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liastefanescu-blog · 7 years

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Bye-bye little girl

Summer, green trees, people sweating, everything seems to have a shade of yellow attached to it.

I open the front door of my home. I hear the same creak which always makes my ears quiver. I am standing in front of the hallway, not being able to move as if my feet are glued to the ground. The week spent away from home felt like a whole year.

A weird sensation makes my heart shrink. It’s hot as hell, but the warmth and familiar smell that usually greeted me are nowhere to be found. The house is still in a resounding deep silence. It seems like nobody is home, which is very wired since always there is somebody at home from the five of us.

I manage to make a few steps towards the living room. My mom is sitting in front of the laptop. She turns to face me. Nobody says anything. She stares at me with gloomy eyes and I can’t understand a word of what she’s saying. Her mouth is half-open with her chin pulled back and her teeth are showing up. Now, more than ever, her age seems to be layered on her face, which once was soft and silky. Wrinkles seem to dig on her forehead and mouth. When I was younger, I used to bit her chin and she would just laugh. Her whole face would lit up and glow, like the sun on the sky. My sun. Mama.

I walk to my room. I feel like there’s a hole in my stomach. The room t is half-empty. The poster which was on my door is gone. I turn around. Mom is behind me.

The poster is now ripped into pieces, thrown into the dumpster. It has been on my door since my 5th anniversary and it reminded me of the people which were no longer in my life. It was as though it has been protecting my door, the entrance to my room, until now. As a perfume has the power to send you back to a specific place and time as soon as you feel its scent, such was the case with this poster. It was a gateway, a portal which, if closed, remains so forever.

Blood rushes to my head and I start screaming until my eyes are brimmed with tears. But she already left the room. I let myself fall into my bed and go to sleep crying. The sound of a door opening wakes me up and I see my dad coming in. He lay on the bed and hugged me tight.

‘What happened?’ I ask.

'She started to throw away the clothes and things she didn’t like while she was alone’

'And why didn’t you do something?’

He sits quietly. Even if our discussion has ended, I can feel his fear and confusion. Man respected and feared by many for his intelligence and rational mind now stays in silence with his daughter, both being terrified by what will happen. I have never seen him as vulnerable as he was then, in that moment.

The next day, my two sisters, Jane and Luna get home. Their eyes inspect everything and slowly, their suspicion turns into certainty. All three of us start observing that not just my poster was thrown away, but also photographs with us, from when we were younger, Jane’s favorite scarf, clothes, books, almost everything that was red or had the color red is missing.

My mom’s presence becomes unbearable. I don’t know how to look at her anymore or how to act when she’s around. I try to avoid her at much as I can. Home is not home anymore and everything that doesn’t relate to this place brings me comfort; it is a place with unpleasant surprises.

My mom starts to disappear more and more from home. Nobody knows where she goes and we all feel frightened. After a few days when this has started, I call her and she tells me that she will come. And she came. But after five or six hours, when usually she would come after a very short time I would call her.

One day, while I was out for a stroll in the park, I saw my mother on a bench, talking to some strangers. I take a deep breath of relief. I go to her, determined to take her home. The same people she talked to wait for her to get up and while she’s turned with her back towards them, one looks into my eyes with a devilish look and, without saying a word, points his finger to his head implying that she is a lunatic. They all start to laugh.

The state of things got worse with each passing day.

One night, I hear my mom waking up and walking around the house. Neither me, nor Jane are asleep. My heart beats faster and faster until its pulsating beats remain the only thing I can hear. We both feel that something bad will take place. Suddenly, our mom runs toward the balcony and looks outside. I feel like I am living with an intruder in the house. She opens the front door immediately after, slams it to the wall and runs outside. Jane and dad get up and run after her. I remain pinned down to the bed. I get up but I feel stuck. The lights from the neighbors turn on and my eyesight goes blank for a few seconds, little cold drops of sweat rolling down on my face, my heart racing. I can see Jane and dad wandering the streets looking for mom, one with a lantern and one going about everywhere. I try to pull myself together but the shock is too big.

The next day, when I wake up, mom is home, in front of the laptop. I go into the kitchen to eat something. She comes in and starts explaining how she is here to save everyone. I start crying and I tell her:

'I don’t need a hero, I need my mother.’

She looks at me with pity and keeps on telling me the same stories. She invites me into the garden and while we observe the flowers, I see how she is caressing each little flower, with a tenderness I haven’t seen for quite some time. I feel lost. She tells me 'I can’t return from the mission I have started”. My feelings turn now from hate to indifference. Back in the kitchen, I slowly but firmly take back my seat at the table and I look at her while she is speaking and how her eyes move. Her voice is fading into the background. She can see my lack of response so she goes back to her laptop.

A few days after, dad asks her if she wouldn’t love to go with me and my grandmother to the seaside. She lightens up and agrees, or at least, she seems to. She didn’t know that we had a discussion, or better said, Jane, Luna and dad had a discussion which they later revealed to me. With a night before, me and mom start packing up for the trip.

It’s morning. The previous night I slept in the same bed as my two sisters. They wake me up and kiss me on the forehead, indicating to continue my sleep. I don’t move and stay still so I may only seem asleep.

My mom’s bags are in front of the door. I know this because the night before she told me about her plan to escape once we reach the seaside. I listened and I didn’t say anything.

Now, while quietly in bed, I can hear low voices and steps. A voice starts to speak louder and louder. I can tell that my mom doesn’t realize what is happening. Mom wants to come into my room to wake me up, but my sisters talk her out of it. Mom falls silent and doesn’t fight anymore with them. They leave the house.

The door opens, the car engine starts, mom opens up the bag and takes some clothes with her. The door of the car closes and the sound of the car gets further and further away.

Silence once again.

Jane and Luna return to bed. Luna leans on the wall and Jane stays in the other corner of the bed. We stare fixedly at a spot but without a particular direction.

I look at them and then I turn around. I couldn’t sleep properly after that for a long while.

(“A story which doesn’t want to have a name”, along with the photographs from Human and Nature helped me get accepted at the Let’s Go Digital workshop)

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