The Red Bow [Chaelisa]

27. Sacrifice

January 27, 2015. First year of college.

Pov Chaeyoung.

When my eight-grade literature teacher referred to the Romeo and Juliet tragedy as a seminar, I locked myself in my room for weeks, racking my brains to find a coherent and simple way of specifying such a well-known and complex classic work. Everyone expected me to arrive and say something like: “The Capuleto and Montequio families lived in conflict and in this environment the love of Romeo and Juliet was born …” No, it would be too easy to tell from the popular perspective of the novel, so I decided to turn the book over and break my head even more looking for the key piece of my seminar.

On the day of the presentation, I started my seminar with the following quote: “These violent joys have violent ends. Dying in triumph, like fire and gunpowder that are consumed in a kiss.” I remember exactly the reaction of my classmates and my teacher to these words; most students looked at me in surprise, probably wondering if this quote was part of the novel, I know that because I heard them commenting one day that they didn’t need to read the book to tell the story.

My teacher, on the other hand, smirked, and I knew I was giving her what she wanted.

So I explained what Shakespeare meant by that quote. It is almost like Newton’s law, if this is a violent and exaggerated joy; its end will be none other than the violent and exaggerated end. Fire travels through the gunpowder quickly in a hurry and despair, but when contact occurs, the explosion. That’s what happened to Romeo and Juliet when they thought they lived perfectly in their own bubble before everything collapsed, and now, sitting against the trunk of a tree watching the calm lake, I realize that not very different from fiction, my life he was following the same path as a tragic novel written by Shakespeare.

I should have known when my dad got a raise on the job, when my name started to be recognized in Juilliard, and when Lisa came into my life. Who would have thought? I was living the romance of my dreams, with the most beautiful person I ever thought didn’t exist; everything was perfect with Lisa, she always made sure that everything was perfect, that my body vibrated in full happiness for my first and, desperately wish it were so, my only love. I was completely happy until my father’s illness manifested itself again and I had to watch everything I built over the years, be thrown in the trash. My days in Juilliard were numbered, a decision that my parents were not yet aware of, but that would help support our family until secondhand. My father was discharged from the hospital yesterday afternoon, he looks fine, it’s not like a tumor sucks his life out day after day like a soul-sucking demon. This morning, at the café, my mother said that Dad is going to borrow from the owner of the company and explain our situation; it is not yet certain, but he has a lot of money and has always helped the employees who needed it.

So I allowed myself to have a thread of hope.A ccepting a loan from an unknown person would make me feel less bad, I would not endure the humiliation of receiving money from Lisa or Jisoo, even though I know that their intentions are totally kind. I know that they would not take the money back when I had it, and that was one of the reasons why I refused the help offered by them.

I closed my eyes, leaning my head against the tree, I breathed the fresh air of that place, allowing me to be enveloped by the fresh wind that embraced the leaves of the trees, releasing a pleasant smell of nature. The abandoned ranch had become my favorite haven for so many reasons that it only made me feel at home more and more that I visited it. The lake was home to some fish that swam freely through the crystal clear waters, I loved watching them all day if I was allowed.

I incredibly felt better now that my dad was home, being able to have him around making coherent decisions made my thoughts easier to control and the pressure in my head lessened, relieving my stress a little more.