Uncle Tom had never been very nice to me. When he went for diner at home on Sunday evening (because it was on his way to get back to work on Monday morning) he gave me a kiss on the forehead and didn't speak to me again for the rest of the evening. He gave me the regular kiss and hurried to join my parents in the living room to drink an aperitif, always a whiskey without ice. The three of them used to tchat for a long time in the living room, and it was as if I no longer existed, they simply ignored me, too focused on their adult conversations. They laughed a lot and got along well on many topics.
Sometimes my mother, seeing that I didn't know what to do to keep myself occupied, would try to explain to me why they were laughing so hard... I often didn't understand anything about the joke, but I laughed anyway to please Mom. She insisted that I stay with them in the living room with a Coke, and stroked my knees while chatting with Dad and Uncle Tom as if I were a pet... So I would go back to my room to play with the cat or at the computer while waiting for us to pass to table... I was very hungry because this aperitif used to last for ages, and secretly, I was hoping that I would finally be taken a little interest in me...
But when we got to the table, it was even worse ! They had drunk too much and never stopped talking amongst themselves and laughing at things that I never understood and, truth to be told, that did not interest me ! Then they would make the excuse that I had to go to bed because school the next day and I would then have to go back to my room and listen to them chatter in the dark. Luckily Mom always bought my favorite dessert when Uncle Tom came over.
Anyway, I didn't know Uncle Tom well and neither did he, and that was fine. But one day, when he showed up on a Sunday evening around 8 PM as usual, he was no longer the same. I, who had plenty of time to shadow the details since no one was paying attention to me, had noticed things that I did not understand. And when I talked to my mother about it, of course, she listened to me as usual (because she is very nice) but I could see in her eyes that she didn't take me seriously. She told me that she didn't notice any change in his behaviour, but that was entirely because people who love each other are blind when it comes to be objective. But me, I didn't like him at all, so I could be aware about the strangeness of it. Plus, he wore a long coat that he didn't take off despite the heat inside our house. And when my parents insisted for him to leave it, he took the excuse that he was sick. I swear that he hided something underneath or maybe his own transformed body...
However, I swear that Uncle Tom's movements, throughout the evening, had all been much slower than usual, that he had not blinked once all evening long, and that a flamboyant gleam passed through his eyes the only time he looked at me. The gaze was also prolonged, him who usually barely looked at me ! And at the same time as he turned to look at me, a broad smile appeared on his face, but a weird smile, a slow-motion smile. Even more, his face continued to split into a worrying grimace and he laughed out loud while continuing to stare at me, his eyes turning black again. I also heard clearly in my head (and in my heart) : “Don’t tell anyone.” I don't know how long this moment lasted, but it was like a freeze frame, a break in time because I noticed, after this long and weird moment of complicity with Uncle Tom - the only one I had in my entire life - that my parents continued to chatter as if Uncle Tom and I had never had any contact, as if nothing had actually happened...