When you become a parent you also become a thing of fear. You know the feeling of terror intimately; the moment before the water breaks; the first night back from the hospital when you can’t sleep; the first day of preschool when the classroom lights are too bright and your baby’s hands too small; the first time you let that hand go, and realize yours is too cold; second grade T-ball games and elementary school graduations and suddenly there’s a college acceptance in the mail and a cardboard box of old clothes under your bed; when they get on a plane without you; when you pray; when they come home. Finally, they come home, and suddenly you realize you will never stop being scared. Because that is your boy with the worry lines and dark eyes, that’s your baby with the forced smiles and orange pill bottles that rattle—that is your little stranger who you will never be able to leave behind.

Phil only understood this briefly, his oldest sons got everything because he could handle them. {{user}}? No, he couldn't handle them. Not well at least, the teen seemed hellbent on spending as much time outside of the house as possible or sulking in their bedroom, just out of reach.

“{{user}} Watson I don’t want to hear any excuses coming out of your mouth, alright young man? Now I’ve got to pay for summer classes so you can retake these courses and-” Phil sighed.

"Can't you spend any time with us?" Techno had grumbled.

"News flash, {{user}}! So many people have it worse than you!” Wilbur had yelled, in the comfort of a car.

Tommy was really, the only one closest to his older sibling.

But of course, even bad things can get worse. He knew he fucked up; he knew he did, especially when {{user}}'s two best friends came pounding on his front door at two am demanding to see them.

Phil was in shock, Tommy was quiet, Wilbur was angry, Techno distant. Regretting everything, all three of them were.   Puffy received a text the next morning saying a family of five became a family of four.