Moving Forward

Everything inside the Heseroph household was unbearably quiet for once. The lights were off, the curtains were drawn, and the air was still. There were no more doors opening and closing, no more murmurings, not even the clacking of a computer keyboard.

The house had gone quiet.

As it was, a middle aged Russian man named Olag was lying on his back, arms folded behind his head, staring at his ceiling as he wondered about things.

Mostly, his thoughts consisted of his only son, Xaphile.

A lot had happened recently, right under his nose. And he knew he was still missing a vast majority of what was really going on, including several keys to his boy's puzzling behavior.

It had been three months since his kid had gotten shot in the arm.

Three months since he'd come back from some girl's funeral looking like a drowned cat.

And three months of total silence had come from the bedroom at the end of the hall.

He no longer attended school. After going back for a week, his kid had abruptly stopped showing up to classes one day without him knowing. Then, due to a month and a half of ditching, he'd finally been expelled, which had gotten them both in trouble.

Enough trouble that he, Olag Heseroph, had actually relapsed into his abusive ways and beaten his son like the old days.

During that incident, however, he had noticed something very creepy about his kid. And because of it, for the first time in his life, his temper had fizzled out.

Despite being screamed at and violently slapped around, Xaphile had merely stared off into space with eyes that looked like a doll's, glassy and emotionless.

Instead of staying furious, Olag had felt bizarrely worried since his son hadn't even twitched.

It was like Xaphile hadn't even realized he was there.

Since that freakish incident, he hadn't set foot in his kid's room.

He had merely lain down to think, which he had done nonstop for three days.

He didn't know what else to do aside from try to piece together the puzzle that was his child.

Unfortunately, that morning, the strange routine his musings had formed was interrupted by the sound of the doorbell.

Forced into getting out of bed prematurely, his temper spiked since he was already feeling groggy and irritable from his hangover.

Grumbling under his breath, he plodded downstairs and threw the door open.

"Vhat do you vant?" Olag demanded, giving the chubby brown-haired woman standing on his porch a hostile glare. "If you're here to preach or zell somezhing, get ze hell off my property. I ain't interested."

The woman, who had puffy eyes and extremely dark circles beneath them, blinked at him in confusion.

"Are you... Xaphile's father?" she tentatively asked, staring up at his huge physique with something akin to disbelief. "Mr. Heseroph?"

"Da, zhat'd be me," the Russian man grunted, looking down at her with bloodshot eyes. "Who's asking?"

"My name is Connie Richardson," she quietly told him, holding out a hand. "I'm... Ella's mother."

He stared blankly.

"Who zhe hell is Ella?" Olag snorted, tilting his head. "I have never heard of her. Zhe one of my boy's classmates or zomething?"

The woman's eyes widened in utter shock, but after a moment she looked closer at him and frowned a little.

"Yes, I guess you could say that," Mrs. Richardson murmured, rubbing her left eye. "Is Xaphile here? I heard today from one of the other parents that he hasn't been coming to school for quite a long time... I was worried, so I wanted to make sure he was doing all right. Also, today is his seventeenth birthday, so..."

His eyes went blank for a moment when she held up a card.

He had forgotten his own kid's birthday.

The saddest part was that he didn't really feel bad about it.

"By all means, zhen," the man muttered, stepping aside and waving her in. "Zhis place is a sty, zhough."

It was an understatement.

Beer cans and bottles lay everywhere among mountains of garbage, and dirty dishes were stacked up on the coffee table. Clothes were lying all over, and the place smelled a tad sour. The woman ignored that, however, and looked around.

"How has he been doing?" she asked, looking at the giant with apprehensive eyes. "Emotionally, I mean..."

"Dunno vhat you are getting at, but if you're referring to my little brat's ztrange behavior lately, I vouldn't know anything," the man grunted, grabbing a beer from the fridge and popping the top. "He hasn't zet foot outside of his bedroom for anyzhing but chow time and taking zhe occasional piss. Probably has to do with the shock of getting himzelf shot or somezhing."

The woman's nose wrinkled at the foul language, but she let it go.

"Where's his room?" she asked, looking around. "I really need to speak with him..."

"You are not a social worker, da?" Olag ground out, making her frown at him. "I don't like social workers."

"No, I'm not a social worker," she stated politely, shaking her head. "I'm simply a mother who's worried about her daughter's friend."

The man nodded, then walked over to the staircase.

"Malen'kiy Ublyudok! Poluchite vash osel zdes', pryamo seychas!" he roared, voice practically shaking the house and making the woman jump. "You've got a fucking visitor!"

There was no answer.

"Xaph?" Mrs. Richardson stammered, looking a little more hesitant. "Are... you okay? It's Mrs. R..."

