"I wanna go pee."
"Joey I asked you if you needed to go and you said no. We'll stop at the gas station while we tank and you can use the washroom there, okay honey?" The woman said all of this very quickly.
The lightly freckled ten year old boy freed himself from the pillows resting on his lap, unfastened his seatbelt and left the car as if his mother hadn't spoken at all.
Leaving the car door ajar, he strolled across the front lawn in a need of a haircut, looking at the house to see if his daddy was standing by the windows, seeing them off after the last goodbye hug Serenity and him were going to have in a long time, but the lights inside weren't turned on and the curtains were closed and you couldn't see inside. Joey went into the house and closed the door carefully behind him, because his father didn't like it when the door was slammed while he watched TV. Dad was always watching TV so it always bothered him when the door was slammed.
The little blond gingerly walked to the bathroom with his favorite Optimus Prime sneakers on, peeking over his shoulder to see what the man was watching, the TV was always on his Dad liked it like that. Dad always loved to watch TV, sometimes he would let Joey watch violent films with him when Mom was playing bridge on Wednesday nights, but after Dad stopped going to the factory to work he left the TV turned on all the time even with no sound, because he would do something at the same time and it made him feel like he was a busy man, he said.
But now he was watching nothing.
The TV was turned off and his father was not moving. Joey retreated from the bathroom, he didn't really want to go pee anyway he just wanted ot take a goog look at the house one last time, and so Joey walked to the living room and unto the beige carpet, even though he had his shoes on, because it didn't matter this was the last time he could walk on that carpet anyway.
The scene before him was beyond strange. He had never seen his father like this. He was just staring into space. It's like there was an empty person on the sofa with nobody inside, the eyelids were half closed and there was no glow in the normally expressive brown eyes of his father. He didn't even react when Joey put himself between him and the TV set (even if Dad got angry he couldn't send Joey to his room because it was not his room anymore).
It was sad when his parents argued and when Mommy and Serenity cried, but it was also sad if his Dad was going to stay alone in the house like this.
Joey tip toed away from the man as if he didn't want to wake him up, well he knew his Dad was not quite asleep but maybe something inside him was, he didn't know quite what exactly.
Outside, the rest of his family was waiting for him, the car engine roaring already. Joey strolled to the car but stopped in front of his car door, left hanging open.
"Come on, Joey."
His mother had said this a tad impatiently, seeing how it was getting darker by the minute and how she hated to drive in the dark, especially in a sedan crammed with two small kids and their combined luggage. She motioned for him to sit next to his baby sister, who was buried under double her share of pillows and shiny, pink and white, Barbie themed duffel bags. "Hurry up!", she said in a little voice, half pretending to be struggling under a crushing weight.
"Serenity, don't whine after your brother. Joey, hurry up, it's getting late."
Joey didn't move forward and shifted his weight, looking at down his worn out shoes sheepishly. The young matriarch got out of the car, key still in the ignition, and her kitty heels clicked and clacked on the pavement all the the way to her boy. She knelt before him so that their eyes were more or less at the same level, and grabbed him by the shoulders like she did that time when he used a metal knife to steer the toast out of the toaster.
"Honey, look, I know you really like the Transformers poster but we can't bring it because it doesn't fit in the car."
She panicked inwardly; she could see the moisture springing in his beautiful brown eyes. His father's eyes. She then spoke even faster because she knew that otherwise her voice would stagger a bit.
"Honey, look, when we get to our new home, we'll go to the mall together and we'll get you a new poster, I promise, okay? Look at me Joey." She grabbed him by the chin, pulling it up a bit. "Look at me."
The boy shook his head sideways, still avoiding his mother's stern gaze. He glanced at Serenity, who had fallen asleep already, drooling on his pillows. He looked at the the dull front windows of the house behind him and looked at his feet again, sniffing this time.
"I want to stay with Daddy."