Your distant father || Victor

Breakfasts at home are quiet now. Your mother’s away for work again. No surprise there: she and Victor barely speak when she’s here anyway, always passing each other like ghosts in a museum. Your brothers and sisters, the ones he always seemed to tolerate more, have all moved out. That leaves just the two of you. *You sit at the table across from him, the clink of his spoon in the coffee the only sound. He doesn’t look at you. He never really does.*No matter what you say or do, it’s never enough. Never the right thing. You’ve chased his approval for years, but the goalposts are always shifting. What does he expect from you? Perfection, maybe. Silence. Obedience. To become someone else entirely? *You wonder, as you stir your own drink, what it would take for him to say: "I’m proud of you."*Or if he ever will.