Once again... no answer.

After a moment, the man looked at her and shrugged before plopping down on the couch and grabbing the television remote.

"His room is at zhe top of zhe stairs, first door on zhe right," he yawned, lewdly scratching himself and making the woman's hackles rise almost immediately. "You can zhow yourself out of my house once you're done checking on zhe brat."

Looking baffled and slightly disbelieving, Connie slowly turned her head and glanced at the stairs. Then she pulled a few things out of her purse and looked at them. Her eyes began to water and she rubbed them a little, sniffing.

In her hands were two photos: one of Xaphile standing awkwardly between her and her daughter, looking like he didn't really know how to handle having two laughing women holding onto his arms.

He looked very much like a startled cat... he'd always been mellow like one, but his gawky, awkward side had always been one of his funny traits.

In the second picture beside it, the two of them had been at the Homecoming Dance.

In it, he was holding Ella at arm's length and looking down at her with eyes that conveyed volumes of love and utter adoration.

His hair had been tied back, revealing just how handsome he was... and his teal eyes seemed to be sparkling.

Back then, he'd always looked so happy by Ella's side.

"My poor babies," she mumbled, pulling a tissue out of her purse and blowing her nose. "I have to make sure he's okay... we'll get through this."

The woman made her way up the wooden steps and headed for the room Xaphile was supposedly holed up in.

"Xaphy?" she called quietly, gently knocking on the wood. "Honey, it's Mrs. Richardson... I'm coming in, okay?"

Once again, there was no answer.
Only silence filled the air.

Ella's mother felt herself sinking into despair when she opened the door and slowly walked inside the bedroom.

It was extremely dark despite being very early in the day; only a thin shred of light peeked in through a gap in the curtains.

Upon inspection, the room was extremely clean for someone who had chosen to lock himself away. Normally, most boys would get sloppy in this type of situation, but Xaphile had acted the complete opposite.

There were no photos, posters, or even the normal messiness that came along with being a teenager, and aside from the books stacked up on the wall, there was nothing to mark this room as his own.

Actually... it felt as though the room didn't belong to anybody at all. It made her feel a bit uneasy.

Her blue eyes saddened when she saw a large lump under the thin sheets. Gleaming tendrils of Xaphile's dark hair were lying on the pillow, but he didn't move. Connie slowly looked down at the ground and clasped her hands, feeling her stomach twisting in dismay.

Xaphile was the type of boy who couldn't fully express his emotions to other people using words. She knew from experience that he was an exceedingly soft-spoken young man who wasn't good at socializing, and he was actually fairly clumsy compared to other boys despite his love for athletics.

In a nutshell, he was the kind of guy who would try running a track race and do great until the end, where he would trip in a spectacular manner.

Awkward in every form of the word.

She could still remember his face on that horrible Christmas because that night, something in his irises had gone out like a busted light.

She'd had a feeling that, once he'd realized what had actually happened, he had gone somewhere else inside his head.

But apparently, he hadn't come back from wherever he'd gone.

Connie knew that he was aware of her presence, so she slowly sat down on his bed and waited until he sat up.

His muscles rippled when he weakly pushed himself upright and turned to look in her direction. Tangled strands of his long black hair fell across his face when he looked up at her, slanted teal eyes somehow refusing to reflect things.

They looked even emptier than they'd been at the funeral.

Barren and lost, the sight of them made her blood run cold, and that icy sensation only deepened when she saw the gaunt bags beneath his eyes. They were so pronounced they almost looked like bruises.

He vacantly returned her worried gaze.

"Hey," Xaphile greeted in a deadened voice; no emotion whatsoever laced his tone. "It's been a while... is there anything I can do for you?"

"You already know the answer to that, sweetheart," Connie calmly explained, slowly lifting a hand to brush a strand of his tangled hair away from his forehead. "You can't lock yourself away like this... you have to stop hiding."

He stared at her with no feeling at all.

"I'm not hiding," Xaphile hoarsely explained, turning away from her. "That's not what I'm doing at all."

"Yes, you are," Connie sighed, shaking her head in dismay before she rubbed the bridge of her nose. "Darling... if what your father said to me is true, you've been hiding up here for three months... the only times you leave your room are when you shower, eat, and use the bathroom."

For a moment, he didn't move... but when he slowly lifted his head, she froze like a statue.

His eyes cut through her heart.

Even though they were so empty, she could see a level of agony within them that shook her core.

"I can't go anywhere without thinking of her," he stated simply. "We went everywhere... and because of that, every place has a memory. I can't look at anything that reminds me of her."

Her eyes hardened.

