and yet showing how close to death she really was. He did not dare touch her; fearing that if he moved anything she could surely tip over to the other side, he just stayed still in his chair watching her pale face for any movements. His father was outside the room yelling at the doctor in German about how this can't happen. Damien stays in his chair.

They only got a few days with her, and then she crashed and burned for a second time. This time she was fully gone taking his father with her. The sun was shining as brightly as it could have the day she was buried; hundreds of people Damien didn't know showed up at the church offering shallow condolences and leaving soon after the coffin was lowered into the ground. Damien stood with his father who wore a somber expression, next to that grave until it was filled and covered with grass; he placed a bouquet of tulips on the ground above his mother, assuming they were her favourite flowers since she had always insisted that there be tulips in her drawing room. He wondered on the car ride home how many families would be spending the day at the park today.

It wasn't long after that did the older Dalgaard become harsher with his words and colder with his actions when it came to his life at home. Regardless of his bad attitude, Dalgaard Sr. still maintained good relations with most of his political allies particularly the ones in the customs division of the government who have consistent visits to the house.

Damien found out the reason behind those visits the day he was rummaging around his father's study looking for a stronger pair of scissors to cut the mast to his current model which was too long. Going through various drawers, Damien came across a baggie filled with white powder and a few bottles of prescription pills for conditions he was sure his father did not have. Knowing that the massive void between him and his father would mean any confrontation or words said about this would just be pointless, Damien started a search over his entire house to find every baggie and every pill. He could forgive his father for a lot of things but this was not going to be left alone, least of all by him. So, Damien figured out a way to get rid of the drugs and made a call to one of his classmates who he knew was having a party that night.

That's the story of how he is now sitting on a bench at the city square eating Belgian fries waiting for two fine art students to buy the last of his father drugs and he can go home to a clean house and feel somewhat normal again. Fenna and Sacha show up after his last French fry has been eaten and pay a good price for their drugs before saying goodbye and thanks. Damien walks home with a naïve sense that everything will be okay from now on. When he reaches the front door, his father greets him with absolute rage.

Though he does not know exactly how son got rid of his drugs he knows that he does have something to do with their disappearance, with that he sends him to a boarding school in America so he can no longer meddle in adult matters and that's the start of the story of how he meets a van der Woodsen who will breathe life back into him when his own father decides to cast him out.