Floating Through Life ✔️

Chapter 4

Her mom was the kind of person that always feared being left out. Her fear drove her to obsession and then it became her way of living. In time, the fear she had for herself became for her only child. She was scared that her daughter would turn out to be an outcast, someone that people frowned upon. So, she tried to raise her one legacy  in the most perfect way possible. She wanted strong, independent, confident, but she got only Abigail: weak, broken, and worst of all, irrelevant.

So her mom tried harder, she made Abigail's life ideal. It was privileged as in tours around the world in the summer. It was makeovers and shopping and spas. However, it was unbearable for Ab, it was going round and round and being someone she didn't desire being. It was the replacement of maternal love and tenderness with the materiality that life offered. It was strangers all through the summer instead of a fun time with her working dad at home. It was people she didn't know brushing her hair rather than her own mom softly untangling her messy curls. It was excess and luxury, but she loved quiet and cozy. She loved her attic and the smell of books. It was strange to Ab how little she wanted for how much she got.

She fluttered her eyes back open, her breath was heavy and shallow at the same time, such contrast making her head light. Her forehead leaned strongly against the window. The view of the garden outside was as heavenly as it ever was. It was decorated with forget-me-nots: the wood, the water, and the alpine. It was a lavish green with blues and yellows, and a hint of pink. For some reason, it all took her back to the day in which light rain dimmed the beauty of the greenery, and the sound of droplets became her emblem for heart break.

It was loud, like all their fights had been. It was screaming and cursing and glass-breaking. The sounds peaked and pitched until at some point: all was silent. Her parents had very different policies in life. Her dad liked to let it slide when her mom always wanted to call the manager. Her dad liked bubblier dinners out: where they could eat and laugh, while her mom favored a place with table cloth and candles. Yet, they always got along, one of them always tolerated —at some point even loved— the other enough to just let it go. Then, they had a child, a creature that would carry on living with their learnings for the rest of her life. A small tiny being that they hoped would reignite their love, only she took that flame of hope and blew on it.

It wasn't her fault really, but oh it was. There were two different ways that her parents set for her, and she walked down the path her father drew, and that was how all of the mess escalated. Sometimes, Abigail wondered if she turned out to be more like her mother, would her parents have left each other? It always conflicted her for she knew that her dad was fighting for her to be her true self, but if her true self was different, would he have fought at all? The thought spun in her head like a leaf would in a hurricane, but it died as quickly as it started when her life took on.

That night ended with absolute silence, it was deafening. It scared her so much that she remembered even how her heart beat fluctuated. How her anxiety became real in the form of perspiration. How her darkest nightmare unfolded into the ground of her own house. For a moment, she wanted to open her door and tell them to continue screaming at each other. She wanted to tell them to keep on letting the anger out, but her fear froze her. She thought that it was the end of something that has been begging to be finished for years. When they were quiet, it wasn't because their exasperation dried out rather than already expressed. It was all done. There was nothing left to say.

For the first year of the divorce, she stayed mainly with her dad as her mother struggled to move out and hunt for a new job after so many years of relying on her spouse. It was all happening in the most  inconvenient time:  it was happening right before her first year as a middle schooler. During the time no one cared about how she looked or acted. No one cared to check up on her so she lost care for that too. Her father was too busy trying to let go of the ties that bound him with her mom, and her mom was too busy making a new life for herself. Ab wondered a lot of the time if her parents hadn't gotten divorced at that specific time, would she have been looked after? Would she have gone to the salons she usually visited with her mom? Would she have acted more confidently and assertively on her first day of middle school? Most importantly, would she have been bullied? Yes, yes, yes, and no, but only time could tell, and time is always silent.

Ab found it ironic how horribly her parent's divorce made her feel in contrast to what they actually wanted to make her feel like. They never explicitly told her, but she knew. She saw the cracks in their relationship and the lack of compatibility when it came to raising her. She saw how they could both negotiate every other thing but the way of her upbringing.  So she knew that all of this was because of her. However, for a few months after they have broken up, she received minimal attention. She spent nights up thinking about the situation pointlessly. Would she forever be ignored and put aside? She was the child they had to fix their marriage, but when the marriage was over, what was she?

Of course she was wrong in thought. Her parents sacrificed so much for her, but a child could only see so little, and her parents went back to normal after their lives adjusted. The only ironic thing in the situation was how her parent's neglect for her during the formalities of the divorce was what affected her for the rest of her life. The lack of care in the tender, first year of middle school destroyed her. After all through the avoidance of what they wanted to be shunned: they achieved just that. Their divorce led to her downfall.

Her parents, The Marshalls, a couple they were. People marveled about them all around the small town they lived in. What a sophisticated, well brought-up lady and what a gentle man. This was them. People whispered, Kath's scarf is marvelous, it's from Paris, and look at how wonderful Abigail's dress is, it's from Milan. They were the family with the greenest grass and the biggest backyard. They were the sort of family that went horseback riding on weekends. No one knew about the late night anger her parents shared for each other. No one knew about the sadness they carried as a part of themselves for failing to succeed with each other. They had undoubtedly lost their love for each other, Katherine and Bradley, but did that mean that they should really let go?

The truth is that no, besides Abigail, they shouldn't have let go for they both left each other without wanting to. It was unclear to them at the time why they felt so attached, yet more crucial matters were at hand for them to notice. So, they focused on what they wanted at the time rather than forever. They wanted a life for their child that excluded all the fights and the pressure. They wanted a life for Ab that meant she could grow up without developing hate for the married life. They wanted for her a life free of anxiety and psychiatrists, but they did not want to let go. Yes, they did not love each other anymore, but they were incomprehensibly comfortable. They felt that they reached a point in their lives where the familiarity held them close. They felt like reached an age in which the power of their past together made it impossible for them to move on. Yet, they did it, for Abigail.