All the things we leave behind. Pt1
#1 of The sum of the whole
For those that know me and want to know a bit more of my background. Life is hard, it feels like it wants to break you, don't let it.
All the things we leave behind.
Foreword: I am not writing this for anyone specific in mind, this is more for me than you as it chronicles my real life events and explains who I am and why I am the person I am. If anyone reads it and takes anything away from it, that is more than I had hoped for. Based on my real life with only some slight modifications.
Aside from brief flashes of happier times when my folks were still happy and in love, the first real memory I have growing up was the silhouette of my father holding his suitcase as he left for the last time and never came back. I didn't cry or beg as one might expect of a five year old, rather I just stood and watched as things fell apart. I've always known I wasn't destined for an easy life and any happiness I had would be fleeting for one reason or another. Being raised by a single mother with three kids in those days was not easy, but my mother has always been a fighter. For a woman of short stature who always wore a smile no matter what, I knew she could take on lions and win. Where most would have crumbled under all the false accusations of her infidelity and the multitude of lies, she wore a soft smile and shouldered it all while maintaining the lie "we just grew apart" so her kids would not grow up hating their father. Even when what little savings she had dwindled and we were surviving on handouts from churches her resolve did not waver. Putting her children before her pride, my mother did any odd job she could find to put food on the table, including selling second hand jackets on the side of the road at one point until finally finding a job at a local school for the mentally handicapped.
Things improved a bit after that, finally having a stable roof over our heads and a warm bed to sleep in. Life was by no means easy, yet we never felt we were lacking anything from the way our mother loved us. Looking back on it now we can laugh, but when you're in that sort of situation you thankfully don't know how tough life really is until you compare it to the lucky few. Luckily for us we never even thought to do so. Even when little instances of my sister begging for something at the checkout line was met with my abruptly blunt brother responding with "Stop asking, we're too poor for that" bringing a shameful blush to my mothers cheeks as the kindly old lady behind us offered to buy it for us.
While my father was off living the high life with random women and trips around the world, every request for some assistance on his end by my mother was met with the excuse that he had no money left. Still my mother refused to say anything unkind about our father, even inviting him and whichever current love interest he had to birthdays and other special events.
Cut forward a few years after a couple of failed relationships to a drunk abusing boyfriend and another womaniser, finally a real man came along and swept my mother off her feet. He would turn out to be the man I have always tried to model myself after. To this day my mother still recollects their first date, how shy he was and how he ended the date with a firm handshake. She had thought he was not interested in her at all until a day later a bunch of roses arrived at her workplace with a note apologising for his shyness and how he hoped he had not given her the wrong impression. As things do they progressed, eventually finding my mother married to the man as she puts it "was the love of her life". I would love to say things were perfect after that, but as most of you probably know, life is never that easy or fair. Being self-employed and with a very messy divorce behind him, my stepdads ex-wife made sure his life was a living hell every chance she could. Claiming every cent possible and usually getting it because of her rich family she could afford the better lawyers. Still my stepdad did not harbour any hatred to the mother of his two boys. We made due and we were mostly happy, we all loved each other and he became more of a father to us than the man whose DNA we shared. Life was good for a while, we all grew older and went on a few adventures and as one tends to do, you forget the bad stuff and don't expect anything bad to happen.
Enter the teenage years where hormones start kicking in and making usually rational and smart kids turn into assholes. My sister fell into the wrong group of kids at school, started dating someone my mother never approved of and for good reason. Of course being a teenager my sister knew better and he was the man she was going to marry. At least that's what she thought until she showed up back home in tears after he'd tried to kill her again for the second time. It was all we could to do stop my stepdad from heading over to beat my sister's boyfriend to within an inch of his life, at one point locking him in the room with all of us until he calmed down enough to be rational. Not long after this my sister got an opportunity to leave the country, hopping on the popular Au Pair train and heading to the States to live with a family for two years while she found herself. It was during this time her and I grew really close, being that no one else in my family was tech savvy, I was the only point of contact back home. She shared all that had really transpired with her now ex-boyfriend, how he'd cheated on her and even physically abused her. During those two years of emailing back and forth a strong bond was formed between us, one that persists to this day, we share everything and are still best friends for it. When she finally returned home my sister had blossomed into a beautiful strong and independent woman that didn't take shit from anyone. A point she proved when she bumped into her ex while out on the town one night and promptly gave him a black eye.
During my sisters stay overseas however things back home had started to devolve again. The happy period was officially over, my stepdads business was suffering after he'd been held up at gunpoint before being beaten by the robbers and one of his workers fingers being chopped off when they could not get his wedding ring off. Being old school he did not believe in counselling, looking back on it I always wonder if things could've been saved if he had spoken to someone about it. With my sisters imminent return from overseas we were putting pressure on him to get her room ready so she could have a place to stay when she got back. Understandably with how hard he worked this wasn't ever going to be possible, to which my sister moved into my room when she got back. This did not sit well as I had also just started working and her late night partying did not fit in well with my schedule, as would be expected tensions rose quickly. After a few weeks of constant complaining by all parties involved my stepdad finally finished my sister's room, there was a stunned silence as he showed us what he had accomplished. The sheer level of love and affection he poured into making that room something my sister would enjoy spoke volumes for how much he loved her as his own daughter. Sadly this would not be something that would fully dawn on my sister until much later in life after it was too late.
