CONFLICTED JUSTIFICATION

It was 12 AM and I had a plan, I knew Mama was hiding something from me but I was not willing to confront her about it, I’ll find out myself, I ate 3 hours ago and I faked my sleep Exactly one hour 30 minutes ago, I was ready so I stood up, I headed to the place where we normally keep our mail, which is like a small wooden shelf close to the kitchen, just hanging over, this was the same place we put our keys but where we put our mails were at the top. I slowly walked past her room putting my ear on her door hoping to hear a snore and I did, it was a soft snore but still that would do.
Now I knew she was asleep, so I went check for the mail. I searched and searched but did not find it there, I was baffled.

“Has she taken it in with her?” The question I asked but then from where I was standing, I could see the table, I could see some documents and I could also see some mails, so I walked there and searched for the mail, and finally I saw it, I immediately opened it and then I saw what it wrote. It First started with salutations to my mother and then he talked about his ideal reason for writing.

“You know the kind of man I am, and whatever I want I will get it, you have my son with you, and I will be coming to take him back from you, I know where you live and I know you ran away, we had a boy together and you to took him away from me, how dare you?” Wait what? Mama ran? No that can’t be right.

“I will show you how strong the bond of a son and the father is, I will be coming for him and I will wish to come for you too but that will be if you allow me to and knowing you, that is barely going to scale through, you have always been my Corazon and know you always be, do not hide him from me because if you do I would still find him. After all blood is thicker than water and he is my blood. Tell my son, I love him and he has the blood of a strong man, Tell my son I wish to see him and I have not been able to see him because I never knew where he was. To my Corazón.” It ended. Mama ran? I can’t believe that no, no, no.

“click.” The lights turned, it was her, it was my Mom and she asked.

“What are you doing up by this time…” she asked, scratching her eyes and looking at me but I gave no reply.

“Why are you not….” She said but stopped in her tracks when she saw the letter in my hand, she looked at me, and looked back down, with nothing but shock in her eyes.
“I thought I carried that letter in with me.” She said, but I gave no response.
“Give it to me, I will burn it now.” She said walking to me and then I said to her.

“Mama, you ran?” I said to her as I squinted my eyes in denial and moved back a little.
“You don’t know what you are saying.” She answered trying to take the paper away from me but I moved my hand further back the closer she came to me.

“Mama, tell me the truth, what happened.” I asked as her prowess to destroy that letter increased and she forcefully held my hand and then took the letter from me.
“If you take the letter. It will not change all I have read in there mama, it will change nothing and you know this.” I said to her standing up and raising my voice.

I was 14, I was young, in all my glim and glam, with all the power I have trained myself to have, I still wanted a father, I wanted to know my own father, even though I developed a kind of dislike for his names, it never meant I didn’t want to see him or have a talk with him, play a game with him, throw ball with him, these emotions ran through my heart and I raised my voice at mama and she looked at me, surprisingly and backed away from me a little.

“You raised your voice at me?” she asked me, as I gave no reply but I waited for an answer.
“Alright fine, what did you read? What did you see that made you raise your voice at me? What? tell me, I have raised you for years and you have never done this, you have never disobeyed me like this and now because of this letter, you sho…..” she was saying raising her voice in anger at me but I was swallowing both the pain in my heart and the anger in my chest.

“You ran mama, that’s what it said, it said you ran!!” I replied to her shouting back at her and that made her angrier.

“Yes, I ran! I ran Sabastian, you saw it there that I ran didn’t you then I ran, you saw it there that I ran, you saw it there right? what else did you see there? Did you see that I was a hooker? Did your father put it there?” she shouted back at me as tears filled my eyes.
“Why did you lie to me?” I replied her softly as my voice broke in-between.
“You said that he left us, you said he abandoned us. You said that he didn’t care for us and he ran away, but here it says it, you ran.” I said as my eyes leaked and tears started to flood my face. The hurt, the pain, the fact she lied to me again, that broke me, she could have told me and I would have understood, why did she lie to me.

She paused for a second looking at me as pain filled her eyes as she realized I was in the right.

