(essay)

He never heard his father’s last words. Roy never thought about what kind of voice he had. The only thing he knew about his father was that he was a man. Who lived somewhere…Who ate something. Who worked with somebody. According to this description, every second man on his street could be his father.

Standing on his mother’s grave, Roy thought about the values ​​she had invested in him. She never spoke badly about his father and rarely complained about men in general. Pig Bob from work isn’t added in this list. That bastard should have been locked up a long time ago.

His mother respected the man and the humanity in him or her.

It doesn’t matter what orientation he or she is. It doesn’t matter how many hands he or she has. It doesn’t matter what part of the city he or she lives in. Everyone has their own reasons for one decision or another. And everyone has a choice how to act in certain circumstances.

His mother believed in the multiverse. In another universe, his father stayed in the family and instead of Roy, the Cherisher raised Anthony. That was the name of his father’s favorite cartoon character. Perhaps it was a sign that his father was too infantile to be responsible for raising his child in this universe.

His mother never treated him as a mistake or a big obstacle in her plans for her promising and productive years of youth. In another universe, she left him with his father and flied to New York to pursue a career as an architect with a prestigious architecture and construction firm. And there Roy also was Anthony.

His mother didn’t scold him for childish pranks. She was only frightened, and when she calmed down, she explained what danger had lurked in his antics. When he had eaten her lipstick, she wondered how Roy could manage a “treat” that tasted so awful when there were chocolate chip cookies waiting for him in the kitchen. In another universe, she didn’t explain him how many chemicals were in lipstick, but simply spanked him and put in a corner. It didn’t matter if he was Roy or Anthony.

His mother often told him how much she loved him. Her voice wasn’t cut through obsessively sentimental notes from which the child rejoices, the teenager is embarrassed, and the adult replies with a sigh “me too.” Roy felt how calm and wide love could be. She always loved him no matter what. In another universe, he was born a girl. A girl who was loved by both grandmothers, and not only by granny Mariette, mother’s mom. Grandma Jade, dad’s mom, had insisted on the name Jade. In the honor of herself…And she raised a girl as arrogant and hypocritical as herself.

His mother knew how to be a good mother. She reassured Roy every time she went to work that she wasn’t leaving him, but was seeking a good future for him and secure happiness for her family. In another universe, she left Roy with his granny Mariette and went to the New York to build a career as a successful architect. He became attached to his granny and took every visit of his mother hard. He remembered her from the gifts and numerous promises that next time she would return forever.

Roy stood at his mother’s grave for a long time and analyzed his childhood, imagining it in the conditions of other universes. Until some man abruptly pushed Roy out of his thoughts: “Once I confessed my love to this woman …”

He never heard his father’s last words. But heard the first. “Once I confessed my love to this woman …” He confessed. Didn’t love. Instead of sincere words, false confessions. Instead of helping, he simply ran away, leaving her alone with the child.

In another universe, Roy went berserk and punched his father in the face. And in this one, he did it too…