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Neglect
Don't know what happened. It just didn't quite work out. Just a prologue to a story i was writing.
Jonathan had no true upbringing during his youth. His mother, Sophia, had died a year after he was born from lung cancer, and his father, Charles, did not care for Jonathan. Perfection was the only child deserving of Charles’s love, and he did not find that in his son. Rather, he chose to bury himself within his work. He was an architect, and held his work of the highest regard. Every square inch was to be precise, every support positioned perfectly. There was no fault in Charles’s creations. So worthy were they of his praise that often he would sit in his drawing room, gazing at the finished product, marveling at the sheer beauty of his work. His perfection.
Even at the young age of 5, Jonathan had the patience of a Buddhist. At night when his father was working, he stared at him from the doorway, watching intently, and with deep interest. The passion which his father poured into his work dazzled him and he studied his moves, attempting to imitate them, and drawing imaginary pictures in the air. When it was time for Jonathan to go to sleep, he would remove himself silently from his seat, brush his teeth, and lie down in his bed.
Holidays were no different in Jonathan’s house. On Christmas, his father would sit down with him to eat a dinner from the French restaurant down the street, and would then resume his work. Jonathan would go to bed to find ten dollars on his dresser. He would place it in the small piggy bank he kept on his desk and go to sleep while his father drew his soul onto paper.
As much as Jonathan’s lack of a fatherly figure hurt him, it helped him all the same. He grew accustomed to being on his own and learned to take care of himself at a very young age. When he was 8 years old, he memorized every possible way to get home by subway, including the stops to get to school and his father’s place of work. He was an exceptionally bright child. Jonathan’s teacher was deeply impressed and had repeatedly asked Charles to come in to speak with him on Jonathan’s performance, and each time Charles had brushed it off, telling the teacher he had pressing business to attend to.
Regardless of his father’s negligence towards Jonathan’s needs, he had grown so accustomed to it that he did not feel the need for love and attention that a child often does in his elementary years. He took everything his father gave him as a blessing, and loved him with all his heart. Jonathan attributed the lack of attention to his father’s inability to show his emotions.
“That’s how all guys are,” Jonathan would think to himself, “I hope I grow up to be just like him. A great man.”
And then Jonathan would beam at his father’s back, while Charles pressed his nose into his creations.
Birthdays came and went, and Jonathan grew up to be a sharp young man. Everybody had seen the potential within him. His friends envied him, and his teacher’s prided his work. At 18, Jonathan had straight A’s in all his classes, and ended his senior year top of his class. This was the peak of Jonathan’s life.
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