After thirty minutes of staring at his ceiling in silence, he takes a deep breath, sits up, and gnces at his clock. It was quarter to five. I Need to go to the bathroom. He thought to himself. He wasn't in there for long. A minute max before he flushes the toilet, and washes his hands before he leaves. He turns left and takes three steps toward his room but then stops and looks at the door to his father's study. He stands still for a second and thinks. A little time in there couldn't hurt. He then slowly walks over to his father's study, quietly opens the door, and shuts it behind him trying to make the least amount of noise as possible.

  As he was facing the now closed door he turned around and scanned the room to see that the room was the same as always. The room had a single bck bookshelf that had old cw marks all over it from Jazzalyn. His Father tried to repce it many times but anytime he tried, Jazzalyn would hiss and scratch anyone who tried to remove it. Once Jazzalyn died after seven years of them having her he decided to keep the bookshelf as a way of remembering her. The room also contained a fluffy white carpet, a two-square window that had some action figures on it, a brown desk, and a light brown chair. On top of the desk, it had multi-colored folders, three pens, a silver rectangle tin that held his father's cigars, with his favorite lighter beside it, and a picture frame that used to contain a picture of the whole family. But now held a picture of Kodey smiling in a bar wearing his casual clothes.

  Lincoln took a deep breath and he was surprised that he was still able to smell the scent of his dad's cologne that he would wear all time no matter the occasion. It wasn't an expensive bottle but his father loved the smell of it. "Wow," he says as he nods his head slowly as he feels like he has gone back in time for a second when he used to sneak in and watch his dad work. I'm never gonna get used to being in this room. He thinks to himself before he goes over to the window, opens it, and sits in front of the picture of his dad. He then pulls out his phone and puts on his father's favorite jazz song. Lincoln didn't listen to jazz in his free time as he found it too old-fashioned for his liking. "Nope." He ughs. "I don't know how you listen to this type of music." He then pces his phone on the table, picks up the tin, and pulls a cigar out. *Scratch. Scratch... fffff* Was the roar of the fme from his dad's lighter, he then set the cigar a light. A couple of seconds ter he closes his eyes, takes a deep breath, and says. "Hi, dad." When he opened his eyes back up he saw his father glowing in the sunlight near the window.

  "Welcome home." He takes a good look at him. "You went training again even though you just came out of hospital didn't you?" Kodey asks while he stands next to the window and blows smoke out of his nose with ease.

  "I mean I feel like I have rested enough so I gotta start training again. I need to get stronger so that I can win the next tournament and make you proud." Lincoln responds. Kodey slowly turns around, walks over to him and rustles his bck curly hair, and says.

  "You have already made me proud." While Kodey was rustling his hair, Lincoln could feel the warmth radiating off him which made him sad. Seeing that Lincoln's smile had faded away Kodey asks "What's wrong?" In a concerned tone.

  "If only that were true." He pauses. "If only you could tell me in person," Lincoln says in a sad tone in response while clenching his fists at the same time.

  "What did u-"

  "Nothing at all," Lincoln cuts him off. The room went silent and he was unable to hear his dad or the music. He could see Kodey's mouth moving but to Lincoln, it was like he had put everything on mute. "I see." He looks at Kodey wording something. "It doesn't matter what you say." He pauses. "Or do." He closes his eyes. "Cause I broke the illusion," Lincoln says sadly before he opens his eyes back up to see that Kodey was no longer in the room and the only thing he can feel is the cold breeze that was coming from the window. He falls backward onto the white carpet and spreads himself out like a starfish. "I promise you I will make you proud," he says quietly before he falls asleep.

  "Lincoln. Lincoln. Lincoln." Henna sighs and walks over to the table to turn off the music. "Come on, Lincoln, wake up." He opens up his eyes to see her crouched beside him. "Dinners ready," Henna says as she rises from her crouched position and goes to close the window while Lincoln gets up from the floor, stretches, and then starts to leave the room. "You okay?" Henna asks which makes him pause in the doorway. He turns and says.

  "Of course I am." With a fake smile on his face before he fully leaves the room and heads downstairs with Henna slightly behind him. "What are we having?" Lincoln asks as he enters the kitchen to see Izabelle frying some fresh burgers and a pot of pasta boiling. The smell of the burgers cooking made his mouth water.

  "We're having pasta mixed with cheese and burgers and Henna made some sad," Izabelle says as she turns off the stove and starts to pte the pasta. While she was doing this, Lincoln sat on the chair that was closest to the fridge and Henna grabbed the bowl of sad, and pced it on the table before she sat on the chair that was closest to the kitchen sink. "How many burgers do you guys want?" Izabelle asks.

  "I'll have one for now," Henna responds while texting someone.

