I only fell in love.
I did everything right.
It was obvious as months passed by of the great division between how we perceived each other and I endured everything despite him not having any affections for me.
Pain became part of my life, a normalcy. All will be well right? cause pain is part of any relationship, To make it last you've got to taste some of it, enduring patiently the obstacles and droughts that comes in a relationship. Thats how it's supposed to work right?
This was only a phase in our marriage.
I was only 18 and he was my first. I have so much more to learn.
He was gradually changing, like it was almost out of characte, almost as if he was never the man I fell in love and choose to spend forever with.
Changes are suppose to happen right? Change is constant in everyone, no matter how we deny it. He changed and so did I, the difference is that My love for him was the causation of such shift so I could love him more and be a better wife and lover for him.
I only, truly, genuinely wanted the best for him.
Like no one ever did for me.
One day out of the sudden, he layed his soft uncallous yet firm hands on me, hard and forceful. It was the first time soomeone had ever slapped me and my husband, who I chose to spend forever with at that. The very first seconds numb my whole body, My brain was racing on what sense and emotions would I feel, the stinging pain on my cheeks or the painful craking of my heart as it slowly dawned of me, the realisation of the grand-scale of mistake I made.
I wasn't a ignorant fool, I knew the first time wouldn't never be the last time.
I knew I could only endure, this was the life I choose for my self. My Anthony wasn't a deadbeat husband and he was tired all the time, the pressure must've taken a toll on him, I was his wife, I should be there for him, I should understand him. Maybe he wanted to reside in my but is unaware of how to express it.
As unhinged the lover I was a few years back, she was young- I was 18, I didn't know how to leave, to run away, clueless of the first step. I only knew how to bury her head in her books and academic papers, I knew nothing of the realistic reality of a relationship.
It can only be a cycle. Soon I became used to his pattern, to his cycle of love and anger and destruction then soon it was just numbness, I found solace in destruction, in pain.
Where could I run? I had no escape.
I can only suffocate slowly. I was drowning in my own tears and love and for the first time in my 18 years of life I finally realized the meaning of loneliness. I used to be alone yet I had an empire, hope, faith and purpose now I had love, which equated to my misfortune.
Rethinking back, I did lament of the sacrifices I had done for the sake of love. I had given up everything I have built from the years of my blood, sweat and tears and I let it crumble willingly for a man who can't even see me for who I am.
I was truly, deeply, overwhelmingly in love that I didn't realize that I had already endured a year of his cold and insensitive and cruel words and forgave him each time. I willingly disregard my pride and self-respect every single time I faced him and I could only cry myself every single night of the gut wrenching state of heart and mind he created.
The sane man became no more as he found confidence in his viscous words and hands.
I should've humble accepted my mother inlaws invitation of leaving her son in turn she would provide for me instead of stubbornly antagonizing her. She was a mother who have only wanted best for her child and she knew that child would serve murder the longer I stayed there. she might not grow to love me but she did grew to pity me. Who wouldn't pity a woman who've given up her entire future and life for the sake of loving your son? foolishness is pitiful.
Time went by so agonizingly slow yet so fast, I didn't fully realised that 2 years have already passed.
I tried to learn as much as I can. I tried out all the recipe's on all the cookbooks I had gotten my hands on,, I embedded every bar of the piano keys in my brains, in hopes of striking Anthony's heart, I read every book his eyes and thoughts might have wandered on and traced every steps that he has walked on so I could imprint him piece by piece in my heart.
I was a unyielding warrior, even if I was slowly losing herself I would still go on.
Soon I became pregant again, like my pare that time I made sure to take care of my self, to the point of abnormalcy, paranoid at every danger and step causing me even more stress I intended to avoid. For the first time I fixated on something other than Anthony, on my child. In the hopes that I would get the love and touch a crave so much.
My pregnancy made me long for my mother, it made me miss her deeply, desiring to reconnect.
I tried and tried yet I was unable to reach her. I wanted to come to her yet I was already too pregnant to be overly exerting stress on my body.
