Two Masked Hearts - ✓ #WattysShorts

Three

When I was little, I idolized my parents. In my mind, I put them on the same level as Superman and Mother Teresa and Barack Obama. But they were special to me, my own superheroes. And I believed their love was eternal and true.

As I grew older, I realized that we all have secrets. My parents especially had secrets that I only found through the walls separating our bedrooms or when they were in the kitchen and thought I was in my room, not listening at the top of the stairs.

They told me fighting was normal for all couples, but I couldn't fathom how this could be considered "normal." My mom was a control freak, I knew that. She pushed me past my limits to do well in school. That resulted in many of our own fights. But she was different with my dad. She would take things from him, big decisions even. She made things all about her and what she wanted. My dad was a bit more of a free spirit and not so much one for long discussions about things, so he never put up much of a fight. I just think that she grated against him for too many years.

I knew the tipping point when it happened, mostly because the therapist that they forced me to go to twice weekly wouldn't shut up about it. It was a three-day weekend in fall, and my parents were planning a trip to D.C. to visit museums and see it. I'd only been there a few times in my life, and while I wasn't super thrilled about seeing museums, I was excited to see a part of history and a part of our country.

My mom took the liberty of planning the whole thing. My dad tried to help, saying he wanted to visit the National Building Museum. He was an architect, after all, and he loved to build things in our garage. Mom had different plans: first the Museum of Natural History, then American History, then African American History and Culture. The next day we'd walk the Smithsonian National Zoo and visit the Newseum since it was closing and the National Gallery of Art if there was time. None of this fit in Dad's wishes of going to see the Building Museum.

Though they fought leading up to the trip, we still went to D.C. But when we were going to go to the American History Museum, my dad grabbed my hand and took me running toward the Building Museum. He showed me grand displays of things that he knew all about, and I was riveted. I knew American history already because we learned about it in school, so I agreed with him that this was much more interesting and educational.

Because we split up, my mom actually called the police and had them come looking for us. They made us leave before we finished going through the museum, and we cancelled our booking at the hotel we were staying at. We drove home, none of us uttering a word to each other. They fought nonstop when we got home, and I just sat in my bed and cried.

After that, we stopped having dinner together. My dad slept in the guest room. Well, he had been for a while, but now he was definitively staying in there. My therapist had told me that many couples sleep in separate rooms, but now she couldn't convince me that this wouldn't be permanent. I knew what was going to happen, even though my parents wouldn't admit it.

Still, my dad never moved out. My parents went to couples therapy once a week, plus some sort of support group or something through the church. I think they claimed it was some sort of remediation thing, but I knew it couldn't remedy what was already done. Sometimes I thought I knew better than everyone.

Then the pandemic hit, and we went into lockdown. We were stuck at home in quarantine, and that meant we were crossing paths constantly. Before, it was pretty easy to avoid each other. But the fighting escalated to levels I had no idea were even possible. I couldn't blame my dad for getting mad. My mom was constantly harping on him for not keeping a clean office and leaving trash and food everywhere.

It was troubling to watch my parents' marriage fall apart, but even scarier than that was watching my mom deteriorate with it. Her control issues took a turn for the worst with COVID. She followed the CDC's guidelines stricter than anyone I knew, always making sure we all had masks and were washing our hands. I think she was just looking for stuff to do between meetings, so she would deep clean the house pretty frequently.

I worried about my mom and having OCD, but she assured me she was okay and still going to virtual therapy sessions. My trip to North Carolina was exactly what I needed to gain a little control over my own life and have some breathing room. I just worried about what effect my not being at home would have on my family.