Outburst

Chapter 25 - Guilty Conscience

People tended to go to a peaceful and lonely place when they needed to get out of their hectic life and cool their minds down. But how many of them would go to a cemetery?

I hugged two bouquet of daisies on my chest while making my way to my favorite escape place. The cemetery was just like what it was destined to be—quiet, dreadful, and made your hairs over your body prickled. Being the only person who was still breathing, having a life, among these gravestones sometimes bothered my mind, that someday I would lie under it, thus making me realize how valuable our lives were.

After putting down the bouquets on each of my parents’ gravestones, I stepped back and then sat on the ground that was full of dried leaves. I stared at them for a while.

“How are you doing there, Mom, Dad?” I smiled as I hugged my knees. I swept my eyes to their names, read it letter by letter, hoping it would turn into a Skype-like screen where I could communicate with them in heaven. “I’m sorry for not going here regularly like I used to. I... I just have a lot of things to do—and it’s not easy.”

Suddenly it felt like déjà vu. I had said this before, and that time, my Mom was sitting in front of me, looking all pretty with her night gown and her blackish hair, that was getting shorter and shorter because of the chemotherapy. Her smile calmed the 13-years-old me, who was just wetting my face with tears, as well as my Math test sheet with a big, red D+ on it.

“Sorry, Mom. I should’ve studied instead of practicing for tournament,” I sobbed. “Now we lost the game and I got D+ for Math.”

Mom’s warm hug comforted me for a while. “It’s okay, Sweetie.”

“No, that’s not the problem. I have a lot of things to do and it’s all not easy. Basketball, swimming, book club... I’m too greedy for wanting it all while I know one activity is actually enough.”

She shook her head. “Curiosity runs in our family. When I was your age, I have so many non-academic activities as well,” she remarked. “It’s not wrong, not at all. But you have to know that you can’t get them all to go as you wish. You have to do it one at a time. Now that you lost both of opportunities, you’ve learned the lesson.”

“So, if I chose basketball, I should’ve been more focused?”

“Well, yeah,” she replied. “Or maybe, you should’ve chosen Math instead. Even if you didn’t practice and lost the game, you still could save your grade.”

I frowned. “Ah, you’re right. I wanted to impress my coach that I was worth that MVP award everyone went crazy about—but I think I failed.”

“You haven’t,” she said. “You have next year, and the year after that, and so on. I believe you can get it—you just have to be patient. Good times will come, Sweetie.”

And she was right. One year later, my school team got to the tournament finals and I won the MVP. If only her cancer hadn’t taken her yet, she would’ve been so proud, and it would’ve been three of us in the picture of me holding the tournament’s MVP trophy.

“But I think the good time ends now,” I spoke again after getting back from the sweet memory. “See, Uncle Luke got mad at me, again. I know it was so stupid to even talk at that time, but I just couldn’t help.” My eyes were glistened with tears. “Why didn’t anyone understand that? Chad only wanted to get justice for his father, but Uncle Luke thought that I chose Chad over him. It’s not like that...”

I sighed. I wiped my tears before it strolled down.

“I’m sorry... I know you taught me better than to whine over all the problems,” I said, and then chuckled. “You know, Mom, Dad, I really need your hugs right now. I miss it so much. I miss your kisses, I miss your voices, I miss living in our house...” I put my head down. “I miss you.”