Chapter Text
"...Mom?" Clyde voiced across the hallway, small hands meandering along the door.
"What is it, Clyde?" Betsy asked, slowly turning her eyes from the words in front of her to look at the boy. Clyde shyly stood there staring at her through the small space between the door and it's frame.
Clyde sniffled, his lower lip abruptly started trembling as he steadily approached the edge of the bed his parents slept in.
His hands anxiously fisted the pale bedsheets as tears started forming at the corners of his eyes.
Betsy invited the kid to climb on with a soft pat, to which he did, causing small salty spots to appear on the blanket.
"Are you okay, love?" Betsy gently inquired, putting her book away to reach for her son's hair.
Clyde just sobbed louder, and reached to wrap around his mom's torso.
"What's wrong?" She asked again, seeing his weeping do nothing but increase.
"I can't sleep.." Clyde shortly elaborated, before huffing and laying his head ontop of his mom's chest.
Betsy's perfume smelled so nice, it could comfort Clyde by itself, even.
Flowers and small hints of vanilla, it was sweet, and comfortable. Clyde closed his eyes for a moment and let the soft aroma hug him as gently as his mom did.
"Nightmares?" She asked, running her hand through Clyde's brown hair. Hair she'd carefully taught Clyde how to take care of since forever. A small smile of pride tugged her face at the soft texture.
Betsy carefully rubbed wide circles on his back with the palm of her free hand, patiently waiting for her son to respond, or just nod, that was okay too.
"Nightmares." Clyde mumbled, lifting his head momentarily to wipe his face with his sleeve.
"Do you want to talk about it?" Betsy suggested, looking at Clyde's face for the moment he lifted his head up, and watched him lay back down.
He seemed calm for a second; but the question slightly got to him, making his eyes tear up again.
"...No."
"That's okay... that's alright." Betsy assured, letting her middle get tightly hugged by Clyde.
The pair just took in their silence, and sat comfortably on the dim light provided by the lamp on Betsy's night table.
Roger had gone out on a business trip, and without Clyde's sister here, it got pretty lonely in the house, some company was always appreciated, even if it was past bedtime.
"Can I sleep here today?" Clyde quietly asked, making his mom softly chuckle.
"Yes, don't worry." She tried to wipe the kid's wet cheeks with her thumb.
"I'll be here, always."
Clyde read the last phrase from the card his mom had left him.
The letters were so round and so calm, as if she always had time for this, as if she knew from the beginning she wasn't gonna make it.
He walked around his parent's room before laying in the side of the bed that long missed it's owner.
Flowers and a hint of vanilla lingered on the spot, but this time instead of comforting Clyde they made him feel worse. Now they were intoxicating rather than softly embracing, because they reminded him of mom.
But perfume wasn't supposed to make you feel bad, Clyde smelled that scent countless times and wasn't able to get enough of it, yet this time he couldn't stand it.
He was angry, he was sad- he was... confused, his mom wasn't old, he thought only old people died.
Why do young people have to die, too?
When Roger told him mom was sick, and that she was going to act a little bit differently- he never thought about this possibly ever happening.
Clyde wanted to know why mom was screaming at him, she never did, why now?
He was confused too when mom mentioned his sister, who didn't even live with them anymore; but Betsy spoke about her as if she did. She seemed so casual about it, yet Clyde remembers seeing Roger's concerned expression the first time she did.
"She has something in her brain... Clyde." dad explained one day "It might make her get a little bit- mad all of a sudden, but it's not her fault." He sat at the edge of Clyde's bed "We need to be patient with her, okay?"
And Clyde was patient, he quietly took the unintentional yelling and tried to help the best he could with what his mother needed.
Mom was sick, hospital-level sick, and Clyde needed to be patient.
Yet all that was for nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing.
He wanted to tear something apart, he wanted to be mad and stomp around the room and cause a ruckus.
And yet somehow he couldn't; even with Craig right there to pat his back, reassure him, comfort him in the same fashion he always did.
He couldn't cry, but he wanted to, so bad.
All those insignificant mishaps where he did cry, that earned him the nickname of "crybaby" through some students; had made Clyde run out of tears. It was now when he couldn't cry his eyes out like he did at least once a week at school.
He couldn't begin to grasp the idea that his mother was just not longer there, and she was never going to be again; not as she had promised.
And then he had the most unfortunate deja vu. Sitting on her bed as her friends and relatives quietly spoke downstairs.
Hearing the faint sound of cars passing by he felt as if he'd already lived this.
Just a year ago when everything seemed fine, when he was nine years old and woke up from a terrible nightmare.