"I love you enough to let you go."

[likefatherlikeson]

Who: Justin Campbell, Mark Campbell, Gen Hart and Presley Monroe
What: Seeking purpose
Where: Presley's office
When: Monday morning

Justin still wasn't quite sure how he had gone from probably the best high of his life winning the Tony Award, to the low he had hit now. The shit with Will and Kolbie, and the whole fan issues, it had marred his happiness on his win and now the award was sitting on his bookshelf behind a pile of his schoolbooks. He couldn't be excited about it anymore. He didn't feel like he could be excited about anything. All he really wanted was to go to bed, pull the covers over his head, and shut the damn world out for awhile. Inside, he was aching and miserable. He felt like he had been hit by a bus. Which is exactly why this meeting was happening.

It wasn't scheduled initially. Presley had invited Justin to speak briefly at one of the New York events, and he had left the ball in Justin's court. That was one of the things Justin had been considering when the shit with Will hit the fan. When his dad had taken him to the beach - after he had finished bawling his eyes out over breaking up with Will - they chatted and Justin had told his dad he didn't want to do the speech for the Foundation. It had only boiled down to the fact he was exhausted and emotionally wrecked, so adding something else on top of it felt like it would be the straw that broke the camels back.

Instead of just letting him pull the plug, his dad offered to speak with Presley on his behalf about what ways Justin could help if he chose to be involved with the charity. In turn, Presley warmly welcomed Justin and his parents to come meet with him at his office where it would be an open conversation about any facet of the organisation and what it was involved in. Justin didn't have to make any choices, and he there was no pressure. So, here they were, waiting in Presley's office for the guy to arrive.

Justin knew a little about the Foundation. In fact, he had been offered support from it when he had been diagnosed with bipolar and had to quit school. Kalen had liaised on that front for him, but ultimately a personal tutor for homeschooling was agreed upon and Justin hadn't wanted to take help away from someone else who might need it when he was lucky to have plenty of financial security now his dad was taking care of him. He was sitting in between his parents, looking down at his lap with his shoulders slumped. It wasn't that he didn't want to be here, it was just that his mood had plummeted over the last couple of days and he felt stuck under a heavy weight he couldn't shift. He couldn't even go home to bed after this, because Caden wanted to meet with him to talk about something to do with PR... whatever the hell that could be.

Comments

[aussielawyer]

Mark had an arm resting around his son's shoulders so he could know he at least had some moral support. Maybe it was Father's Day yesterday, and fathers all around the joint were doing their dad thing and being spoiled. For Mark, his kid had needed him so he took him away from the city to a nice, relatively quiet beach where they sat and talked for part of the time, or just sat in silence together at others. In the evening, Ali, Andrew, Sunshine and Jack had come around for a joint family dinner, which was nice, but Justin was in bed by about 7.30. That was okay too. Part of the true spirit of Father's Day was realising that being a dad was being whatever your kids needed you to be, and understanding that sometimes, stuff was just really hard.

They had Sunshine sleeping over for the night, and after watching the Little Mermaid, she was out like a light too. He wouldn't have wanted it any other way. Once he and Gen were alone, he filled her in on some of the things Justin had talked to him about throughout the day and he did a bit of looking up flights. It would be First Class, of course, but even moreso now they had a kid that got airsick so the more comfortable they could be the better. He hadn't discussed the chance of going to Australia with Justin yet. He was waiting until both Presley and Caden talked the logistics out with Justin first. Not only did Caden have interest in developing Footloose in Australia, but he wanted to sponsor an Aussie theatre kid to come to Broadway and work in Masterclasses for a few weeks with his Broadway leads, with a part in a chorus... likely Footloose, considering Justin was half Australian. So, Justin could speak with hopeful late teen/early twenties young people who would apply to win the opportunity. It was some very positive developments that would be fantastic experience for Justin, and Mark thought they would be healthy for his son's mind, all things considered. But in between them, Justin was flat and silent. He had barely said two words all morning, and he didn't look like he had slept a wink. Though, anyone who had experienced it knew how painful a broken heart, and this was the first time Justin was really experiencing that. Something a father couldn't stop, no matter how much he wished he could.