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The Affair, Ladybugs, and Blades Of Grass

Family Betrayal

By Laura FPublished 6 years ago 8 min read
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I remember the feeling that was left in the very pit of my stomach when leaving a dear friends house – Something. Is. Wrong.

My parents live on a beautiful property; lush, hearty green grass embraces your fall and feels like a hug from a loving soul when you land. Birds cheer all around you, relentless and reluctant to stop singing their song of praise, as wind chimes do their best to harmonize their sound, while fresh southern air races up through your nose, tickling your nostrils. My parents' house, on the other hand, is a different story. Nestled in every crook and cranny are terrible memories that I try to ignore while visiting, and as I crept up the driveway in my car, that feeling in my stomach was still very present, deepening its position in my stomach. Something about the energy made me very aware that a new crook and cranny would place its painful serpent head in a new spot, forever etched in memory.

Sauntering up the front Italian stone steps, I grabbed for the handle and took a deep breath in — what is about to happen?

Pretending that these feelings weren’t real, I did what I normally do upon getting home: shoes off. Keys down on the hallway tree. Quick peek into the kitchen, and VOILA! There. It. Was. At the far end of the kitchen table was my Mum, crying.

“Ohh. Hi. Sorry. I didn’t know you were here.”

Silence. The sound of birds chirping. The sound of wind chimes colliding.

“What’s wrong?”

“Hi, Laura. Nothing. I’m fine,” my Mom states at a low decibel, barely able to hold the tears back from plummeting to her fate.

Why I didn’t run away, I’ll never know. Instead, I made a tomato sandwich with the freshest, sweetest of sun-kissed tomatoes, picked straight from my parents' garden that very morning.

“Would you like a sandwich, Mom?”

“No." <almost a whisper> "No." <louder> "No, thank you.”

Why I didn’t take my sandwich and eat it elsewhere, I’ll never know. Instead I sat at the table with my crying mother and asked her, again, what was wrong. Shaking her head was all she could muster, and even though I was sitting right in front of the knot, it still wouldn’t go away. Stupidly, instead of trying to calm it, I enraged it.

“If nothing is wrong than why are you crying?” I asked.

We sat in silence: me staring down at the sandwich that rested on my plate, unable to really eat it and mourning the waste of such an incredibly beautiful tomato; my Mom staring at the damp, broken tissue that her thumb and fore finger rolled pieces — back and forth, back and forth — as tears rolled down her cheeks, numbing her position in time. Like a statue in the Vatican, she could be seen, but was too delicate to touch.

Then, just like that, the balloon POPPED and the silence was broken, as if she regained momentum, shed all layers of sadness and headed straight to anger.

“Do you want to know what’s going on? Why don’t you ask your Dad?”

Uh-ohhh…

And like the snap of my fingers, she shot up out of her chair, opened up the patio door behind her and started shouting “Larry! Larry!” Waited. Nothing. So she went to the front door “Larry! Larry! Come inside!” Waited. Nothing. “LARRY! Come tell your daughter why we’re fighting!”

“Oh. No, Mom. It’s okay. I don’t need to know anything”

But she was now in the zone; I lost her. She went over the edge with eagle-like focus and wouldn’t let it go. She was now frozen in rehashing the entire conversation that they just had — over and over again in her head.

“Come here!" (to me) "Come. Let’s go find your Dad. He’s outside. I know it.”

Why I didn’t say "NO!", bust out of the house, and drive away, I’ll never know. Instead I followed her in fear as she continued to shout: “Larry! Larry! I know your out here. LARR…”

Walking outside, down the same steps I walked up only minutes ago, we passed in between the house and garage, a space that was once my sandbox, but was now covered with cement. As I followed my Mom to the left of the house, out of the corner of our eyes, there he was, seeking shelter at the side of our garage.

Hands held his head as he perched on top of an old cement step once used as their main entrance seven years ago. As we approached, he didn’t even look up. He just kept his head hanging low like a flamingo sipping water from a trough, and didn’t say a word. He didn’t even move. Instead, he just stared at his hands. “Larry! Tell your daughter what you did! Go on — TELL HER!”

I wondered if he could see my little feet pressed so firmly into the luscious grass. I wondered if he even cared that they were there. Now I know that his guilt kept him silent, but at the time, in some weird way I wasn’t sure if he was the victim…

"LARRY! Go on. Tell her. Tell her how you would never dance with me while we were out, but when we were at your work functions, your work Christmas parties, YOU became the life of the party. YOU’d want to daaance the night away! Tell her how you never wanted to dance with me though. Oh no, no, no. Only sometimes. Tell her how you would leave me on my own at the table and just go off. Why don’t you tell her about the other woman? The one you told me was nothing! Was just your secretary!”

Processing… Processing… Processing…

“Tell her how you never noticed me. Did you know that for YEARS I tried? That I wanted to believe you. That I thought that you were a better man. A better person. For years, I wanted to believe what you told me, but I just couldn’t." (sobbing starts). "Then, I started to hate myself. I hated so much, and gained so much weight but it didn’t matter. You didn’t notice me either way.”

“TELL HER! Look at your DAUGHTER and TELL HER! Why hide it anymore? There. She now knows and is standing right here Larry. Just tell her. You’ve put me through so much pain.”

At first, I wondered if my Dad would in fact look at me — do I want him to look at me? Do I want him to acknowledge everything that my Mother is saying? Part of me did. Part of me very much did not; but I should have known better.

My Father would NEVER look up from his hands. He would NEVER speak up and he would NEVER admit that he caused my Mother immense pain. Instead, he would go silent and internalize everything, when all my Mother was trying to do was push him for a reaction. A flinch. A movement. But it was him who had now frozen in time. It was him who was the statue. One she would never get to move.

This scenario was not new to me. My Mom wanted to do everything she could to make my Father React. Talk. Make her feel like she was being HEARD. But no. He would not do such a thing. Instead he would let my Mom push his buttons to the point he couldn’t take it anymore, and would then shake a bannister so hard that all of the screws would come loose. Or, the first time I heard my Mom threatening to leave. Then my Dad threatening to leave and my Mother asking me to go convince him to stay — when only being in grade school and not even comprehending what this meant, other than not knowing who would drive me into school.

From an emotional standpoint, the only thing new to this situation was that I was older and the material was new. But the feelings were all the same: numbness, scared, and disbelief, knowing it would all end the same. That I knew. As my Mother continued to express herself, my mind went numb. I felt anxious. I learned too much that I could never unlearn, and so I too stared at my hands. The at the blades of grass. Hearty, earthy, stable green. Keeping my head held down meant I had no visuals to take in, and could block out the sound of my Mother's voice. Then came a gift from above.

Ladybug. Right below me was a little ladybug. It was captivating. I watched it climb to the top of one blade of grass, fall down to another, and work its way back up again. Then – fling! – over to another blade. Climbing up to the top, falling down another, to climb back up to the top. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. As an onlooker, it seemed so exhausting; poor ladybug! If only I knew where you were going, I could help you get through all of this grass!

But here’s the thing: the ladybug appeared to be so at peace with its journey — almost happy with where it was going and how it was getting there. This was so surprising to me for I wished I could be more like it. My bird's eye view of its journey was also impactful, for I could see that this little ladybug had many blades of grass to climb, any which way it went…

But then, just like that, it stretched its beautiful and powerfully poetic wings, and flew away.

immediate family
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About the Creator

Laura F

I am a Mum, friend, wife, niece and daughter. I used to be a sister, but fundamental boundaries were crossed. Boundaries that make me a survivor. One whose on a mission to speak up, so that we may stand together on a united platform.

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