Chapter 19 - 19. ‘Family?’
My father left and took that body with him. I sat helplessly in front Kerberos. My hands were shaking greatly due to the emotion and my tears ran down massively unable to stop without being able to stop.
"Aaargh!," My scream broke the silent night and echoing. I cried and cried. Mickey sat down next to me, while Kerberos looked down and was speechless. "What did I do wrong?" I asked them, "Was my presence to this world a mistake? Why can't I be like my other friends?" No one answered me. Those two creatures just looked at me in silence.
Kerberos suggested us to rest in a place and would continue the trip the following day, but Mickey disagreed.
"We will continue this trip this night," He decided, and he suggested me to walked up the hill not far from the river, "Follow that river, not far from here there was a cemetery. The place we are heading to is not far from that cemetery after we walked through the portal."
"What? A portal?" Kerberos asked, "Zarina? Don't tell me she does not in this world?" the white dog demanded an explanation.
"Zarina has dead, child," Mickey said mockingly. "Just like Zie, her spirit is not in the spirit realm, "She sealed her own spirit to a body…emm…" That cat looked confused how to explain it. "I'll tell you later," He signaled the stone birds to hide.
"Tha, you are strong enough! We will reach the place any sooner," Mickey comforted me. I just nodded to agree with.
We walked along the bank of the river that night. My body was still shaking, and of course Mickey could not keep up with our speed.
Not long the walk, I saw a gravestone, and next I saw other stones. The grave was well cared and the bodies buried were really messed up. They were covered by dried leaves and some dry grass grew here and there. The gravestones were just stones without any names.
"Who was buried here?" I was curious, "Look awful and not well cared. I mean, did not they have any families to clean it up and at least a care taker?" the first time I saw, I was very curious, in fact
"Oh', Miss, you can see it?" Kerberos looked shocked.
I looked back in bewilderment. I stopped and looked at the grave more attentively. "I did not see it wrong, did I?" I asked back to make sure what I saw around me.
"You are not wrong, Miss. It is just it was not human that were buried there," Mickey stopped his steps, too.
***
I was born in a complete family. My mother was a researcher and a teacher, while my father was a designer. I had a brother who was 2 years older than me
Although I had a complete family, the family relationship could not be said good. My father had left us since I was only 7 months in my mother's womb.
My first time seeing him was when I was 9 years old. That made me think my father was a stranger for me. I saw all the struggles my mother made to be with him since I was a child until now. So I had to receive that strange man that everyone said as 'father' to be my father.
My father had a strong ambition that would take everything at stake to make his ambition come true. He sacrificed us, his life and his time, and also grandfather and grandmother. I did not blame anyone over my father's choice. It was his own choice.
.
Everybody is free to decide what he wants for his life, but upon every choice he makes, there are risks he has to take. Each individual should not only take the advantages, but he has to be ready for the consequences that come along with it.
An only child from the main leader of black witch group or pack that was born without having the power of magic at all, even the simplest one was the biggest disgrace that my grandmother tried to hide from years.
My grandmother was a great witch but my grandfather was an ordinary man. My grandfather handed down his incapability in magic to my father. And that was a shameful for witches.
Mother and father were two stupid people who were united in a marriage bound, and were contacted with an acute deadly disease. It was called love.
Since I was a child, I knew exactly the struggle my mother made to be able to be with my father. She sacrificed all for the man she loved. And when my father decided to leave us, she was still waiting for him like an insane woman.
She worked hard and was strangled with debts everywhere anytime my father asked great amount of money to be sent to him. She also had to support us financially. Yet she chose my father more than us although that man clearly abandoned her.
My brother went to a dorm school since he was 10 years old. I remembered well how he cried until his voice disappeared because he did not want it. It was just because she did not have time to take care of us alone while at the same time she had to work hard to suffice us, and sometimes had to send some money for my father.
Although father had left us, once in a while he called mother to ask for money, and that mean my mother would work even harder like a crazy to grant my father's request.
After sending my brother to a dorm school, I was left to Nana. She was an old woman who lived next to my house. We were like a coin with two different faces but were united and were always stick together.
Nana lived alone because all her children had to work in far places and would only go home in Christmas, even so they only stayed for a few days. That old woman was like a mother for me, she made breakfast for me, picked me up from school, and accompanied me to study at night.
Mother only visited me several times in a year, sending money to Nana for my school fees and my needs. Sometimes, she visited just to look at me, without any words, then left.
I never knew what happened to my brother in dorm school, I was just so thankful that mother did not send me there as well. Sometimes my brother called me on Friday, Saturday, or Sunday. He would tell me stories that made me laugh my tears out, but mostly told me sad stories made me feel unlucky to have such life we had.
…
I still remembered very well that moment. I was 12 years old, my mother took me and my brother to my grandfather from my father's funeral. In the very early morning, we were ready to go to my brother's dorm school to pick him up.
At my grandmother's house, it was still 7a.m. the funereal ceremony would be held at 8 sharp. I was waiting on a chair beside my grandfather's coffin. I looked at him, he was dressed in black, he did not seem to die but sleeping peacefully there in the coffin.
Grandmother walked back and forth with my mother. They were trying to contact someone, but their expression was worried. Until at 8.45, the ceremony was not started yet, some people asked to leave the place because they had other things to do.
Several times grandmother requested not to start the ceremony due to the missing of my father that morning. Until when the clock struck ten in the morning and no signs father would pick up the calls, she finally agreed to carry out the ceremony without my father's presence.
My father never came to that funeral. At that time I might have not really understood the situation and only asked 'Why father did not come?'. Later on I knew why.
My father hated my grandfather very badly. He had always thought that it was grandfather that caused him misfortune. He was expelled from the witch group, unable to take responsible for grandmother's position and be isolated.
…