How do you reconcile a broken family

well,

i think good stories come from real experiences. You need to put a little more effort on your setting scene.

It is hard for me to suggest anything without having a knowledge about the family and the characters involved, your characters, so if i give a suggestion chances are high that it will be vague...

You know when people re-concile?
When there is an outside threat.

It happens everywhere, family, individuals and offices. If two kids are fighting they become friends when they both have to hide each other's faults from their parents and like so.

So may be in your story you can come up with an event or antagonist that will result into friendship and re-conciliation of the family.

Open the newspapers, search google for such incidents and u will get many ideas... that are realistic and will fit your story too...

hope that helps

This seems like it would be a very character driven story so I would start by mapping out the characters. Figure out what makes them tick.

You say the family is broken. Why? Because of the death of the mother. Ok, but you'll have to go deeper than that. For example, the father may become emotionally cold and distant with the rest of the family which would affect the MC. Or the older sister (for example. I don't know the characters) takes up the role of the nurturing mother and the MC doesn't like it. Or maybe he feels alienated by the blood family members.

Their reactions against one another needs to create conflict. And conflict makes fiction. You need to create a story that's going to push the MC to the point to where he feels he has no choice but to run away.

Build these characters because that's what's going to make your story. If you get everything mapped out about them (likes, dislikes, quirks, history, ambitions, personality, etc.) to the point to where they're almost a real person then you'll probably find that these characters will write the story themselves.

And if the conflict is too big to resolve, then so what? Leave it ambiguous. For example:

Say you got the MC waiting in line at a bus station. Bags packed, ready to run away. As he stands in line he looks behind him. Across the street there's a small restaurant the family used to go to before the mom died. The MC remembers a particular night the family shared when they were once whole. A tear drips from his eye. He looks back at the ticket booth. Then at the restaurant. CUT TO BLACK.

While I say use ambiguity use it only when it makes sense in the context of the story. Inception was one of the few mainstream examples of using an ambiguous ending, but it worked for the story. The Dark Knight had an ending that, while resolving a lot, opened up new problems. But it was still a defined ending and wouldn't have worked if it was ambiguous.

All in all, just write.

I like LOL's suggestions. An ambiguous ending is needed here I feel. The conflict that makes him run can be anything from too much pressure having to take up the slack caused by their mother's absence or simply overhearing his father say something about wishing they hadnt adopted him. Either way, it's something the audience (despite probably not having faced that situation personally) could be able to feel an emotional link to the main character. Establishing that is key

You have received several good suggestions. One comment that I would make. You say your main character runs away. That leaves the family alone. As radical and contrary to your thinking as this may sound, he's no longer your main character. Your protagonist or main character is an active part of the change process. By leaving the family he is no longer directly active.

What I would suggest is you look at the family who stayed. Who has to take on the burden now. Make them the main character, the protagonist. Follow him or her as he pulls together the remaining family. You can have cutaways to your runaway who stays in touch with your new main character--maybe by letter or phone calls. You can follow him independently as he discovers himself. But really, your main hero is in the family. Now you can work the family reconstruction. When the 'prodigal son' returns, it will require more mending of family ties. However his return marks the emotional resolution you need and offers the glimmer of hope.

Hello, thanks for all the contributions

I realized that it's really hard to give suggestions without really knowing what's going on, so here's the unfinished 3rd revision of my plot so far, please take a look
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1BVSCWc7Rrlh22nt42ReBKBV2VnEFUN7pLriHW3-pwSc/edit?hl=en_US

@Lord of Light: My premise is surprisingly similar to what you mentioned, and you gave me quite a few ideas too, so thanks a lot!

@FantasySciFi: Really interesting thoughts, i never thought about it that way mmm... let me ponder on that a little longer...