You Would Never Know

Epilogue

Life works wonders; one day you're at your lowest, and the next you're at your highest. Like a seesaw, but depending on the highs and lows, it could be an experience you want to share.

Everything doesn't seem like it would fall into place ever, but then suddenly it does, and you're confused at how it happened, just like you were confused about how everything suddenly fell out of place.

For a long time, I thought the only way out was to leave everything behind, especially since I became so afraid to face my reality after it became unlivable, but now, my reality feels like it's a daydream.

While I was trying to escape, I forgot everything about home—what home is and what it's composed of.

Losing my way back home made matters worse; it led to me searching around the world for something I'll never find except in the place I lost everything in. I was yearning to experience that specific pleasant and warm feeling again, the kind you only get when you're surrounded by the people and place you call home, and when I finally found what I lost, I realized I lost myself. That led to a horrific mixture of fear, sadness, and pain that turned into anger, distorting any pleasant feeling I felt and making anything remotely pleasant taste metallic on my tongue.

The feeling of contentment and being home is something I thought I'd never experience in my life again, but I did. I found myself and my way back home, and I got to even make my own too.

"It says to preheat the oven to 180°; do they mean celsius or Fahrenheit?" The article is by an American magazine, so would it be the latter?

"Let's just roll with it, and if that doesn't work, then we will order a cake and pretend we made it." He kept pushing his hair back as he was lost as much as I am, if not more.

Abel cautiously took the oddly shaped cake and put it into the oven, as he didn't want all our efforts to go to waste. "I swear to God if they don't eat this like it's their last meal, then I'm disowning them." I fully agreed with Abel as we went and hugged each other after this war that almost led to a divorce.

We've been in the kitchen preparing for these two gremlins' birthdays since two in the morning, and now it's been five hours.

"This will take a good minute, so let's just enjoy our peace for now." Abel sighed, exhausted.

While we waited, we took this time to finally just sit there and relax a bit, even if it's just sitting there side by side on the counter, eating dry cereal straight from the box.

There was a comfortable silence until we had to get back to the task.

It was my turn to hog the counter fully, as I was in charge of designing.

"Abel, dearest, what were the themes again?" I turned to Abel, who was petting Kuma. Out of all our dogs, Kuma is the only one who doesn't trash the kitchen, so he's allowed in here at any time, also because he's gotten really old and we want him to do anything he wants.

"Bambi wants a bear wearing glasses while sitting in a bathtub, and Boa wants an evil fairy throwing laser beams at the bear."

There was a long silence, one that lasted for a good minute or two while me and Abel stared at each other, confused about how we would make this happen.

Before I could ask Abel anything, he gave me a disclaimer: "I do not know a thing about this, so do not ask me a single thing."

I just sat there with my mouth gaping and then said, "You gave me the hardest part on purpose." I accused him, and he didn't bother to deny the accusation as he gave me a faux apologetic smile while nodding.