The first time Raymond cried in front of his son, it was over a clogged drain.<\/p>\n
The kitchen sink had been slow for weeks. He\u2019d poured vinegar, baking soda, boiling water, every fix YouTube could throw at him. But that morning, as the coffee machine sputtered and sunlight hit the greasy dishes like judgment, the water finally stopped draining.<\/p>\n
He stared at it: a small, dark pool reflecting his own tired face. The man he wanted to be stared back, controlled, competent, unflinching. But all he saw was exhaustion.<\/p>\n
Liam, eight years old and half a bowl of cereal deep, asked, \u201cYou okay, Dad?\u201d<\/p>\n
Raymond grunted. \u201cYeah. Just need to clear this thing.\u201d<\/p>\n
He grabbed the wrench from the drawer, got on his knees, and twisted the pipe loose. A dribble of brown water spilt out. He smelled rot, old milk, and something else, his own impatience.<\/p>\n
Liam padded over, curious. \u201cGrandpa could fix it fast,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Raymond\u2019s shoulders stiffened. \u201cYeah, well\u2026 Grandpa had practice.\u201d<\/p>\n
The wrench slipped, hitting his thumb. \u201cShit!\u201d Pain seared through him. He slammed the tool down. It clattered against the tile, echoing through the kitchen. Liam jumped.<\/p>\n
Silence, except for the hum of the refrigerator.<\/p>\n
Raymond pressed his eyes shut. Not again.<\/p>\n
He\u2019d promised himself, promised his therapist, he\u2019d stop letting anger be the first thing out of his mouth. But here he was, a grown man, sober for three months, crying over a clogged drain while his son watched him unravel like cheap plumbing.<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t mean\u2014\u201d He wiped his face with the back of his wrist.<\/p>\n
Liam stood still, holding his spoon like a shield.<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t mean to yell,\u201d Raymond said again, quieter. \u201cIt\u2019s just\u2026 been a week.\u201d<\/p>\n
Liam nodded, serious in the way only children can be when they think they\u2019re protecting you. \u201cIt\u2019s okay. I yell at Minecraft sometimes.\u201d<\/p>\n
Raymond let out a shaky laugh. \u201cYeah? You get that from me, huh?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cFrom both of us.\u201d<\/p>\n
They sat on the floor. The pipe dripped between them. Raymond passed Liam the wrench. \u201cYou want to help?\u201d<\/p>\n
Liam hesitated, then knelt beside him. \u201cWhat do I do?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHold that right there. Don\u2019t let it slip.\u201d<\/p>\n
The boy\u2019s small hands wrapped around the cold metal. His fingers trembled slightly, just like Raymond\u2019s. Together, they turned the pipe, water gurgling as it gave way.<\/p>\n
Something about the sound loosened something else inside him, a knot he\u2019d carried for decades, the one his father tied tight, the one that told him men should endure, not cry.<\/p>\n
His dad used to fix everything. Broken fences, car engines, even the holes Raymond punched in drywall. But he never fixed himself. When cancer came, he refused the hospital bed, saying, \u201cA man shouldn\u2019t die lying down.\u201d<\/p>\n
Raymond hadn\u2019t known what to do with that. He still didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n
The water rushed free, spiralling down the drain. Liam whooped, \u201cWe did it!\u201d<\/p>\n
Raymond smiled, the kind that ached in his cheeks. \u201cWe did.\u201d<\/p>\n
He rinsed his hands and watched the sink swallow what was left of the mess.<\/p>\n
\u201cCan we make pancakes?\u201d Liam asked. \u201cMom says you make good ones.\u201d<\/p>\n
That used to be burned. \u201cShe said that?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah. She said you always made them on Sundays.\u201d<\/p>\n
He looked at the clock. Sunday.<\/p>\n
\u201cAlright,\u201d he said. \u201cPancakes it is.\u201d<\/p>\n
Liam clapped his hands, splashing a bit of leftover water on the counter.<\/p>\n
Raymond reached for the flour, and when he turned back, Liam was watching him, not like kids watch cartoons, but like they study you when deciding what kind of man to become.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat\u2019s it like?\u201d Liam asked.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat\u2019s what like?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cBeing a dad.\u201d<\/p>\n
Raymond measured sugar with more care than necessary. \u201cHard,\u201d he said. \u201cGood, but hard. Like fixing a leak you didn\u2019t know you had inside yourself.\u201d<\/p>\n
Liam nodded. \u201cI think you\u2019re good at it.\u201d<\/p>\n
The words hit him square in the chest. Not because they were true, he didn\u2019t know if they were, but because they were mercy. Pure, undeserved mercy.<\/p>\n
He flipped the first pancake. It tore in the middle.<\/p>\n
Liam said, \u201cDoesn\u2019t matter. We\u2019ll eat it anyway.\u201d<\/p>\n
Raymond laughed. \u201cYou\u2019re damn right we will.\u201d<\/p>\n
They ate at the counter, both barefoot, sticky with syrup. The radio played softly, a station his father used to keep on in the garage.<\/p>\n
When the DJ mentioned rain later that afternoon, Raymond glanced at the sink again. The water was clear, moving freely. He thought about how many things he\u2019d let clog inside him\u2014guilt, grief, his father\u2019s silence and how maybe, just maybe, it was time to let them drain, too.<\/p>\n
After breakfast, Liam went to play in his room. Raymond stayed, staring at his hands. Scarred, rough, unsteady.<\/p>\n
He filled a glass of water and lifted it, noticing how it trembled in the sunlight. It wasn\u2019t much. But it didn\u2019t spill.<\/p>\n
For the first time in a long while, that felt like enough.<\/p>\n
He took a sip, the coolness grounding him, and whispered, \u201cYou did good, kid.\u201d<\/p>\n
He wasn\u2019t sure if he was talking to his son or himself.<\/p>\n
Maybe both.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
He\u2019d promised himself, promised his therapist, he\u2019d stop letting anger be the first thing out of his mouth. But here he was, a grown man, sober for three months, crying over a clogged drain while his son watched him unravel like cheap plumbing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":182,"featured_media":24525,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3530],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23572","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-flash-fiction","writer-susmita-mukherjee"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23572","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/182"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23572"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23572\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24526,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23572\/revisions\/24526"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24525"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23572"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23572"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23572"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}