"No matter your problems, face them with a bright smile and a bucket of chocolate ice-cream," nana once wisely told me. At the time, I was barely twelve and thought that I could summon a unicorn if I just believed in myself.
A decade later, despi...
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Maeva's point of view.
"Why in the world did you not tell me?" My father paces in the living room, cigarette loosely hanging between his fingers and a scowl darkening his face. With every step he takes, a cloud of smoke follows him, and I stare in utter confusion. Now there are quite a few things I have not told him about... how am I supposed to know which one he's just discovered?
'Do you think he's talking about the thing?' Nah, I don't think so. Not a soul knows about it, except for Daniel of course.
'What if he suspects it?' Are you trying to make me lose my composure, conscience? Stop it with the what-ifs, already!
"What's going on?" mom asks, wiping her hands from all the acrylic she's been drowning in. She takes off her painting apron and sits next to me, mirroring my confused frown.
"Your daughter," he says, "she found a job!"
"Congratulations, honey!" she throws her arms around me and sways me from left to right in celebration. I can't wait to witness the dramatic mood shift once dad fully reports his flashing news.
"She's a bookshop keeper!" he announces, a forged smile merely stretching his lips. I see that Mrs. Letterman has wasted no time before telling her favorite client about the new staff.
Almost instantly, mom's embrace is broken and a light tap falls on my shoulder. And three, two, one...
"Maeva Clara Anderson," she shouts, her voice resonating in the room, "you have thirty seconds to explain yourself."
"I needed money. They needed an employee. Our needs met. And now, no one's in need anymore." I explain, tone ever so cool, and legs crossed nonchalantly.
As he tries to hold himself from ruining his wife's vases, dad sits on the very edge of the sofa and cries in disappointment, "why haven't you asked me for money?" Did I not make it clear enough when I decided to get a student loan that I wanted to pay my own tuition fees when I graduate? "You did not spend years in college to sell books!" Here we go again with the whole college bullshit.
I understand their concerns. I know that having a kid is not always easy, especially if that kid does not turn out the way he was supposed to. However, I'm fed up with people telling me what I should do because I'm good at school. Am I bound to follow the career that my grades have earned me? What if I don't want to be the madly smart scientist everyone envisions me to be? What if I want to be a musician, a writer, or even a florist?
~~~~~~○ five years earlier ○~~~~~~
"Mm," says the white-skinned woman, "it seems that you have excellent scores." Mom and dad sit next to me, their proud grins getting wider and wider with every praise the guidance counselor adds. The latter reads my report card and rocks her head as she flips through the pile of paper.
