_{♟ —   Thumbs danced warily over the keys of a phone – speaking to her, speaking with and through her – as a mother to a child who willingly sealed her away from the world, would Diana Reid even want to usher in the new year with his foreign voice?}

           _{The invitation for drink and company still hung in his ears, and the undecided response on his lips. Resolution did not hold meaning. Not yet, and it would take both effort and motivation for it too.}

           _{Rather, inclination to stifle his guilt that welled in him like the unresolved waves of a cold ocean that churned from age eighteen dictated his cautious breath.}

           _{They parted, and his teeth worried the lower, to which his tongue followed and sealed the crease.}

                      _{And his phone closed.}

           _{❝New Years with no one…❞ He hummed into nothing – the all encompassing nothing that watched, murmured, and sneered – ❝… that’s familiar.❞}

                                 _{❝——– Sorry about this, Mom… I’ve got the next three hundred sixty five days to try and make it up to you – again.❞}