Problems of an Invisible Girl

Chapter 18

Rina spent hours and hours crying and sobbing and letting out silent screams of agony. Her whole life was a lie. Everything she ever knew was just an illusion. The truth was that even her own parents didn't want her. Why would she expect anything else from the people who weren't her biological family? The terrible revelations explained so many things about her life which she couldn't understand before. It explained why the moment her father died it seemed as if she stopped being a member of her own family. Knowing that she was adopted and that her father, well her adoptive father, was the only one who actually loved her, despite everything, explained why everything fell apart the day he died. Remembering that day was always painful, but after learning about him convincing her adoptive mother to take her in, it made remembering that terrible day unbearable. Of course, once she started thinking about all those painful memories she wasn't able to stop. The sadness started becoming overwhelming, tightening around her heart and making it difficult to breathe. It seemed to her like she had cried out rivers of tears, but she still had enough to go on. Her head started hurting, which often happened when she cried too much. She hadn't cried that much in a very long time and it was difficult to come out of it. Maybe if she cried it all out she would feel better, but she never did. What made her cry even harder was the fact that no one came to check up on her, no one cared.

After tiring herself out, and having not enough strength to do anything but lay in her bed and stare at the ceiling, she suddenly had an epiphany. She realized that she had spent her whole life worrying what other people would say, especially her family, but it was about time for her to start living her own life, the way she saw fit. Since her adoptive family didn't get rid of her after her father's death, she assumed that there was something in his will that prevented them from doing so and decided to do whatever she wanted. No one cared either way, so why should she worry about being a good daughter, sister or friend. She was exhausted by trying so hard, and of no one appreciating her efforts. Instead of trying to please everyone else, she decided to focus on herself, to do what made HER happy. So she came to the conclusion that she should start doing all the things she always wanted to do but was ashamed to actually do them. Even though she wanted to change her way of living, she knew that she was still a shy introvert, so she came with an idea that she thought was genius. The idea was to do all those things while invisible. It looked like a win-win situation, she would have fun and no one would laugh at her. She decided to do that while she waited for Serena to come back because it seemed like she was the only person that could actually understand what Rina was going through.

In the next week, Rina did her best to avoid all her family members because she was not ready to face them. She had no idea what she could say to them or how she would behave, so she decided that the best course of action would be avoidance. It actually felt good to live life without their negative and rude comments. Every day seemed a bit better without them tarnishing it with their unfounded disrespect and contempt towards Rina. In her opinion, the fact that she was adopted was not a good enough excuse for their terrible treatment of her, but she had no desire to argue with them. It felt like a cleansing experience to avoid their negativity and noisiness. Invisibility helped her out a lot in avoiding all of them since she was finally able to more or less control it. For the first time in a while, she felt some positive emotions about herself. She felt proud of her ability to control the power that she only recently discovered and proud of her self-control in not telling her 'family' all the awful things she wanted to tell them. But there was one thing that she firmly believed in, and that was that you shouldn't purposefully be mean towards people, no matter how much they deserved it. That was something she learned from her dad. Even when her mum and brothers were not nice, her father still tried to make all of them happy. He put his wife's and children's well-being before his own, and he did it every day of his life. In the olden day when they had some money problems he barely ate food just so it would be enough for the others. Even after everything that happened Rina never wanted to disappoint her father, so she tried to be kind and generous as much as she could. When she couldn't, she at least didn't do anything mean or disrespectful.

The first thing she did, the day after she decided to change her life was sneak in, invisible of course, to check out some dance lessons. Her whole life she loved dancing, but since she was generally clumsy, she never had enough courage to try it out. This way she could see the instructor and follow the moves without anyone making fun of her. She chose the huge dance studio downtown because it was a huge one and there was a lot of unused space where she could practice without tripping anyone. Even though she was invisible she tried to keep in mind that she was not a ghost and that she had to keep a distance from people so as not to freak them out. The music and the general noises in the dance studio were loud enough so that even if she fell down no one would hear anything and that made it even easier. In the first dance lesson she attended, she was simply thrilled. She never expected it to feel so good. It felt liberating to just follow the beat and dance your heart out. Of course, that first day her moves were clumsy, and she was tired from a long day at school, but it was the first time in her whole life that she felt complete and absolute freedom and it was the best feeling ever. Dancing helped her express her emotions in a way that was both beautiful and liberating. She loved every second of it. From that day on, every day after school, she went to the dance studio and felt better than she had for a long time. That was until she went home. Home started feeling like a dark hole of sadness that wanted to trap her so that she couldn't escape it ever again.

Trying to get rid of the suffocating feeling she had at home, she started spending less and less time there. Besides school and dance lessons, she also started sneaking in to listen to some Spanish language lessons. That was another dream of hers and it was the best choice she had ever made. The less time she spent at home, the better she felt. It was like finally, her eyes were open wide for the first time, and she was able to see the beauty of living. Surprisingly enough, her mother never questioned where she went or even criticized her. It seemed to Rina like the revelation helped her mother stop pretending she cared. They were just roommates living in the same house, and Rina realized that she was fine with that. If they couldn't love her for who she was maybe it was better that way. Her Spanish lessons were going great, and she enjoyed the feeling of accomplishment that started filling up her heart more and more. She couldn't help but wonder if other people's lives were filled with joy and small wonders. Was she the only one who had been missing out on life?