All through the winter he was there. Every morning as I entered my office, I looked out of the window to check. The boy was in a doorway, wrapped in a filthy duvet trying to sleep.
Sometimes people gave him money, but mostly they just walked by. In all that time I never crossed the road to speak to him.
I hadn’t seen my son in ten years. He stayed with my wife when we broke up and she turned him against me. I moved to the city to get on with my life.
By chance at the weekend, I met a former neighbour who she told me she was so sorry and she couldn’t imagine what I was going through.
I had no clue what she was talking about and wasn’t interested in asking. She didn’t need prompting; she was determined to demonstrate her compassion. My son died a few weeks ago of a drug overdose. He’d left my wife when he was seventeen and after some years ended up in a squat with other addicts.
My neighbour clucked her condolences and went on her way.
I didn’t contact my wife. What can we tell one another?
Yesterday, I looked at the boy in the duvet properly for the first time. He was about my son’s age. I searched online for a local charity that works with street people and emailed them details of his location. This morning when I came in the boy and his duvet had gone.
Words: Richard Rooney
Illustration: A.I.
Flash Fiction 250
Flash Fiction 250 