Steve has all but been absorbed into the Henderson family, beloved by all their friends and seen as a treasured brother to Dustin and a delightful boy by Claudia. To Steve, Claudia is everything a mother should be; warm and gentle and kind and loving. Nothing at all like Steve knew a mother to be, nothing at all like his own cold distant disapproving mother who barely looks at him.
Maybe Claudia doesn’t know the Harringtons very well, maybe she doesn’t know Steve’s barely-there troubled relationship with them, but she wants to do something nice for Steve so she invites them to a family dinner with her and Dustin and anyone else the filler wishes. And when the dinner begins, the Hendersons don’t like what they see. In the presence of his parents, Steve is a shell of the sweet doting dorky young man they know, quiet and stiff and barely speaking. Perhaps his parents only talk about themselves, barely asking about him and not really listening to his responses, chiding him for little things and clearly disapproving of every aspect of him. It becomes increasingly clear to Dustin and Claudia that their Steve has been deprived of love his entire life, and it casts a sickening clarity on the way he gravitated towards the Hendersons like a moth to flame, the way he shows no regard for his own life or needs, the way he always puts everyone else first.
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timeasmymeasure
Harringtons and Henderson’s, awkward family dinner
Date: 2022-08-30 10:21 pm (UTC)Maybe Claudia doesn’t know the Harringtons very well, maybe she doesn’t know Steve’s barely-there troubled relationship with them, but she wants to do something nice for Steve so she invites them to a family dinner with her and Dustin and anyone else the filler wishes. And when the dinner begins, the Hendersons don’t like what they see. In the presence of his parents, Steve is a shell of the sweet doting dorky young man they know, quiet and stiff and barely speaking. Perhaps his parents only talk about themselves, barely asking about him and not really listening to his responses, chiding him for little things and clearly disapproving of every aspect of him. It becomes increasingly clear to Dustin and Claudia that their Steve has been deprived of love his entire life, and it casts a sickening clarity on the way he gravitated towards the Hendersons like a moth to flame, the way he shows no regard for his own life or needs, the way he always puts everyone else first.
They can’t let that continue.