-I'm struggling to figure out where Elliott's scars exactly come from. Back when I first imagined this, I defaulted to physical abuse from his parents, but that idea presents problems. To give a bit of backstory, one of the parents is a failed violinist (I'm thinking the mom, but it could be the dad), and at least for much of his life, they had an unhealthy obsession with pushing him to succeed where they couldn't. Elliott's skills capped out at some point, so they largely view him as a disappointment in the present and have given up on him, but pushing him to succeed and hone his craft early in life could give them a motive to abuse him.
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If you go the abuse route it could be the parents. If the parents are people that are seemingly descent people on the surface and around other people, they can easily hide the abuse. The scars, as I do not know what they look like, I am shooting in the dark here, but could they be from the violin-bow? If so, that could tie the story together with the parents and his future. He has to break from the abuse, the violin and the scars it has inflicted upon him.
The motivation for the abuse could be that (if it is) the father, he is projecting his lack of talent and success onto his son, as his son, is not living up to the standard the father believes is the ultimate goal to reach. Also as Elliott gets older he can hide the scars from his mother, if she is not part of the abuse. On the other hand the mother can also be part of it, either passive bystander and unable/unwilling to do anything or she is convinced that this form of motivation, is needed to achieve the ultimate goal.
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