Rocco-s Pov 17 99%

He smiled—a small, crooked thing—and started walking toward the point.

“Ma,” he said, leaning over the railing.

Rocco grabbed his jacket. He didn’t know who he wanted to be tonight—the angry boy, the sad boy, the boy who kissed girls in closets and then ran. He only knew that staying in this room, with its museum of old selves, was a kind of dying. rocco-s pov 17

That was the motto of being seventeen. Maybe. Not yes, because yes meant commitment, and commitment meant the possibility of failure. Not no, because no meant closing a door, and every open door was a future you couldn’t afford to burn. So: maybe. The coward’s gold.

He walked out into the September dusk, the air sharp with the promise of autumn. Seventeen was not an answer. Seventeen was a bridge, and he was standing in the middle, the past a dim shoreline behind him, the future a fog he couldn’t see through. But the wind on his face felt like something. Like maybe, just maybe, he wasn’t broken. Like maybe he was just becoming. He didn’t know who he wanted to be

Downstairs, his mother hung up. He heard her blow her nose, then run the faucet to cover the sound. She would come up in a minute, knock twice—gentle, apologetic—and ask if he wanted meatloaf. She would pretend her eyes weren’t red. He would pretend not to notice. That was their love language: the art of the graceful lie.

The Weight of Seventeen

“Okay,” he said. His voice came out steady. That was another skill: the steady voice. The one that said I’m fine when his insides were a riot.

His mother’s knock came. Two soft raps. her footsteps retreating down the hall.

He heard her hesitate on the other side of the door. For a terrible, hopeful second, he thought she might say something real. I’m scared for you. I miss you. You’re not your father. But she just sighed, her footsteps retreating down the hall.