"You're such a smart boy."

His father smiled at him. Sage.

"What do you want? Dad will buy you something you want!"

"I don't want anything." Sage sat quietly in his chair. He had returned from Elementary School with perfect grades. His feet barely touched the floor.

His dad patted him on the head. "That's my boy."

Sage closed his eyes under the warm touch. Soothing and calm, like a beam of sunlight in the afternoon.

Of course, my dad loves me, He thought.

--

A dinner plate shattered on the floor. Sage winced, but before all else begin to clean the shards up. He hoped desperately he didn't hear.

"SAGE!" He heard his father's voice from the other room.

Sage's instincts told him to hide, but there was nowhere to run and only worse to come if he did. Instead, he stood in place in shock and fear. His little heartbeat started to thud against his chest, and the panic rose to his head like a thundercloud.

His father marched across the room. He could see his father's face grow red and veins underneath the skin of his neck. His eyes were harsh as if the gaze could pierce through Sage's flesh.

He tried to explain that he didn't mean it and that he's sorry and that it won't ever happen again.

"Then why do you always make mistakes?"

Sage has learned by now that it is a trick question. There is no right question.

"Why do always make mistakes?" His father repeats, voice rising.

Because I'm worthless and undeserving and ungrateful. He wants to answer. Sage has tried that before. It didn't work.

His father struck his belt against the wall, a crack sharp that made Sage jump and cover his ears. "ANSWER ME."

Sage felt a throb at the perimeters of his body and the sweat that trickled down his face. "I-I don't know."

"I don't know I don't know. Is that all you know? Do you know anything? THINK." He commands.

Sage's vision blurs.

"Oh don't be so weak. Stop crying."

When Sage doesn't stop, the yells continue.

"If you don't stop crying I will strike you."

RUN RUN RUN RUN RUN His body tells him and then the tears come and hiccups arise and Sage tries to hold his breath to stop it.

"Will, you ever make this mistake again?" His father asks.

Sage knows this is another trick question. Say no and he will ask you why did you make another mistake. All other answer choices are unsatisfactory.

--

Eventually, eventually, Sage's father gets over his anger and lets him go. Sage was never sure why or how to calm him down. Perhaps it stopped when his father was sure he got his message. That he was useless and ungrateful and the devil. Under the heavy blankets, Sage feels hopeless. It's all my fault. He thought. Why why why couldn't he just be perfect. It wasn't that hard.

Again he thought his father must not love him anymore. No one can love something that's defected.

If I'm not perfect I might be discarded. And that was a much more frightening thought than being beaten.

In the end, he was too tired to think.

But before he fell asleep, his father returned to his room. He sat by Sage's bed and patted his son's head. Sage can already predict the lines he will say next.

"You know I only want the best for you."

And then Sage is relieved. Everything is okay. I am still worth loving, at least until the next mistake.

--

"Isn't all love conditional?" Sage thought out loud.

"Who are you talking to..." There was a stirring in the bedsheets.

Sage leaned out of the hotel window, watching cars below trudge by, into a sluggish night. The air smelled gasoline and cigarettes. There were no stars tonight.

"I find unconditional love hard to believe don't you think?" he continued. "No one loves a defect."

When did I get here? he thought. A desire to rebel? An urge to stop being perfect even just for a night? To pretend someone out there would love him regardless of who he was?

The stranger sat up the bed. Sage can't recall their name but remembers them inside him. "I sure love you right now," said the stranger and pats the pillow beside them.

Lies.

"Of course," Sage replied and slipped back under the sheets.