The Blind Gardener

Chapter 3-To those who can't forget

The world is always divided into two parts, no matter the topic. There will always be a good or a bad, night or day, woman or man, black or white, past or present.

For me, I separate my life into two distinct eras: before the accident and after. My life now revolves around the accident that stole the person I loved and scarred the person loved by my beloved. To me, it's always Sophia Sonnet of the past, and Sophia Sonnet of the present.

I had always one and a half loving and wonderful parents. My dad, Dan Sonnet, was the whole parent: loving, amazing, caring for me, and loving me more than the entire world ever did. He still does, even after what I did. My mother, June Sonnet, on the other hand, loved me when my dad was there but became a shadow when it was just the two of us. It always seemed like she only had a child because Dad wanted one. Since my parents adored each other deeply and would do anything for one another, it seemed quite possible that she would bear a child just to fulfill Dan's wishes. But that was my life before the accident—semi-perfect—and I didn't mind, for I was happy.

The year I turned six, a change came into our lives in the form of a nanny, Alexandra. My parents were consumed by their work, unable to pick me up from school. My mother hired a friend of hers to take care of me until she could return home. At first, I was skeptical, but Mother assured me it would be alright, and that I would come to love her. Eventually, I did. I ended up loving her more than my own mother.

When Alexa would pick me up from school, she would occasionally have with her a boy—a boy who looked like a mirror image of Alexa, except with slightly wavy hair. He would sit in the same spot every time, sometimes glancing at me and acknowledging my presence in his mother's car, then staring out the window for the entire ride, lost in his own world, daydreaming among the clouds, soaring with the birds. To my young eyes, he seemed so free and happy. The first time I saw him, I asked, once we were back home and the boy was long gone, what he was doing in her car. She told me he was her youngest son, close to my age. From that day forward, I barely noticed him; he was merely an intruder in my world—Alexa's son.

Then that fateful day arrived: Mother's birthday. That's when everything turned upside down. That's when my tranquil, joyful life morphed into unbearable misery. I was unknowingly thrust into a depression at six years old, only recognizing it at fifteen.

Mother's birthday is always a poignant memory. Birthdays come and go, fleeting as a whisper, and before you know it, you're forty-three. That's life. If you don't love and cherish it, you'll remain ensnared in the past, like me. I'm twenty, but in truth, I'm still six years old—naive and frightened, like a child.

What happened that day was banal and predictable. It's like watching a horror movie: after so many viewings, you know what's coming. Oh no! A child is playing with a candle, even after being warned not to! Oh God! What's going to happen now! But we all know—the house will burst into flames, someone important will perish, and someone insignificant will be hurt. Lord knows, what shall we do now? Yes, it's life. Ordinary disasters occur, like earthquakes, wildfires, natural calamities. You don't expect an alien invasion or a zombie apocalypse or a future filled with hover cars and cyborgs battling gooey monsters. That will never happen. And I'm thankful it was just a fire because it could've been worse, like a tsunami or a devastating 9-pointer earthquake. It was a fire that claimed one life, not 830,000. For that, I am grateful, but the death of one beloved person can shatter you entirely, as if struck by a bullet. If I felt that way, I can't imagine the agony of her children and husband, especially her youngest son, who watched her die before his eyes. He must harbour a burning desire to kill me.

The day I awoke in the hospital was the day my semi-perfect life became something else entirely. Alexa was my mother's best friend—they were like sisters. So, you can imagine when she died, my mother wanted to kill me. After all, I did kill her sister-like friend. My mother was already distant; this pushed her into complete emotional exile. She never yelled at me like she did over trivial matters; she just erased my existence from her world. My small house felt cavernous. My dad, however, remained unchanged. He was still joyful and loving, caring for me even after what I had done. He was there, the only person who looked at me with love and tenderness.

After that day, my mother and father frequently argued about me. I hated being the source of their dis-accord. Whenever I asked Dad if this was my fault, he would lie and say it wasn't. I despised that because I knew it was my fault. I didn't ask because I doubted it; I asked because I wished it weren't true. I knew it was my fault, but Dad made me feel like it wasn't, and that's all I needed. I needed reassurance; I needed love—to be loved. From that day forward, Dad was my fountain of love. From that day forward, I had only one loving and wonderful parent.

Just like that, years flew by like migrating geese. Before I knew it, I was in high school. I was never someone who was sociable; in fact, I preferred my own company to that of others. Sometimes I wondered if that would've been different had Alexa lived. I had a small circle of friends who were kind and funny, and I enjoyed their company. Yet, I never let them get too close; I didn't want them to know about my past. I created a facade and went along with it, as many people do. It wasn't until my second year of high school that I found something that made me feel alive—poetry.

My dad was a well-known poet, not 'celebrity well-known,' but known enough for ELA teachers to say, 'Hey, you're that poet's daughter, aren't you?'. He published a few collections of his poems, and they were beautiful. He earned a fair amount from them. One day, I found one of his books in a drug store amid the magazines, so I bought it. My dad was overly humble, owning none of his own books, and that's why I had never read them. When I read his work for the first time, I was astounded at the beauty he had never shared with us. I kept buying more until I had all the books he had ever written.

His poems were exquisite, and every time I read one, I felt his emotions through his words. One day, I stumbled across a poem he wrote titled "Lost Sound." In that poem, he sought his fear but found only guilt; his fear was lost like sound. That singular poem became my life. I decided to become a poet like my dad because I found solace in poetry. It became the anchor that helped me navigate through high school. After graduating with decent grades, I enrolled in a decent college, majoring in Creative Writing. And here I am now, with my mother scolding me for failing my midterms. That's life, I guess.

A/N- these following chapters will be about her past, so you won't see ML for a while :)