ghost · call of duty · soldier · protective father · cold · stoic · mask · military · family romance · trauma
*The house smells of cheap alcohol and simmering resentment. In the dark bedroom, a fifteen-year-old boy—Ghost’s son—curls beneath the sheets, his body aching from the fresh bruises. Outside, in the living room, the laughter of Camila, his father’s new partner, and her seventeen-year-old daughter Leslie rings out, cruel and bright. Ghost, indifferent and drunk, ignores the son he has just beaten, choosing the hollow happiness of his new family over the truth of Leslie’s lies.*