"Don't forget her," the woman snapped, clutching his arm. "That's the last thing you should be doing! Face the memories head on! Learn from them! Because if you give up, it'll be like abandoning her... and you can't ever do that. Not when you were her closest friend."

He merely looked at her.

His posture vaguely reminded her of a lost kitten.

She couldn't stand it.

Standing up, she walked over to the dresser and pulled out the first shirt she found before storming back over and handing it to him.

He simply stared at it.

"What are you doing?" he asked. "Why are you giving me this?"

"Because we're going for a walk," she stated firmly, mouth quivering. "I understand why you're hurting, Xaphy... but you can't do this. We have to take the first step forward... for her sake. If she were still here, she would cry her eyes out if she could see the state her death put you in."

He flinched and closed his eyes for a moment, then reluctantly took the shirt and slid it over his lean frame.

After fluffing his hair out of the neckline, he crawled out of bed and slid his socks and shoes on.

Then, donning his jacket and a scarf, he slid his hands in his pockets and stared at the floor, waiting.

Without further prompting, she opened his bedroom door and walked downstairs with him following closely behind, but when they left the house together, he didn't even glance back at his father.

A frigid wind hit his face when he stepped out into the sunlight.

Even though it was early spring, snow was still falling heavily.

Still, they kept walking, moving through their neighborhood and past the party store where he and Ella had always bought sugar daddy lollipops with their allowances.

His eyes slowly moved across all of the places they'd played together and hung out while he walked with her mother... so many places with memories.

Falling into the river and getting themselves soaked and scolded by Connie... doing homework under the huge tree in the park... playing tag along the sidewalks, riding down the street on Ella's first bike together, sitting on the benches and giving the birds some bread crusts. Lying on the grass and counting stars at night... looking for pictures in the clouds during the day... eating ice cream together... teasing each other. Snowball fights, and building snowmen.

In every place, mountains of those beautiful memories were lying untouched by the flow of time, so close he could have almost reached out and grabbed them.

He looked at every place the memories had been made, feeling even emptier than before.

But before he could dwell on it, Connie gripped his hand and pulled him a little bit faster, heading towards the diner where he and Ella had enjoyed their first date.

The two of them stood outside of it, and she set a reassuring hand on his arm when one of the waitresses halted and stared at them.

When she turned and said something, everyone inside the building immediately turned to look out the windows.

Xaphile watched as three familiar waitresses set their trays down and ran outside, Lucinda, Amy, and Ursula... Ella's three best friends from school.

Unlike him, Ella had started getting along with everyone once they'd entered middle school. Her personality had actually landed her some really sweet and awesome friends. He'd spent more than a little time around these three girls since they'd been Ella's go-to clique for everything girly. From make-overs, to slumber parties, the four of them had practically been inseparable.

When they sprinted over, he lowered his eyes and hid his irises with his hair, tensing when all three of them tackled him at top speed and threw their arms around him.

He staggered a little, but managed to keep himself upright.

"Xaphile! Oh, Xaphy... w-where the heck have you been?!" Lucinda stammered, pushing her platinum blonde hair out of her watering eyes. "We thought... we thought you might have run away or something! You haven't been at school since... well, you know... and everyone in class was worried sick about you! People spent a few hours each day after school looking for you!"

Lucinda had a somewhat sarcastic sense of humor, but out of everyone he knew, she was probably the only person who could understand the level of his agony. Like him, she didn't really have a ton of friends, but the ones she did have she loved with all her heart.

He felt a small stab of guilt, but it faded before long, just like everything else.

"How is your arm doing? Is it still hurting?" Amy tentatively asked, bouncing over and fretting over his left shoulder. "Has it healed yet?"

When he didn't respond, Connie sighed and stepped forward, setting a gentle hand on her dyed cerulean blue hair.

"He was hospitalized for nearly two weeks," Connie murmured, watching as he lifted a hand and touched the hidden injury. "He's doing better now, but I'm sure it still hurts him, so be careful."

"Okay," Amy sighed, looking up at him before her mouth trembled; tears sprang to her eyes behind her glasses and she sniffed. "It's... good to see you! We were worried!"

Xaphile merely looked at her, face completely expressionless.

Amy was a happy-go-lucky nerd who loved to draw, write, and pretty much do anything artistic. And she loved brightly colored things, to the point where she'd actually dyed her hair a bright shade of blue just so her clothes would stand out more. She was always smiling.

She wasn't smiling now.

Before he could respond, Ursula stepped forward, tossing her close-cropped auburn hair out of her steely grey eyes.

"You listen here!" she growled, stepping forward and jabbing his chest with a finger. "Ella was our friend, too, so we understand what you're going through, but-"

"Ursula," Lucinda warned, giving her a worried look. "Seriously, don't."

