For the hundredth time that day, my hand picks up the remote. While clutching a laundry basket, a fidget finds ON. I activate my son’s empty glare, and loses himself in the only familiar version of the world.
Not the version we had planned. Not the version we wanted to let him explore.
His eyes flicker when his first sight of a toy store lights up. Pressing a tiny fingerprint to the screen, he drags it down; passing a monster truck, an excavator, and swirling back up to the other side of the aisle. The smile is brief, as he glaces around a living room that he hasn’t been able to escape in two years.
I go to clean the TV, and only end up wiping my cheeks dry. A jagged swirl of hope, I cannot erase. For the space in time where there was more than this, I cannot wipe clean.
My TV is disgusting.
Kathlyn Ramsey Moore 