As a child, our son Timothy told his teachers he was adopted. During adolescence, he wailed in misery, certain that his best friends had moved away. By age twenty, Timothy’s grief sank into glum desolation, and he would lie on the bed all day, bemoaning an imaginary poverty. None of his therapists could free him from his flawed perception of loss...
This story (about 1000 words) can be found at Every Day Fiction.
See my Top Story of the Month interview about "Deprescience" at
Folly Blaine recorded a podcast of the story that you can listen to HERE.
The story came out as a reprint in August 2015 in Beyond Science Fiction.