Evenings
Chapter 15: Flashlight
He hid under her bed this time—maybe she wouldn't find him until his Dad got home. Then again, he dreaded that almost just as much, considering they would just fight about him, or, so a child would assume. He never heard his name, except when it dribbled out from between his mother's lips. He heard talk of 'acting strange', 'this is all I can do', and false promises.
He tucked his Sentai flashlight close to his chest and curled against the harsh carpet. Sleep would come to him soon and she wouldn't find him here. Yamato was a bit envious; Takeru was staying with one of their aunts for a few days while the parents 'worked things out'. Yamato wanted to go, too, of course—but that wasn't happening. Not while his mother was around and his school was insisting that was the last thing a troubled boy needed.
"Yamato? Yamato! I'm too tired for this!" called his mother.
The boy just nodded his head and backed further against the wall—if she did find him, maybe her claws wouldn't reach him. Or maybe he could blind her with the flashlight again. That had worked once before.
He heard her step into the room. Surely she was looking for him to do things that had become too frequent, too strange and confusing, and sometimes even painful. He watched her slippers cross the carpet and closed his eyes when he saw her palms hit the floor.
"Yamato. You need to go to bed. Come out from there!" she insisted.
"No!"
"Please, baby? You have school in the morning."
"No," he repeated, this time in a shakier voice. His eyes were hurting from keeping them scrunched closed and so they opened to meet the matching eyes of his mother. "You just do weird things."
Natsuko ran one hand over her face and she leaned down further on her opposite elbow, "Ya-Yamato, come on, just come out. I won't hurt you."
"Liar," he insisted, pointing the flashlight at her. How he wished it were a real gun, like the super heroes on TV. Then he could turn his mother back to normal, to the person he was slowly forgetting with every caress and whisper.
She reached out to him and he flipped it on, putting his faith in some kind of forlorn hope, but the light didn't even flicker. Terrified, he shook it. With a whine, he realized it wasn't coming on. He shook it again, but it was still just darkness.
"It won't glow," Yamato whispered to himself. All the voices around him, especially the worried pleading of his partner, weren't getting through. When he tried to answer for his own failures, only scared whimpers escaped him. He didn't have time to run, to hide, as eyes burned into him. Especially Taichi, who was long since fed up with his best friend's attitude. Kiwimon was already on them, but Yamato was frozen, staring at the lifeless crest in his hands. Gabumon rushed over to him; never seeing the blond so scared in his life.
"Yamato? Yamato, what's going on?"