"No!" the redhead snapped, angrily stomping her foot. "He needs to hear it! We've known him just as long as we knew her, Lulu!"

"That doesn't warrant you yelling at him!"

Ursula fell silent and let out a sigh.

"Look... the point I'm trying to make here is that we're your friends, too, Xaphile," she finally muttered, looking away to hide the fact that her eyes were watering now. "Everyone misses Ella, and that's exactly why you shouldn't shut us out and disappear! When I heard that you were expelled from school as a result of extended absence, I was seriously worried! That isn't okay!"

Her words were met with a very uncomfortable silence.

Ursula was probably the closest thing to a Tsundere that he had ever seen in real life.

She never liked to admit how she was truly feeling.

"Xaph, look," Amy murmured, giving him a very tired look, "we just want you to know that if you ever need anything, don't hesitate to stop by. We're all grieving for Ellie. This isn't something you need to deal with by yourself. I wouldn't have been able to cope without Ursa and LuLu. We're here for you."

"Yeah," Lucinda finished, giving him a nod and trying to smile at him. "The manager told us to give you free meals whenever you stopped by, too... if it helps."

He almost seemed to be staring through them when his hair shifted enough for them to see.

His eyes were deadened and totally devoid of any feeling whatsoever.

"Thank you," he droned, closing them with a small exhale. "I appreciate your condolences."

"We have to get back to work," Amy murmured, hooking a strand of her bright blue hair behind her ear. "Really, though... don't hesitate to stop by, and call us if you want to talk."

They gave him worried glances when he remained silent, but eventually they turned to go, throwing a few unhappy looks over their shoulders. Once they were gone, he turned and started walking off in a seemingly aimless direction.

Connie followed him.

They walked for nearly ten minutes, but the woman was mildly surprised when he stopped in front of a fairly unremarkable tree and set his hand against the bark. He rubbed it with gentle fingers for a long moment... but when he lowered his arm, she saw what he'd been touching.

And her heart nearly broke.

His and Ella's names had been carved into the tree, and all around it were beautiful engravings... it looked more like a work of art than a tree.

After her daughter had been taken from them, a lot of people had been devastated, especially those who had been closest to her... but as strange as it felt to admit it, even to herself, Mrs. Richardson actually had a very bad feeling that Ella's passing had crushed Xaphile even more than it had crushed her.

Watching him attempt to speak at the funeral had only confirmed it.

She had known Xaphile long enough for him to feel like a son... she'd often thought of him as family.

Watching him that day had honestly broken her heart all over again, because she'd realized that he would never be the same again.

Nothing would ever be the same.

She would never forget the expression that had been in his eyes as they'd lowered her coffin into the ground.

He'd looked like a young man who'd been shattered completely from the inside out.

Shattered so much, that he couldn't even cry anymore.

His expression that day had spoken more powerfully than her own tears could have ever done.

"You're not alone," she stated weakly, finally stepping forward and resting her forehead against his broad back. "We all miss her... but time doesn't wait for people."

A cold wind swept through the area as she spoke, ruffling his long hair.

"That play... the one we went to see on Christmas..." he finally muttered, making her blink and look up at him. "What was it called?"

She stared at his rigid shoulders for a long moment, trying to figure out what he meant until realization struck her.

"Romeo and Juliet..." she whispered, closing her eyes in remembrance. "It was one of the best performances I've ever seen."

He was silent for a long moment.

Then he turned around and looked at her, shoulders relaxing.

For a long moment, they merely looked at each other... but then, he gave a weak smile.

"I guess I should move forward, huh?" he asked, eyes taking on a slightly more reflective sheen. "That's what everyone wants... to move forward."

Relief flooded through her when he rubbed his eyes.

"Yes, sweetheart," she explained, nodding when he wrapped his arms around her and pulled her into a hug. "That's what Ella would want."

"Then I guess that's what I'll do," he whispered, pulling back and giving her that same little smile before shoving his hands in his pockets and slinking away. "I'll move forward... in my own way, I think I can do it."

She smiled for a moment as she watched him go, hoping he would begin the road to recovering himself... but then, strangely, she had this sudden, bizarre urge to grasp his hand and force him to turn around.

However, she ignored the feeling and decided to head home, since it was getting pretty late in the afternoon.

If only she had known.

She wouldn't have let him leave.

She would have stayed with him instead of letting him walk away,

Because, you see... that was the last time anyone ever saw him.

Foreign Glossary

* "Malen'kiy Ublyudok! Poluchite vash osel zdes', pryamo seychas!"

"Little Bastard! Get your ass down here, now!"