Confessions of an Imperfect Daughter

2 - ANCHOR

ANCHOR

The restraint that prevents danger and safety alike

Running away is a thought I've never put to action, but it's always there knocking on the door that you both avoid. But, right beside it stands the girl with the brown hair, the exotic color only showing up under the invasion of sunlight. She smiles at me and walks right through the threshold and starts to help in tidying up the home that I have built for myself, the one that houses the self I'm yet to fully explore. Her smile keeps me going but it also keeps me from straying. She is my anchor, my comfort and my salvation. Giving her to me was the best decision you both ever made, and by repeating the mistakes you made in my upbringing in hers, you made sure to give me company and friendship coupled with understanding.

We were not alike in personality, though some of our tastes aligned. She couldn't keep down a book even in the form of a delicious meal while I devoured the whole junkyard, she was responsible where I was not, caring where I was not, hardworking where I was not. None of that could, however, dismiss the times we spent comparing artwork, obsessing over boy bands (one in particular) and sharing our frustrations about the people both of us could not help but love, you. She detested religion in ways that I didn't. For her, it was a puzzle she could never solve. You gave all of us a formal education in Islam and I worked grudgingly and hard to learn so that I could put up the pretense of a good daughter. She, on the other hand, could not take in the information for she had no stomach for it. I've seen her study her school subjects and pore over her sketches and paintings, she has quoted her third standard textbooks to me years afterward but she could not grasp the prayers that the teacher taught us for taking namaz. Her pretense went deeper than mine, in that where I said prayers faithlessly and muttered the words that I did not know the meaning of, she moved her lips in sync with mine and hid under my pretend belief.

She had a lot of you inside her, mom. I can see it clearly now in her concern for others, her love for peace and her reigned in disposition. Whenever I thrived in chaos, she reminded me of the simple pleasures that brought peace. She was the water to my fire.

College took me away from her, as much as it did from you, actually even more so. We could never have the private conversations that we had in our room over a phone with both of you eavesdropping on every word. So, in front of you, we talked of the mundane, the new songs that had been released, the scandals that were popping up, new series that we had discovered, her turbulent school life etc. Once in a while, when we would both be online, I would place the call and hear the reassuring sound of her voice and give in to being extinguished. I would tell her about the boyfriend you didn't know I had, the time I got drunk and danced throughout the night, the elated feeling of weed, the mind-blowing company and the surveyed freedom that she should look forward to. She would unburden herself of her exam stress, the overwhelming weight of your expectations, the way it broke her the same way it did you and her uncertainties about her future. I knew she would pull through, a weight I never purposely placed on her shoulders, and I also knew that I would be there for her if she didn't. That's what made it easier to bear.

I know what it took to get us here, which is why I know what I must do if I intend to seek your understanding. We weren't always like this, my sister and I. I'm sure you remember the hair pulling, the biting and the verbal fights that still continue although it has decreased considerably. The mark of the iron box she placed on my knee still stands as a reminder of my stupidity in plugging it in for her and the memory of almost smashing a plate on her head compensates. We were always at war with each other but somewhere along the way, when we stayed silently in the room together as you both fought, when I told her stories because you were busy, when I tied her hair to help you out, when I packed her tiffin, we merged with each other.

She's the reason I'm trying. She's why I haven't turned my back on home. She's part of the reason why it's still home.