Vice

58: Family

Natara retreats back home and curls up in her bed, sobbing into her pillow. 

When Jaquie calls and asks her why she isn't at her desk, she lies and says she has a sudden flu. And maybe she does; she certainly feels sick enough. Her body aches, her limbs tremble and her teeth chatter like she has fever and chills. Her head feels light and her stomach feels ready to erupt.

Macey keeps her distance, casting concerned looks at Natara every few hours as she lays curled up and stone-faced in bed. When Natara first came home, Macey held her in her arms and pet her hair. She asked her what was wrong over and over again, but Natara felt so stressed she couldn't speak.

Too much happened in so little time. Wasn't it just yesterday when she graduated high school?

Back then, her only worries were staying away from the popular crowd and keeping her grades high enough to pass. Now it feels like the "popular crowd" at work is almost everyone who has been there longer than her. It's alienating and lonely, and her only real friends are Jaquie and Cameron - the latter with which she has had a rather turbulent relationship.

When she graduated, she wanted to find a job so badly to make her parents proud and solidify herself as more than just a child. She'd done that, but at what cost? She'd been lied to, manipulated, cussed at, back-talked and it felt like she'd been sexually assaulted, both by the man in the office and her own boyfriend.

Is this what "adulting" is truly like? If so, it's a nightmare. Even the good things that happen come with drawbacks. Getting a job comes with terrible coworkers, mundane busywork, and enough drama that it feels just an alternate version of high school. 

And what of her boyfriend? What were those women in the bathroom saying about him? That he'd slept with every woman in the office and Natara was just the last check mark on his list?

"Hey, sis..." Macey's voice comes out like a whisper from across the room. She doesn't look back at Natara; she continues staring at her computer screen, as if he hasn't said anything at all. Natara pulls her covers above her head, staying silent.

"You know I love you, right?" Macey tries again, a little louder this time. "I don't know what happened, but things will get better, alright?" The tone of Macey's voice makes it seem like she knows that no amount of Asian dramas and sweets will heal Natara's current wounds.

A knock on the door interrupts the silence hanging between Natara and Macey and their mother steps inside. She double takes a few times before she realizes that the ball of sadness atop the bed is her eldest daughter.

"Is something...wrong?" Her mother asks. The scent of freshly made beef stroganoff wafts through the open bedroom door, baiting Natara into peeking out of her covers. She can't remember if she had lunch or not, but her stomach rumbles at the scent of finished dinner fresh off the stove.

"Mom..." Natara croaks. Macey raises her eyebrows as their mother cautiously approaches Natara and sits on the bed beside her. Natara turns toward her mother, still laying down, and buries her half-covered face into her mother's thigh. "I don't like my new job."