Things settled down for a few weeks after this, life seemed to go back to normal. My sister was delightfully surprised by how her introverted little brother seemed to suddenly be so popular as a number of random strangers greeted him where ever they went. For a little while we were happy, my sister more so as she had met her soon to be husband. After being dragged out to the clubs by her friends and not really wanting to go, she ended up spending the evening with someone from her past and things were set in motion. Three days later she had moved in with him and a few months later he had proposed. Arranging with her then boss to give her the afternoon off without my sisters knowledge while he set the scene with rose petals on the floor spelling out "Will you marry me?" on the living room floor, then calling my sister to tell her he was home sick and if she could come home fast. This worked a charm as she rushed home, stomped straight over the petals and muttered how he had made a mess in the house to go check on him and finding him in full suit and tie, down on one knee holding the ring. It's traditional just to say yes in such situations, but my sister never had much tact in these situations and replied with "Yes you asshole, now go clean the mess you made in the living room."
We'd all thought he had lost the nerve to ask my sister for her hand after my biological father had ruined the surprise by exclaiming "What? Are you crazy!?" when my brother-in-law had asked for his permission to marry his daughter. She was devastated that the surprise was ruined and thought she would have to wait another few years for the chance, thankfully this wasn't the case. Wedding plans were underway, there was a lot of love and laughter and things seemed okay again. Until...
"He's gone, he just left and we can't find him anywhere..." came the fear cracked voice of my sister that morning over the phone. She'd been staying back home for a bit and was meant to be doing something with my stepdad but had woken to an empty house. His car keys, phone and everything else was still in the house. None of his workers or friends knew where he was or had seen him, amidst the racial tensions after the ANC had come to power along with a spate of murders in the area, there was a very real and suddenly ugly chance something had happened we were not prepared for. I rushed home to find my mother and sister in tears, not sure what had happened. I had to climb into the attic to make sure he'd not taken one of his guns and done the unthinkable after all the problems with his work and ex-wife, thankfully both weapons were accounted for. The cops were called first to take statements, then eventually a family friend in the K9 unit came to help with a sniffer dog but that ended sooner than expected as the scent got lost not far up the road where there was a taxi stop. My stepdad had simply vanished and we did not know where, how or why.
A few agonizing days later, not much sleep or anything resembling a normal life and we finally heard news. The phone rang and his broken voice on the other end proclaiming how sorry he was and how worthless he'd become. He was a broken man and needed to get out, that morning he'd snapped and left the house, even in this state he'd remembered to lock the door for my sister's protection before hopping on a taxi and leaving the state. Somehow he'd found his way down to Cape Town and found friends to stay with there. No amount of my mother's pleading would make him come back though, he had convinced himself he did not deserve us as he was a failure. One thing he did not count on was the strength still within my mother, we were all old enough to look after ourselves at this point so she packed her bags and headed down to Cape Town to find him. As hard as she tried though he still would not come back, but he did at least start to recover his sense of self-worth and eventually started working again for a large company. My mother came back alone, but the outcome was not as bad as it could have been. She would return a few more times to try bring him back without success, but in retrospect I think those few trips were good to make some lasting memories she cherishes to this day.
Finally with my sister's wedding approaching my stepdad returned for a break, the family was back together again and life seemed to be giving us a break again. I'd met someone special, been together for a few months and things were getting serious. We'd been friends for a while and knew everything about each other, even doing the stupid teenager thing of making out in every unoccupied corner we could find. I'd gotten it into my head that she was the one and started looking at engagement rings, oh how stupid young love can be. A lesson I learned harshly not long after that as one evening at a gathering I found her in the lap of my best friend in a very compromising position. I wish I could say this was the worst birthday gift I got that month, but it paled in comparison to what happened a few days later.
"Listen guys, we've just been to the doctor to see about my headaches. They've found spots on my brain...it's cancer." It's the sort of thing you expect to only hear in bad daytime TV drama, along with the absolute silence that followed for a few seconds as the news sunk in. I would have given anything to take the pain away which I saw in my sisters eyes at that moment, but as I soon learned this was by far not the worst thing I would see in the coming months. The tears flowed and I never thought they'd stop, there was nothing I could do to make it better this time. The air of hopelessness hung thick and heavy, as if the Grim Reaper was standing behind my stepdad with his scythe at the ready.
