Polaroid Truths

Mystery Woman

"What's that?" Grace asks.

I just show her since I'm speechless. This is a romantic polaroid picture of my father and another woman that was taken in 1959, which is 3 years after my parents got married.

"They can't be just siblings, this is a way too romantic pose."

"I... What?!"

"Are you going to confront your parents with this?"

"No, of course not! They can't know we've been here, otherwise they'll kill us both!"

Not 2 seconds later I can here my father scream "We're back", and then some of mother's mumbling.

"Already? How?!"

"I don't know, but Grace, we have to find out who this woman is, can you dig why?"

"Yes, but we can't tell anyone."

We quickly put all the albums back in their place, but I'm going to keep the polaroid, I need to know who this woman is. We book out of the room and go back downstairs to greet my parents again. 

"Why are you back so early, father?"

Right when father wanted to answer my mother cuts him off "We were bored so we just came back home."

"That's not what happened, Patricia."

They don't even have to tell me, they were losing so they just quit. My parents were putting their bags on the floor, but then mother looked at me and Grace as if we were growing kangaroo tails.

"Your friend's still here?"

"Yes, something wrong?"

"I didn't say that. Do you need a ride home, dear?"

"Ehm... no mrs., my mum is coming to pick me up at 6. I hope that's not a problem." Grace replied nervously.

I can't believe how despicable my mother is sometimes.

"Which is in... half an hour, good." Mother turns around and walks away.

Grace and I go back upstairs to my room. We look at the polaroid again, trying to understand who that woman is and where this was taken. We turn the polaroid around to see if there was more. "Texas is our place, love you forever" was written on the back with a red marker, accompanied with a red heart next to the quote. The woman had long and shiny light-colored  hair, and father seemed much happier, he had a beautiful broad smile.

I have never seen him this happy around mother. 

"Where is this place? I have never seen it before." I ask confused. It was a rhetorical question, but Grace answered.

"We know it's in Texas, now we just need to find out where."

And this is where the mystery begins...

{The next day}

*Beep beep beep* *slam* ... *beep beep beep* 

"Why does it always seem so easy in movies, you just slap your alarm really hard and it'll stop making it's annoying and painful noise." I groan.

I turn the alarm off and sit straight on my bed. Hopefully people won't act weird around me today.

I guess I should get up and get ready for school.

{Skip to walk}

Today, instead of talking and greeting everyone, I walk straight to school. I could feel the evil glares the people in my neighborhood were sending me and it didn't feel good, at all. I chose to ignore them and hold my head high, walking to school with confidence.