My mother became a widow after my father passed away when I was just five. I can't say I miss him because I didn't know him all too well and plus and I was so small when he passed.
My parents were high school sweet hearts, they even had me their senior year of high school. And if you're wondering he died at the age of 23 due to a lot of debt he accumulated trying to care for my mom and I.
I was young then but you could tell how devistated my mom was. All she did was sit in her room for the next week and sob. She sobbed because the love of her life was just taken from her and she sobbed because she didn't know how big their financial problems were.
He made it seem like there were no problems at all and treated my mom like a queen. She never lifted a damn finger and that's the way he liked it.
"Señor, por favor, dame la fuerza para seguir adelante y continuar manteniendo a mi hija y seguir viviendo para ella,"(lord please give me the strength to take care of my daughter and to continue to live for her) is something she'd constantly say to herself at night, which seemed to help eventually.
On the one year anniversary of father's death my mom packed our stuff and we left home. At the time I had no idea where we were off too, but I wanted to enjoy the adventure.
We soon bordered a plane with a long 7 hour and 13 minute flight and ended up in a town called "Los Angeles."
We exited the airport and took a taxi to our new apartment on the particularly cool evening. But before we walked inside my mom stopped me and kneeled down in front of me.
"Mi hija," she started "here they don't speak the same language. But that's okay, I'll teach you the language and we will soon fit in." My six year old self just nodded in agreement even though I knew not what she meant.
She then took my hand and we walked inside. It wasn't as nice looking as the one back home in Puerto Rico but it was cozy. The kitchen was small but there was two bathrooms and two bedrooms meaning I'd get my own room this time.
My mom didn't look so pleased but I guessed that's because there were some cracks on the wall "Trabajaremos con esto por ahora,"(We will work with this for now) she repeated many times during the apartment tour with me.
My bedroom had no bed yet so that meant I'd be with my mom for the night. I didn't mind though because I remember seeing her face through all of this. She looked so defeated, so I was determined to not be a bother to her and help support her as much as I could.
By the time we finished looking around and bringing our luggage inside it was late, around 11:45pm. My mom then picked me up, walked to her room and yawned "we shall unpack in the morning Luna dear."
And with that we lied down on the bed and she hugged me tightly and kissed my forehead. Sleep came very easily to me that night, but just before I went unconscious for the night I swear I saw tears running down her cheeks.