→ softly | eruri

23

[ERWIN]

"I'll be back home late tonight, Erwin. Don't wait for me." Said mother.

That's what she would always tell me before she started disappearing for days at time, with no explanation as to where. She'd always come back looking more vibrant, with her full glam make-up but I knew she was trying to hide it. She told me that it had something to do with her workplace yet every time she left the house, she would become more distant from me and father.

It wasn't long enough until the fighting began. The roof would shake with the sound waves that they created. Just watching them raising their voices at each other broke the other half of me. I would sit in my room alone, feeling mortified and in need of comfort from them. But they never came. No matter how long I waited. Sometimes I would stay up all night, too naïve to think it might get any better. My parents - which I dreamed to have a relationship like they had, now crippled with ... pain and hatred.

Over the next few weeks, mother was at the house less and less, until one day she came back with a news. A news that I would never forget. She said she didn't love my father anymore.

"Just tell me the everything, Layla." My father imposed one day, rather uncharacteristically. There's a sadness in his voice and it was the first time I ever saw him like that; so fragile and emotional. "Even if it's hurt, you owe me the truth."

My mother was quiet. She looked tacitly at my father as she did this foot tapping whenever she was nervous or overthinking. It became a habit. I peered at her through the small crack of my door. It was another one of their fights, but something told me it was different. My instinct told me this was much more than a fight.

"Are you having an affair, Layla?" My father asked, his tone was desperate this time. "Do you think I don't know what you're doing? Coming home late every single night? Do you not have any pity for Erwin? Do you not have any pity for me? For us?"

Every word was loaded and delivered with anger I knew he had been bottled up for so long. The only sound cutting through the silence was the creaking coming from the ceiling fan.

"We don't work anymore, Paul." Mother finally bursted. Her voice was sore, almost as though she wanted to compose herself from crying. "He encouraged me and supported me like you never did."

"So, you're saying I've never had any faith in you? Is that what you think?"

"Yes!" She exploded. "You would always force me to do something I'm not passionate about. Doing some jobs I didn't want or ask for."

"You should be grateful. I did all of that for your own good-"

"You tried to mould me into something I'm not! We have different interests now, Paul. Different careers, different dreams. We have no more common ground. Erwin is the only one who keeps us together. But ... people change."

Without breaking the gaze, father expressed, "Our whole marriage is a lie then? Everything that we've gone through these past year? All of that for what?"

I didn't think it would be possible for this to get worse.

"You know what? Just leave us." Father cried. "If that's what makes you happy. Then, do it. Go after your fucking man. I'm sorry I couldn't provide you happiness the same way he does."

I couldn't remember much after that. The morning came as blur and vague. The house was ghost-quiet like I was the only one who lived there. My feet jangled at the edge of my bed. It was still too early for Saturday morning to wake up but I wanted to see if my parents were doing alright. Before I could even get out, mother entered my room while holding a neatly folded clothes on her hands. I was stunned for a moment, didn't expect her to come in and acted as if nothing happened.