Daily Cascade

"Is he... smart?"

Prompt:
Let's try another Sweeney exercise together. Think about any movie that has stuck with you. In your mind, create an image from the movie. Resist all temptation to explain or tell us the movie's name instead let the image speak for itself in your writing. Mathew Sweeney says," using the image to suggest more than itself is metaphorical approach because a metaphor works by using one thing to refer to in terms of another." Have fun!

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He stares at her, almost unable to breathe, at the blonde woman he had once loved. Maybe he still does. He cannot believe her son has his name. He feels a strange cocktail of emotions welling up, swirling together so fiercely.

Then, she tells him, apologizing, the truth.

The boy has bright-eyes, wild hair and a familiar quirk in his grin. It is like looking at a mirror from years ago, his own face glancing back at him, unguarded and unaware.

He panics. He is shaking inside.

"Is he... smart?" he asks, meaning 'Is he stupid like me?'

The boy rushes to the living room to watch 'Bert and Ernie' on the TV.

Such a shock! Certainly. But also regret, thick and heavy, sinking into him for the years he'd lost with the boy: his first step, first words, the small joys and pains and all else that had slipped past by him, without him. Did the child call someone else, "Dad"? He imagines the boy calling him, "Dad!"

Dad! A name he hadn't known himself. He wants to hear the boy say that to him. He wants it badly. He didn't know he'd want it this badly, this much...until now. Such an excitement...a nervous thrill at the idea of discovering a part of himself that had always been there, just hidden, waiting.

Then, as if he has stumbled into a life he didn't know he was meant for...he feels unprepared, exposed. The woman says, "Go talk to him."

And he does. There is hope now, fragile and sudden because he can change things. He could try. And he can. He knows he can.


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Note: here is the scene:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ITGEGE9v0d0