Ecstasy [h.s]

Chapter 54

We had dinner at the same time every night, it was a routine my mother and I never broke, unless I was rebelling against my curfew and getting drunk with my friends in some park far away from home. We always ate together no matter how much we despised one another, I always sat on one end of the table and she sat on the other, the whole dinner was always spent in silence.

"Lead the way, sweetheart," I smile at the lovely nickname. My parents were never ones for being nice, both of them were people whose souls were tormented by anger and violence.

My mom was a violent person, my dad was someone who liked to yell and break stuff. It felt weird seeing him break out of that horrible habit, the last few times I saw him he was the most calm I had seen him in my whole life. However, that calmness was easily washed away if I said the wrong thing, if I said something he necessarily didn't agree with he'd scream and yell, slam his fists on the table, and cause an unnecessary scene, it didn't matter if we were in public or not.

Throughout my parent's marriage, my mother and father never went out on dates and dinners in public spaces merely because of his aggressive behavior. My mother was embarrassed by it, she said it brought shame to our family. We had a reputation to upkeep, and my father tainted it with his disgusting behavior. Her words verbatim.

We walked into the large dining room, my mother already seated at her usual spot. I sat on my usual seat, my father on the opposite side of me. Even throughout their marriage they sat and ate in silence, the only time they ever spoke was when they were arguing over silly things.

As a child, I always wondered how my parents managed to stay together that long, why torture yourself by staying in a loveless marriage with somebody you despised? My mother probably did it to keep the reputation she valued more than her dignity, I never figured out why my dad stayed for as long as he did.

I hope I never end up like them. I hope I never create such a vile space for the people close to me that they fear me, that the only word they can come up with when describing me is angry or violent. I hope if I have children someday they'll never experience what I did, that they'll be born into a family with parents who are in love; with parents who love them more than life itself.

"How's school going?" My dad relaxes into his seat, his lifeless eyes staring into mine.

My mother scoffs from the other side of the table, her annoyance not going passing unannounced. "It's summer, she's been out of school for weeks. You'd know that if you were around."

I almost wanna roll my eyes at her words, as if she knew anything about me either. As if she's around me too. Both of my parents created a distance between us, my father was physically absent, and my mother was emotionally unavailable and detached from my life. Physically she was here, mentally and emotionally she couldn't be further away than she already was.

"It was a simple question to start up a conversation, Maria." My father spits out my mother's name with such high disgust it almost makes me shiver with how vile it sounds, but I choose to ignore it for tonight.

She scoffs again, not responding to his comment while our food was slowly brought by the people my mother hired to take care of the house and cooking. She was a woman who set high expectations for herself, she carried herself with a level of class that made me feel disgusted with how out of touch with reality and life around her she was.

She was too "important" to clean her own house and had more than enough money to hire people to take care of her stuff. She claimed she valued the house and her stuff more than anything, but for someone who "held" such value for her things she couldn't care less about them.

"It's going well," I smiled at my dad's question. I know he could be out of touch too, his presence in my life was so distant that even such a small, simple question brought me excitement. "I enjoy it."