Something's Wrong With the Different Realms

Two: Everything Changed

Isla Venus

So far so good. So far so good. The project seemed to be running smoothly. Jasper had finished his chapter and I was making progress with the planning document. Satisfied with my edits, I closed the document, flopped on my giant canopy bed with fluffy pink faux-fur sheets and picked up my book.

There were too many thoughts running through my head for me to focus on even one sentence in the book. Thus, I stared up at the ceiling instead, and let the thoughts run.

It had been six months since I'd moved here. Six months since I had left Ontario for a tiny city called Majesty in the Pacific Northwest with a population of around 33,000.

In many ways, I had been glad for the move. It was a fresh start. It allowed me to leave thoughts of Regina behind. It allowed me to become closer to Hana, my mom's wife. And Ivy, my stepsister.

Majesty had nice scenery as well. Instead of living in a nondescript detached home, surrounded by rows and rows of identical flat houses, I lived in a large sprawling mansion surrounded by lush forests, near pointed grand mountains. The scenery allowed me to breathe more easily.

But in other ways, I was saddened. I wouldn't get to see my dad. Or my older sister Nova who now attended the University of British Columbia.

I knew we were going to move. My mom and Hana had talked about it since they married last year. I just hadn't expected it to be so soon and so far away. I thought we were just going across the border to New York state.

I thought about the divorce. My mom. My dad. Hana. My sisters. Ivy. The past few years bore quite a few changes. It was dramatic, to say the least.

I was in 3rd grade when my parents divorced. I knew it was coming for some time now. My parents were nice people. They did love each other. But they couldn't quite get along. They had communication problems.

My mother mostly attributed their divorce to the age at which they got married. My parents met when they were 18 during their first year of university. My mom was Black and my dad was Asian. They married at 20. My older sister Nova was born when they were 22. My mom says that they rushed things when they should've waited, especially with Nova. She said that they didn't understand how big of a responsibility a child would be.

They started having minor disagreements on how to raise Nova as soon as she was born but tried their best to work through it because they both loved each other very much. Five years later I was born. My mom picked the name Isla for me. I still wasn't sure why she chose that name because my sisters, Julianne and Nova had names based on the months in which they were born.

Two years later, my mom had another surprise baby. My smart little sister Julianne came into the world. She was sweet but my parents didn't expect her. They didn't know how to parent a third child. It was not part of their plan.

That was when the disagreements started. With Juli, there was one more mouth to feed. And even though my parents were both engineers who made a decent salary, another child was quite expensive. They had to work a bit harder and spend more time allocating funds which stressed them out. Stress led to tension and tension led to disagreements which led to arguments. Arguments about money. Arguments about jobs and working. Arguments about childcare.

Julianne took it the hardest. Even though she was just five she understood what was going on and blamed herself. She blamed herself because mom and dad argued a lot.

Eventually, my parents decided that it was best to split. They split when I was in 3rd grade. We would live in separate houses but we would still go to the same school. My mom decided to take us, kids, because my dad was away on business trips more often than my mom. I still visited my dad often, almost every day. Despite the split, my parents remained good friends. Even if they had communication problems, they still loved each other.