The next few months were a blur, my sister scrambling to get her wedding on track in the hopes my stepdad would still be able to walk her down the aisle. With how fast my stepdad was deteriorating I think we all knew what the outcome was going to be, but we're fighters and don't give up easy. It was decided to send my brother off with our father so he wouldn't be around to see the inevitable end we knew was coming. Despite being the oldest sibling by five years, with his cerebral palsy and high functioning autism he was essentially still a kid and couldn't process what was going on very well. My sister was living with her fiancé at this time which left just myself and mother at home with my stepdad. I'd changed jobs somewhere along the line and despite all this was doing rather well for myself, even earning a degree for being the first specialist in the state for the company. All through this though when I was home I helped out where I could, but no matter how hard I tried there were some things I just couldn't do. In all my years I've never seen my mother cry, no matter how hard things got, but during this period I saw it twice and it felt like a knife to the heart each time. The first time being after they were coming back from a doctor's appointment, hoping for some good news. During their drive home the doctor had called to reschedule their next appointment to an unrealistic date. To which my stepdad exploded and smashed a flowerpot against a wall while exclaiming "Don't they know they're playing with my life!?" before storming off to their room. A few moments later when my mother didn't come inside I went out to find her around the corner crying, I didn't know what to do or say to stop her so I just held her against my chest and let her sob uncontrollably while I prayed for a miracle from which every deity might be listening. No one was listening.
Things progressed pretty fast after that, the man whose lap I used to sit in growing up shrunk and started to fade into a husk of his former self. The cancer progressed rapidly in his brain, causing sever mood swings and delusions. I remember being called into his room one evening with my mother as he rambled about how he knew she hated him, as he put it "You keep hurting me, I only fall when we're alone together, I know you hate me and wish I was dead." The pain I saw in her eyes I will carry with me forever, she knew it wasn't really my stepdad saying those things, but they still cut her deep. I tried harder than ever to be there, to help and support. From helping physically lifting and carrying his frail naked body from the bath to assisting him into peeing into a bottle. If you've never been through something like this, even if I hate you to the ends of the earth, I would not wish this on anyone. Watching a loved one fade away and know there is nothing you can do but watch helplessly as they go is not something anyone should ever go through. Eventually he deteriorated to the point where we could no longer look after him ourselves, he was moved into a step-down facility a short drive away. The house was eerily quiet those last few days, where the ragged breathing and fevered mutterings used to fill the silence, there was now an emptiness. I hoped we'd at least have that emptiness for a bit longer, but it wasn't meant to be. At 2am on the 15th August the phone rang, I was gently shaken awake by a teary eyed mother who just said "He's gone." Time seemed to slow down as we got dressed and I drove in numbed silence with my mother to identify the body. I can still see his tiny little form laying slack jawed on the bed staring sightlessly at the ceiling as clear as day in my mind. For the second time in my life I held my mother as she sobbed uncontrollably. I remembered the last conversation I had with him a few nights before he was moved to the step-down facility, the promise he asked me to make which I carry with me to this day. "I know the fear you have of becoming like your father, but it's the choices you make that will define you, not his blood. Stand up for what you believe in, no matter how hard. Be honest and don't lie, especially to loved ones. If you make a promise, stick to it and don't say what you don't mean. Promise me you will be your own person and don't let anyone else mislead you." It was a short conversation which has shaped my life and my being. If I'd known it was going to be over so soon I would have stayed in the room with him longer to try gain as much wisdom from him as I could. But now it was over finally, now what?
No matter what happens to you or your loved ones, life goes on. In the wake of my stepdads passing my sister's wedding was still to come. I'd since met another lady friend whom I'd travelled to see and whom had helped me deal with the grieving of my loss, if timing and location were right I know we would've been more but neither of us were under any impression that this would ever happen as we both had separate lives we weren't willing to change. To this day we are still good friends and share stories of our lives, I've watched her get married to someone else and have a kid; as happy as I am for her there will always be the "what if" in the back of my mind. She joined me as my date for my sister's wedding before all this though, the only woman so far whom managed to get me up and dancing like a spastic in front of a crowd of strangers and friends. Very few people have connected with me on that level so far, something my sister even pointed out after the wedding.
By this point it had been a year since my almost fiancé had cheated on me, I had had enough of holding onto that animosity and anger for so long. I finally reached out and after a great deal of effort on my part I was truly able to forgive her. Somehow this helped us turn into really good friends, we still get together with our respective partners who get annoyed with our inside jokes, but no matter how long the gaps between seeing each other are, whenever we are together it feels like no time has passed at all. For a little while after I forgave her I was at peace, things seemed to be getting back on track again and finally I was starting to feel happy again.
POST: I will end this chapter here as it has been rather long winded, as you can probably guess this is not the end of the story yet as I am still here and plenty more has happened since then. There is far more truth in here than I originally intended, but as I promised my stepdad, I do not lie and I do not have any shame in what I have gone through. If anyone reads this and wants more, please let me know and I will try fill in the rest, at least up until current events. Otherwise I may try my hand at writing fiction for a change.