I had passed my 21th birthday when I gave birth to my little boy, I named him Artemio. He was a strong healthy boy, he had mine and my fathers eyes. I could only cry as I was hit with a strong, overwhelming feelings when I held him.
For the first time in the past year, It was the first time I felt full and contented. He might've been out of my womb but I've never felt more connected to him, as I stared in his chest breathing up and down.
He made me feel truly alive again. He made me have purpose. He made me feel love.
The love I've looked for all my life is finally found, with him in my arms. My heart was warm and full. Every vein in my body felt renewed with his touch.
I was his mother and I would make sure he would have all the love in this world.
Yet, The Gods above despise me, punishing me for taking away my mothers only daughter from her, leaving her alone. My Artemio was taken away from me by my mother-in-law and I could only struggle and watch as she did. I could still hear his piercing cries as he was separated from me, I could still hear my heart cracking from the back ground.
I was still too weak.
I was left alone again. She tore him away from me, she took my hope away from me. She left the country leaving me alone with her son, who she could've raised and loved better.
Why must she take away my chance of being a mother? She never grazed a hand on my body, nor spit out sharp words to prick my mind yet she've torn my already bleeding heart in two.
The beggining of my end and the end of my beginning.
It took me long enough to realise that maybe she made the right choice of taking my son away from me. Maybe it was for the better.
I had willingly let his father destroy me, gone of every ounce of courage to leave and to fight back.
I only ever want the best for him. I would never be greedy and make him miserable with me.
In the end I was nothing. Everything had been taken away from me, willingly or not to the point that I was nothing, An empty shell who's worth was defined by people and I let them.
I could only watch from my own body as nothing seemed to matter anymore.
I didn't even care anymore as I watched Anthony be intimate with other woman, I should've expected it since I was never enough for him and I would never be.
Tears surprisingly didn't seem to fall anymore, like I was unable of creating them anymore or did I just run out of it.
It doesn't even matter anymore.
I just want to sleep all day. I hated the sun and the air and the water. I hated living. SlowlyI could only die but the pain never ends there, so does the guilt when I was sent the news of my mothers death by a neighbor of ours. I could only hear the twisting and scraping of a brewing chaos in the back on my mind. yet I was too tired, too exhausted to grieve.
What was I living for?
My mother she was gone.
My son was better off without me.
I hated pain as much as I found comfort in it.
Finally I decided I would die. In this manor and hunt Anthony and the people here for the rest of their life. I wanted it to be painless, I wan't it to be clean, I want it to be easy so I researched all of how to end my life that way.
A single action changed the course of my life, again.
For the first time I opened my email, for the 3 years I have spent in the manor. Like I was moved by the heavens to open it for the last time, I didn't know what to expect or why I was expecting.
Letters through the form of emails were sent from me. From my friends and my mother. There was a staggering amount that it was astounding. I opened the latest one in my name, from my mother.
Miracle tears burst without me controlling it.
I was crying for the very frist time in a long time. Like a catalyst waiting to be triggered.
I found love in the most unexpected time.
Love had always been there after all.
I was loved. I am loved.
I see that now.
The younger me only perceive the love she believe with all her faith she wanted. The love she've needed had always been there all along.
Countless of letters have been addressed to me in a span of 3 years, by people who would willingly love me if I let them.
The chains had a little crack that can only grow further. It has no choice but to break
I only saw the person of my affection as someone who has the sole capacity to complete me, to love me.
The regret was slowly sinking its sharp claws into my skin yet I was comforted to know that I was wrong.
Wrong that I had no choice.
My mother sent me a letter every single day ever since I chose to leave, in hoping that I would open my emails regularly like a routine back then. It only stopped a day before she died. As I read through every line that she filled with her love, hope sank within the very core of me.
I had always been stubborn, now all I have to do is focus that stobburnes in the right direction. I would stir my own ship, even with my very own bare hands, no matter how long it would take. I would rebuild me again. I would find the very dear daughter my mother molded.
Knowing that I am loved and would never be alone in this world.
Maybe it wasn't to late for me to restart my life all over again, to live the life as mother always wanted.
And so I would do just that.