  "I'll have two," Lincoln says in a happy tone. After she hears their responses she puts the amount of burgers they want on their pte.

  "Here you-" Before she could hand Henna her pte of food, Izabelle heard her phone start to ring from upstairs.

  "I'll be right back," Izabelle says with urgency as she rushes out of the kitchen as fast as she possibly can and up the stairs to get her phone. Once Henna hears the sound of her opening up her bedroom door, she pulls out a small bag of crushed sleeping pills. Walks over to the ptes, pinches a small amount of the powder, and sprinkles it into Izabelle's cheesy pasta. She then grabs Lincoln and her pte, hands him his pte, sits down with her food, and starts eating. A couple of seconds after Henna swallowed her first mouthful of cheesy pasta. While she was doing so she heard the sound of Izabelle coming back down the stairs. "Say something funny, anything," Henna says as she wants to pretend they are talking about something but Lincoln didn't catch on.

  "Huh." He says in a puzzled tone. Henna sighs and says.

  "Never mind." Before she kicks him in the shin making him shout in pain which makes her put on a believable ugh. Meanwhile, Izabelle comes back into the kitchen looking somewhat disappointed.

  "Sorry" -Izabelle sits down- "I thought that was your father but it was just Sophie," Izabelle says before she notices that Henna is dying of ughter and Lincoln is rubbing his shin. "What's so funny?"

  "Lincoln." She lets out a burst of ughter. "So, so. Oh gosh, okay. When he was staying at Brodie's house, they went out to drink and, and. As they were out he got so drunk. That he pissed himself and started calling a random girl mommy before vomiting on her. Henna says before she smacks the table once and starts to ugh uncontrolbly and nearly falling on the floor.

  "Okay, okay. It wasn't that funny. Gosh," Lincoln says before he stacks four pieces of cheesy pasta onto his fork, a slice of burger, and pops it into his mouth. This is really good. He thinks to himself as all the fvor hits his tongue making him want another mouthful as soon as possible. The cheesy pasta was great. Warm and light with a little kick of heat of spice but the burger was the best part for him. It was juicy and tender the way he liked it. After thirty-five minutes of them all eating, both Lincoln and Izabelle had finished eating and Henna only had a quarter of pasta left. "That was good mom," Lincoln says just before he pours himself a third gss of orange juice and takes a couple of sips.

  "I'm gd you enjoyed it," Izabelle says in a tired tone, with a small smile as she rubs her right eye. "Gosh, I'm tired."

  "Maybe you should head to bed," Henna says, even though she still had a spoonful of chewed-up pasta in her mouth. At least if you're gonna say something, finish what's in your mouth. Lincoln thought to himself.

  "Yeah, maybe you're right." Izabelle says while she struggles to get up and start to walk out of the kitchen "Goodnight." She says while yawning as she heads up the stairs.

  "Good night." Both Lincoln and Henna say in a loud tone so that Izabelle can hear them from the top of the stairs.

  "Henna." He takes two sips of his orange juice. "Don't you think it's time for us to stop this? I don't think it's right to continue to py pretend," Lincoln says as he tightly holds on to his cup while Henna finishes the mouthful of pasta that was in her mouth.

  "I don't see the problem," Henna replies with a calm tone.

  "You don't see the problem. Are you kidding me? Please tell me you're joking?" Lincoln asks in a serious tone.

  "Look." she let out a heavy sigh "We need to give her more time."

  "How much more? A week. Two weeks. A couple of months. Years." Henna stays silent. "How much more time does she need, Hmmm?" He pauses. "How long is she going to have to be drugged up just to get by the day? We both know that's not her. Not right now, and we're not helping. No, we're just holding her down with all this medication crap and shoving it down her throat like it's candy. Like here you go" -he smacks the table-"take it." -he smacks the table- "take it." -he smacks the table- "take it." He says smacking the table once more as he starts to shake with anger.

  "Look I said, she just needs more-" Before Henna could finish her sentence Lincoln shoots up from his chair in anger and says.

  "HOW MUCH-"

  "I DON'T FUCKING KNOW!!!" She screams at him at the top of her voice, cutting him off. She then takes a couple of seconds to take a couple of deep breaths and compose herself. "All I know is that she needs more time. She... She isn't ready to face reality. If we take her off the meds and tell her, she might go back to her old ways. I." Henna pauses to correct what she was going to say. "And I know we both don't want that so we're going to give her more time until she can handle the truth," Henna says. Not liking her say that, Lincoln picks up the gss he was drinking from and quickly throws it at the wall, having it explode into tiny pieces. *Psssh* was the sound of the gss smashing in the kitchen. He then storms out and heads to his room while Henna just looks at her food in silence.