Sinking Away

1 - The Girl and Her Father

This is a work of fiction.

Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously.

Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Sometimes even to live, is an act of courage."
― Lucius Annaeus Seneca

I was angry and sad and very frustrated. I didn't know what I was doing in this god forsaken place of a university, and at this moment, I didn't ever want to know.

I just wanted to disappear, and miraculously reappear in the school I had spent the latter part of my senior high school days day-dreaming about.

But the harm had already been done. My fees had been paid for, and at this very moment, I was lying on the bed in the room I was to share with my roommate until I could convince my parents to let me go solo next year.

I never dreamed of this. I never dreamed I would be in this school. Sure, I had bought the application forms and filled those months ago, and I had known they would offer me a good programme. But I had just thought my parents would have allowed me to pursue the course of my dreams instead of pushing me into a programme I hated and knew nothing about.

Pharmacy sucked.

Sure, it was my personal opinion, but I knew it would suck.

People who had loved chemistry and all things related to that, had withered under the intense stress of the six-year programme. How much more, me, someone who had absolutely hated chemistry in senior high, had barely managed to pass chemistry in her final exams and had been forced to pursue a course that dealt with nothing but chemistry, chemistry and, wait a minute, some more chemistry.

Thinking about my life and the misery that would follow my low academic performance made me suicidal. Being on the second floor in my hostel, I badly wanted to jump down the balcony just so I could escape the impending doom whilst letting the entire world know of how much of a controlling and selfishly obsessed man my father really was.

I really wanted to end it all at that moment.

But I couldn't.

I remembered that beautiful woman who was my mother, and how much she had supported me. I knew she had had no say in this and I knew if anything happened to me, it'll hurt her the most. Grabbing my teddy bear, Crystal, I put my face in her warm fur and let out all my bottled frustrations.

I don't know how long I cried, but when I finally stopped, it was dark out. I stood up, walked a few steps and turned on the lights and fan in my room. My door was already locked so I just stretched and wiped the remnants of my tears off my face, hoping and praying that it wasn't so obvious I had been crying.

Finding that the taps in my room weren't flowing, I dreaded going down to get a bucket of water from the large storage tank. After a fifteen minute pep talk to myself, I grabbed my bucket, walked out of my room, locked the door behind me and shoved the key in my pocket.

The trip downstairs was actually easy and I was glad to find out that I was the only one standing before the tap. After half- filling my bucket to a level I knew would be sufficient, I picked up the bucket and bean my return trip.

I was much slower this time, pausing every few minutes to catch my breath, rain insults on my father and criticize the hostel for not having running water on the week of reporting. After several minutes of whining and puffing and panting, I was finally in my room. I turned on the lights, locked the door behind me and settled on bathing the cold water, instead of warming it up a bit with my electric kettle.