You're a good boy, Travis.
look, it's all fun and games, but then this fucking card. jesus christ in heaven with a stripper on his lap, it breaks me every time.
travis hackett is a grown-ass 56-year-old man. he's an officer of the police, a respected member of society. a werewolf hunter, to top that. but he keeps a recent birthday card from his mom pinned to a board. at this age, most mothers don't send a card, and if they do, most sons don't keep them. he did. it's not even the fact itself, it's the how he kept it.
he puts it in a room upstairs, where nobody usually goes, but he also keeps it on display there. he hides it away from others, but to him, it's an object of pride.
he keeps it open, so they words are easily seen.
and like... it's not even a good card. dull-colored, showing lack of interest or emotion of the person who chose it. kinda generic with its forced joke and the oh how the time flies message. this takes two whole lines out of five total. the last two are the driest congrats ever and the standard sign-off.
but the third line. You're a good boy, like a pat on the head. He's not the best anything or the most anything. He's not a dear son. He's just. A good. Boy. AND HE FUCKING KEEPS IT LIKE A TROPHY.
A good boy protects his family. You ain't no good boy.
and on that note, travis hackett starts to unravel. within the next seconds, he:
admits his failure at once (I wish I could take it back, but I can't) the moment his ma raises a voice
when it doesn't work, he does his best to calm the storm down, because I bet he knows exactly how this conflict escalates and he's been through it many times (he asks his mother to calm down, he says please to show he's being rational and not angry. him being angry makes her angry and the whole thing spirals out of control)
doesn't try to defend himself when his mother calls him a piece of shit and a trash and a motherfucker
calls out to her when nothing works
uses protective body language
you know who else does it? kids in abusive households, who had to find secret tracks around someone's temper and be on their best behavior, trying their hardest to prove their worth and failing. thinking: I'm not good enough. thinking: they wouldn't be angry with me if I were good.
so yeah, the fact that this royally fucked-up man clings to a birthday card with words of praise from the woman who got him that royally fucked-up in the first place? that. that's what breaks me.