We’ve never thought that the 13 hectare field was not really ours, and it only takes my premature marriage to retrieve it.
We got the news on April 13, my very own 15th birthday. It wasn’t a huge celebration. It consist of Italian spaghetti, the recipe my Aunt Mandy made just for me, gallons of ice creams and sodas, roasts, cakes and a few friends and kin to celebrate. One of my classmates and friends, Amethyst Bloowryth, almost erupted in anger when she found out that there’s no beer. But when she saw and met my Granny, who was a very conservative Asian, she sulked and attacked the vanilla ice cream instead.
My family had been influenced by my Granny. I think Gramps knows it, but he just let Granny do what she wants. She even influenced us to eat everything with rice, never to leave the table after eating and wait for everyone to finish, not sweeping the floor and stitching at night, to keep kissing elder’s hand (which looked more like letting the elders’ knuckles touch your forehead, similar to letting them give you a knocker), not to call our parents on their own names, and even avoiding counting acne on my brother’s face, or on anyone’s face. Granny never told us why. Whenever we tried to ask, she would scowl and tells us that just do what she says. I guess Dad had suffered worse when he courted Mom.
Yep, my Granny is superstitious.
“Hey, Jacky,” my brother, Carter, fourteen years of age, said. His hair was combed in a slap dashed fashion, yet revealing his light-hearted eyes. He removed his hand from his jeans and gave me a soft blow on my shoulder, “where’s my gift?”
Why the heck would I give him a gift? I thought, offended. I punched back, a hard one.
“Am I supposed to ask you that?” I told him.
“Ow,” he moaned and rubbed his shoulder “thank you very much. I appreciated such present,” he scolded, then trudged away.
I frowned. Carter sometimes loses his screws on his temples. But I tell you he is the coolest brother I have ever had, not that he had so many friends and he is too popular at school, not that he is the football superstar, not that he is the 2nd in class, I can tell that he’s cool because he knows how to be mature. No, on the second thought, because he is mature. I can tell that a person is cool by his maturity. Gramps, Dad and Carter are some of my examples.
I wonder when he would get a girlfriend.
And speaking of which …
“Now that you’re fifteen,” Aunt Mandy, cocky as ever, told me. She hung a heavy hand on my shoulder, grinning. “Could you do me a favor?”
“What?”
“Never, I say, never;” Said she with wide eyes, “never have a beau until time comes, even marry, okay?”
The unexpected request made me half frowned, half smiled.
“MANDYYY!!” Granny scorned from the kitchen. “SUCH WORDS, QUIT IT!”
She rolled her eyes, and then turned to me.
“Aunt Mandy,” I told her. “I’ll never do such thing. I would finish my studies first.”
“ATTA GIRL, JACKY!” Levi, my youngest sister, yelled near the mike. A moment later, everyone was exclaiming what Levi had said. I felt my face warm.
“Hey, Atalanta,” Lia Randalph, one of my bestfriends and classmate, jeered. She always calls me Atalanta. I think I have heard it in one of the myths my brother used to tell me. “looks like your Aunt’s not looking forward for you to have a boy,”
“What?”
“Why not be discreet?” said Drew Mustoffe, “in the woods, at the park. I’ll let you meet on one of Timmy’s companions,”
