They said you'd meet someone, fall in love, and that'd be it. I spent most of my life believing this analogy and waiting to meet someone. I saw my parents and thought maybe that was love. It was sticking to each other to the end of time, even if it made you miserable. All that mattered was that you were together and stuck to each other like family.
I thought love was my mom crying at night alone and my father coming home drunk with a stack of cash to make her happy. And love was my mom's smiling face every midnight when she heard my father's car park in the driveway. And then love became breaking plates and shouting in the kitchen.
And then, love became seeing my mom drunk for the first time in my life, as my father didn't come home. Then, love became the best family trip of my life after a decade.
Now that I think about it, it was a happier time when the four of us would squeeze into one small motorcycle, and the only family trip we had was visiting family in the countryside. I, facing backwards with a backpack over my stomach, my mom carrying my little sister in the middle, and my father riding the motorcycle. I would take in the fresh smell of farms, and the wind would blow my hair. I'd be looking miserable, but my heart was the calmest. But then it became about front seats and closed windows with a nauseating car smell.
I thought if you had love, you had it all, and it wouldn't matter where you were or how much you had. I used to think love was enough, but time and money change your perspective on life and love.
So, here I am, packing boxes to help my mom move out because she says it's getting suffocating by the day.
As I pack her things, I question my understanding of love, its existence, and if I'll ever have the courage to do it. When you learn something and believe it your whole life, you'd think that was it, nothing more, nothing less, nothing complicated. And then, you become an adult, and all the real-life tragedies that your parents shielded you from will be thrown at you by them like a never-ending shower of arrows over a fort with no defence.
But it also makes you realise that your parents aren't some superhuman with perfect instincts. They also became adults at once, had you and then were pretending to be one till you were responsible enough to deal with their shit. Once they stop pretending, you get to know the humans they are, and it's not always a pretty sight.
It's our family house, but it'll be just me and my sister after Mom moves out. After the divorce, my father said he didn't need anything and would now like to live the life that he had always wanted for himself. He's always been running away from us to run away from being a husband and a father, so I'm not sure what he's on about, but I understand him as a human being. I understand his need to isolate. So, we let him go because why not? He has every right to live life on his own accord, and I guess now I get to do that too.
First, after he moved out, it was just us three for a while, and I'd go to work, my sister's in college, only visiting during holidays, and my mom waiting for us at home. She'd been trapped there for too long because that's where he wanted her to be. She found solace in waiting for ignorance within four walls of an empty room. Even when she has the freedom to fly, she couldn't find the courage to crawl out of the prison she made home.
Now that she's decided to move to a new place and start being independent, I wish her nothing but happiness and liberation. I hope she will feel free once she starts living like a person, not a wife or mother.
I drive her to her new place, and she has a sad smile, but it's a smile of a nervous new beginning. I drop her stuff and hug her, "I'll visit often, okay? Good luck. I love you."
"I'm so sorry, my dear, dear daughter. But you know I have to do this." She has tears in her eyes, and it breaks my heart every time. Feeling your mother's pain is the most painful thing in this world. Burning alive is only second to that. And I'd much rather be burned alive than see her in pain again.
"I know, Mom, I know. I'll always love you no matter what. So please just live now. For yourself." She nods, and I kiss her forehead.
It was a long drive back home to the empty house. I look at my parents' empty room and sigh because this is my new reality now. The roles have changed, and I have to accept it. I would move too, maybe sell the house and travel or buy a fancy apartment. But these thick hollow walls remind me that our family was once complete, and if I get a chance, I will have a complete family again someday. It's the type of wishful thinking I can't let go of just yet.