Excerpt: "This Is The Sound That's Made"

Taken from Chapter Two...

He stared at it once more before carefully opening it; he tried really hard not to tear the paper, because it wasn’t every day that he got presents from his parents, and gasped when he saw what was beneath the green and red shiny paper.
It was a golden pocket watch, large and round and beautiful. He could hear it ticking and was partly surprised that it still worked. He was even more surprised when he turned it over and saw an inscription on the back.

Sam,
This belonged to your grandfather, who passed it on to me.
I’m passing it on to you.
Take good care of it .You were named after him. I know he’d
want you to have this.
Dad

Tears filled Sam’s eyes as he turned the watch back over. This was his grandfather’s watch. It was of some value to his father. And his dad had passed down it to him. He couldn’t believe that his dad had given him something – first off, that was just unheard of, but second, what he had given him had to be a family heirloom or something, Sam didn’t doubt that his grandfather had gotten it from his dad, who had gotten it from his dad. He was even named after the guy, something Sam had never known before. It made him feel good inside, made him feel that if his parents named him after his grandpa, then they had to hold some measure of love for him.
He sniffed and placed the watch back into the box it was in and placed it on the paper, wiping the tears from his face. When his mom and dad got back from wherever they had gone, he was going to hug them and tell them that he loved them – even if they got creeped out. He didn’t care, though; maybe this gift would be the start of them treating him differently. Maybe this was the reason his father had come in to talk to him earlier this morning. Maybe, finally, they were actually beginning to love him. Maybe they would start being a real family now.