Our Last Family Dinner
All of it was over.
I drifted toward the sunlight, toward the distance. The warmth fell across me, gentle and steady, without a trace of cold.
I felt my body growing transparent, fading into the light, little by little.
There was no pain. There was no sadness, only a boundless, quiet peace.
I knew I was disappearing, disappearing from a world that had given me nothing but suffering, dissolving into the endless sweep of time.
After this, there would be no more Tommy Lawson. No more the boy who had been broken by a behavioral correction camp, failed by his parents' blind conviction, and dragged down by his sister's inability to act.