A broken promise

As I packed my suitcases with everything I caught around me, my mother would talk to me from the doorway of my room. "You don't need to do this. Talk to her". Despite the silence in the room, my head was full of noise. I could feel my face flushed, and my throat was full of anger that I thought I was about to vomit. I knew that if I opened my mouth, I would say things that I could not regret later. "This is also difficult for her. You have to understand" she remarked, condescendingly. Those last words came out of her so simply; yet they came to me like poison on a dart. I felt intoxicated once again, since the truth was that, it was always me who had to understand. Since I was a child, I had to deal with intrusive comments from strangers. Foolish prejudices from sinister women. The cruel laughter of bullying children. The disapproval of an embarrassed father. And despite the world seemed to want to eat me alive, she had always been there when I needed someone. My sister Clara had always been the silver lining in my stormy skies. Every time someone wanted to hurt me, she would step up for me. Given the naivety of my mother, a victim satanized by a bigoted society for being a single mother, Clara had forged a maternal role in my life without anyone asking her. However, I always felt that there was something inside her that she was hiding, even from me. Something was simply missing. I remember one night with special care of not forgetting. She appeared in my room and just sat at the foot of my bed, with her eyes injected into me, and as tears were running down her face, she said: "I will always protect you. Don't forget that". At that moment, that phrase had a double effect on me. On one hand, I felt considered by the person I loved the most. I knew I could trust her; nevertheless, I understood that there was a latent danger that she wanted to warn me about. Something that, because of my innocence, I did not understand well at the time, but it did not take long until I was able to discover it. However, I remained attached to that message, as a mantra that I repeated within myself a million times; and although many times I had to meet again with all those situations that took the best of me, my sister's words resonated in me, healing all ardor.

As I took out clothes from my closet and chose what to put in my backpack, I felt how I was unraveling all the hidden places in me for years. Tears flooded my eyes, so much so that it was hard for me to see what I was doing. Everything was in darkness, since I had broken the vial out of sheer impotence. I could hear my mother saying things, but her voice grew distant as I sank into my mind. My body felt altered. In fact, when checking my right hand, I noticed that there was blood running and it had stained the shirt I was wearing, but I ignored it since I didn't feel it was something important at the time. Probably from adrenaline, I couldn't even feel any pain; at least not physically. In all that time, my sister did not appear because, as I had previously discovered, it is common for humans to break our promises. After spending a summer away from home visiting some of my mother's cousins ​​who lived on the beach closer to our little town in the middle of the country, Clara, who was by then legal of age, had left our house. My mother had kept the secret for weeks by the time I questioned her. When I wanted to know why or where Clara had gone, she only told me it was for the best for a while. During the time Clara was away, everything she had ever told me made me weak. The fears and insecurities of the past came back to me like flying daggers, without much being able to do to prevent them from harming me. There was no one who could help me at that time. My mother, who worked during the day and only came in the afternoons without interest in hearing from me or anyone, was encapsulated in mediocre expectations in the face of everything that was happening. "It will pass, everything will pass", she said as she swallowed Doritos and sank deeper into the couch. So when the clouds covered everything above me, I knew I was on my own.

I stood in front of my mother who was still in the doorway. I could not see her face since the hall light showed her against the light, allowing me only to notice the tobacco that was lit from her cigarette every time she inhaled, in addition to the smoke that already flooded the entire room. "Let me go, please". As I was holding one of the suitcases, I could feel the handle of it getting wet with the blood coming out of the cut on my hand, but none of it really mattered to me; I just wanted to get out of there. "Nowhere will you be better than here". Someone could say that those words were a comfort, but I received them almost as a threat. "Let him go, mother!" My heart raced when I heard Clara's voice from her room. My mother allowed me to pass. Walking to the front door, the last thing one could see before leaving was a hanging silver cross. It belonged to Clara. She was wearing it around her neck the day she returned home on a winter morning. The snowfalls had a large part of the town covered, so the schools chose not to open those days in January, including mine. I remember it was a very cold day; enough to have to sit next to a small electric stove that we had and that hardly worked anymore. Despite the snow, my mother had to go out to work, so I spent the mornings just with my thoughts, the jazz music from the radio and some magazines that my mother brought from her job at the supermarket, most of them about beauty, with supermodels in sparkly dresses and great hairdos. Suddenly, the front door opened; And although it was Clara who entered, inside me, when I looked at her face, I knew that she was no longer the same person that she had left a long time ago. "Mother has told me what is happening at school. I want you to know that that must change. You're wrong". Her voice was no longer like it was before, sweet and charming, even being a shy voice. Now, she had grown harsh, and even contemptuous. And by saying those words, I also understood that she would no longer be the one to defend me; and on the contrary, I had gained an enemy that knew me well.

As I left the house, I felt the same coldness that I felt the day she returned. The night was merciless, but my heart could not bear any more suffering; to get out of there was to survive. However, before I could leave the front yard, I heard Clara's voice: "You are leaving because you cannot deal with the truth. You prefer sin before attending to God in your heart; but he will follow you, wherever you go, he will go with you. God is always going to protect you. Don't forget that". The floor at my feet was turning red from the drops that fell from the suitcase. When I turned to face her, for a moment, I saw the sister that once promised to protect me. Tears running down the sick and proud face of her were those that I once knew; but that did not matter anymore. And as I stepped once, the last words I ever spoke to her came out of my mouth and heart: "I wouldn't believe it even if he himself came down and promised me. There's no God where I'm going. Don't forget that".