farewell (18+)

42. Closure

"You what?" My Principal asked me from across his wooden antique desk.

"I said I quit." I crossed my arms. "What part of it don't you get?"

He seemed shaken by my sudden lack of composure. "You can't do that! How am I supposed to find a substitute this close to terms?"

"That's really not my problem." I got up and circled the chair resolutely, placing my hands on its leather back. "I'll keep in touch with you to set the details of how you can pay my salary arrears. If you see a number from England, you better pick up, or I'll set my lawyer on you like a rabid dog."

I saw his jaw drop before I turned on my heels and strode out of his office. I gave the son of a gun two weeks' notice only because I wanted to make the transition as smooth as possible for the students. In the meantime, I let my family know I was moving, went to see them so we could have a proper goodbye, and made arrangements for Darya to receive the money from the apartments we had inherited, including the one I was living in, which was already in the process of being sublet. I found a job at an average school in Oxford, had to start somewhere. An apartment relatively close to it was rented, and I had already sorted what I was going to take with me. I guess love makes us efficient.

This was it. I was moving to England.

I took a deep breath once I was out of the school grounds and started shaking. It had taken everything in me to confront my superior like that, especially because I knew he wasn't the one to blame for the delayed paychecks. Still, I had to give him a piece of my mind because he was and remained a very shitty boss, and he was the middle man between us and the school proprietary. I could go on about the problems of the proletarianization of academic labor, but there's no time for that. There was one last stop I had to make before leaving Brazil, and I couldn't muster the courage to go there until the last minute.

Talavera Bruce Penitentiary

***

I walked through the dull-looking halls of the correctional unit, fanning myself with a brochure I had taken on the street out of sympathy. At close past noon, the Bangu area felt like scorching flames from hell. And I thought my neighborhood was hot. Forty-three minutes waiting had wavered my resolution. The many relatives of the inmates yapping about their personal lives as if any of that was my business didn't help either. I had been shaking, tapping my foot to conceal it. Why was I even doing this?

I had crucified Darya so much for wanting to see our mother, and now here I was. The irony made me feel hypocritical. Sure, my sister's reason for coming was because "she wanted a family" with a convicted murderer, but I had sworn I would never set foot in this hell hole as long as I lived. Now I more than wanted to; I felt like I needed to be there.

I had no idea what to expect as the guards finally called us in and we headed to the visiting area. The open patio was located between the main building and the cell blocks, so as soon as we were outside, I could see the inmates coming on our direction under the watchful eyes of the officers. My stomach turned in a very bad way as I picked a table to sit by, waiting for the person who had turned my life upside down in the worst way.

Gisele was her name. I say this, because to this day, I'm incapable of acknowledging her for what she was. I can't even say it now. It was beyond me to fathom her importance in my existence when she had been the one to shatter it. She walked confidently toward me, and that alone had already annoyed me. Her dark, coarse hair had barely any grays in it. The eyes looked just a bit more tired than I remembered, not a scratch in her complexion, no signs of violence. Her dry features looked smooth for a thirty-nine-year-old. She looked skinny in an unhealthy way, but other than that, she looked good for someone who had been in prison for the last three years or so.

"You look surprisingly put together," I said as she sat down across from me.

She shrugged with a coy smile, lowering her voice. "I pretend to be a converted Christian; nobody touches them for fear of the wrath of God."

I nodded slowly, irked by the fact that she looked somewhat merry. "How are they treating you?"

Her cocky look wavered just for a moment. "Not too bad... I mean the food could be better. Sometimes it goes bad because of the heat, but..."

"It is too hot in here."

"I'm so glad you came." She smiled fondly. "How's Darya? I haven't seen her in a while."

So the little brat did come to visit her.

"She's fine. Good grades, good boyfriend."

"I'm so proud of her... What about you? How's life? Work? Do you have someone too?"

"Sort of."

I felt glad and relieved that Darya had at least respected my wish and refrained from talking about me during her visits there. We stared at each other in uncomfortable silence. Gisele was probably picking up that I wasn't too enthusiastic about this conversation. She scanned my face as if to figure what exactly I was doing there if I wasn't willing to have a normal conversation with her.

She reached out over the table with an awed expression. "Look at you, all grown up... It's like looking in the mirror."

"I am nothing like you." I retracted my hand, watching her face freeze. "I will never be anything like you. Do you know why? Because I'm not a damned murderer. I'm not some heartless scum who doesn't give a crap about her own kin."

"Is this why you came here? To insult me?" She sat back, crossing her arms. "I'll have you know you and Darya are everything to me. Everything I've ever done was for you."

"Spare me! Do you think I'm some idiot? That I'm so gullible to buy that crap?"

"It's the truth."

"Bullshit! You've never done anything for anyone other than yourself. Even before your hateful crime, you've never been a real mother to me or Darya. You didn't raise us, and you know nothing about us."

"I gave you life."

"You made me an orphan!"

There. It was out. I had been asking myself why I was doing this, and I thought it was due to some morbid curiosity to face her, to check if she had any remorse. But I realized I didn't care if she regretted it. I didn't care about anything related to her. I just needed to confront her for once. I never had the chance amidst the chaos of the trials. Gisele's eyes became two vicious slits. The good mother facade crumbled right before me as she revealed her true colors, moving restlessly like a caged animal. That's exactly what she was if you ask me.

"What do you want?" she asked.

"I only came here to tell you that you're nothing to me, so you could see this face. Etch this image in your thick skull, because it's the last you'll ever see of me."

I spit in her direction without even looking to see if I had hit her and got up to leave. The last thing I heard was what I assumed to be her punching the table to regain my attention, as well as the hustle of guards taking her away. She screamed for me to come back because she was my mother, and I rushed through the curious eyes of the families there. I just ignored her the way I always did, the way I would always do.

_____

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