“Sabastian, its not like that, I didn’t want you to be ……” she was saying trying to come close to me and hold me but I was hurt and angry so I distanced myself from her.
“Sabastian, you…why are you distancing yourself from your own mother? Why are you running away from me?” she asked as she tried to get closer to me, her face gathered with pain and her eyes were filled with tears. I couldn’t stay to watch her cry or I would end up in more pain so I left the parlor and went to my room.
“Saba…sabastian, mi dulce nino…sabastian.” She shouted my name as I walked out on her, leaving the letter in the table and walking to my room, I could hear from her tone as I turned my back that she was already crying and she was in pain but I still kept on walking to the room.

“Sabastiannnn!!” She shouted one more time and then I shut the door, I could hear her cry from the room but even I was in tears, I was in pain, I was in Dismay, why would my mama do this and it seriously hurt me, I didn’t want to know the reason I just wanted to be away from her because I knew it, I felt it, I was waiting, I was always waiting, I found myself waiting and I knew that something was off but I didn’t want to bring the topic up with mama anymore because mama gets angry when she hears it, even the word gang or mafia riles her up and makes her angry talk less of my father, she even hated the movies.
So, I had to stay away, I had to stay away from the topic, I had to bury the curiosity, had to just please her and not talk about it but now hearing this, no, this broke me.

The next morning I woke up and prepared for school, I can’t even remember how I slept, ohh yeah, I slept curled up in my own pain and disappointment, in my own regrets and tears.

It was 6:31 AM and I was already ready for school, I was not ready because I was a good person, I was ready early because I did not want to see Mama, I wanted her to be on her own while I be on my own.
I left the house as discreet as possible, and even though I found out lying in the parlor I took the kitchen door, I walked around a bit before heading to school and by the same time, 6AM, I saw him, the boy the seniors bullied, he was sitting outside of a park close to school, it was obviously dangerous but he was there and he sat on a swing eating something, he was always eating. Then he fell, and lost glasses.

“Uhhhgh, my glasses.” He said standing up and looking for it, I wanted to walk by but I decided to help him because I could clearly see where it fell.
“Wait, wait, I know where it fell just hold on.” I said to him and then he paused.
I looked for his precious glasses and I gave it to him, then he said.
“Oh, thank you.” Putting on the glasses to see who is close to him and then he saw me.
“Oh.” He said staring for a sec.
“What” I asked him, as my eye brows came closer.
“Ohh, uh, nothing, I was not just expecting to see you here” he said, pressing his glass closer to his face with his thumb.

“I should be saying that about you, not the other way around” I said to him.
“Ohh, me? I’m always here by this time, in fact I’m sometimes here earlier than this, so yeah that’s why I’m asking, but it's alright, you have your reasons.” He said carrying his bag.
“Hold on, you are here earlier? Bro this is a dangerous neighborhood, why are you out by this time, what would your mum think?” I asked him.

“Nah, my mom doesn’t care about that, in fact she will probably wish I never came back.” He replied me, Laughing on top of something serious.
“Wow, I guess you are not a mummy’s boy then" I said to him.
“pffft, I’m a nobody’s boy actually, I just exist.” He said.
“sheesh, that’s rough bro" I said to him and then he laughed.
“So how about you..” He asked me.

“Ohh, well, I don’t want to talk about it but I’ll just give you a brief because you answered my own question, I got in a fight with my mum so I am here out early.” I said to him
“Oh, I get it she got really angry it seems.” He replied me. But then I clarified.
“No, I got angry at her so I left the house early.” I explained.
“oh, oh….wow though.” He said to me.
“What?” I asked him.

“Look, don’t get offended by this or anything but I wish I had that, I wish I had the opportunity to be angry at my mom, if I was by any bit rude to her, I am legit gone, I’m not eating that day or any other day, something like that.” He said laughing.

“But what if she lied to you and that lie is what you have been believing all your life and now you find out it’s a lie.” I said.
“That’s a tough one but have you thought of it like, maybe she has a reason for ever doing that?” He said to me as I sat next to him digesting his words, I mean I knew he was strong and all but I really never expected him to be wise.