Dear Parent

Dear Parent,                                                

I am typing on her old typewriter because I need to write you a letter. You have been out of my life and, therefore, selfishly left me to carry on your cleaning crew all on my own. I don’t understand why I need to run the business all by myself.

You are missed, but you are not my Mother. You are my mommy.

My mommie.

I have always looked up to you. Margot’s aunt drives me to school (except today, Saturday); she’s raising me. Showering me with birthday gifts and summer vacation!

But I understand. You left to work in South America. Since I was born here, I am to speak my own native tongue. I am to know my relatives (yes, you) more and more. I should be happy and content making phone calls and exchanging emails.       

The only thing is, I don’t speak your language.

My cleaning crew is not my family—they’re my business. The company pays me “the big bucks.” Do I want money? Those women love me, but can they like a mother should her daughter? Huh?!          

You’re my mother. The parent who abandoned me to go to South America.

For a job.

Why couldn’t you work here? Speak Spanish from here (or Portuguese, whatever you learned)? I don’t really care. We speak English in America. Not selfishness.

Well…phone calls await.

Catherine ripped the letter from the typewriter and folded it, telling herself to just stuff it in the stupid envelope and give it to the mailman—and go home. He will not read her letter. He will not interrogate her. He will obey her—by taking it to her mother. To read. To understand. To see that she should be as important to her mother as much as these people paying her company to clean their house needs a little sweeping and dusting.       

No, wrong comparison.

A daughter and a mother need each other. Period. 

Catherine stuffed the envelope, it pregnant with paper and truth and desire, and then dashed out the door. The mailman was in front of her as soon as he stepped onto the sidewalk in front of the post office. “Sir!” 

He nodded. “Catherine! Nice to see you.”

“Yes—I need you to do this please!”

She stuffed the envelope in his hand, and he thanked her, happy to mail it. Catherine, surprised, watched him then go, and dashed home, typing more letters. Hours flew by before Catherine had envelopes upon envelopes containing words of hope. She told him the following Monday to tell her mother about her day and her life.

One could not always talk to someone else in another state easily, much less another continent. So Catherine wrote letters. Scratch that. She wrote her words rather than spoke them. They would mean more on paper. More importantly, her mother couldn’t interrupt her. She could only read.           

That night, Catherine waffled between sleep and thoughts. The latter stole her attention. I am an eight-year-old child. I get paid “the big bucks.” That means mommy should see that I deserve love—after all, she gave me her company. She made me the owner of a cleaning company. I’m sorry it doesn’t pay great, but at least it allows me to know I’m the best in her life—the best businesswoman.               

Then she smirked. Mommy doesn’t even care I’m earning such “big bucks”! She thinks I’m just running a company. So maybe I don’t understand what’s going on. But if I show her, I’ll let her know that she’ll be sure as heck wrong that I don’t know what I’m doing. Sure someone in the family checks in on me. But they don’t know I’m a rich girl living in a world of green.

I’m going to pay my way to Mommy’s place to save the day. Save my day. Save our day. Save my life from total abandonment. Forever.

Catherine, with the help of Margot’s aunt, hitched a ride to Buenos Aires, rented a limo to her mother’s mansion and then hiked the large steps to the front door. Before she left, Margot’s aunt required Catherine to forgive her mother. Catherine nodded.

Knocking with all her might on the large oval wood, Catherine sighed hugely, tapping a foot on the stucco patio. Then she growled, “What’s with this woman?”     

Striking her hands on her hips, she took a brief glance around the patio. A lot of gargoyles had their backs to her, like they too pushed her away. She huffed, twirled herself around and pounded.

“Yes—one minute!”

I’ve been waiting ten. Can’t you go any faster? Catherine rolled her eyes and then looked right up at her curly-haired, mascara-wearing parent all decked in a faux dress that made her clench her hands into fists of envy. Maybe if I were you, I’d actually have a life! Catherine made a mental note to tell her cleaning company to clean her mansion completely of everything her mother owned. Even this dress.   

Forgiveness could wait. Mommy needed to understand.

Catherine walked inside, her mother now talking on her cellphone. Her mother absentmindedly closed the door, Catherine watching it, her eyes saddening. She switched to the scenery after asking and being ignored again. Marble tables boasted of three beautiful azaleas. Four bronze statues, some with lovers, stole the four corners of this amazing place. Then, the kitchen gleamed with—        

Catherine didn’t come to witness the cleanliness of her mother’s mansion. She already knew the cleaning company didn’t come for this place. This house. This undeserved residence where selfishness and greed reigned freely like leaves flying in the wind on a crisp fall day. 

Well, this house won’t be very great after I rid it of this stuff. I’ll tear down this place faster than my mother can buy it back from me! Catherine went into the kitchen to fix herself something. Grabbing the peanut butter and jelly from the refrigerator, Catherine then took bread from a cupboard and opened it, taking two slices. A butter knife was soon in her hand, the silver and crystal bead decoration shining in between the blade and handle. Sadness wrapped around her like these beads around the handle. She blinked.

“You okay, honey?”

“No.”

She ignored her mother’s gestures. Carrying the snack over to the marble table, Catherine made herself at home. She munched as she watched her mother smile. Margot’s aunt’s desire came to her.

What was Margot’s aunt really talking about when she said that? Was she serious about it? If so, how? Mrs. Rachel was down here, and Catherine was up there, basically living by herself. It wasn’t like she really had a mother. Dad passed away three years ago, when Catherine first started kindergarten. Then Mom moved away, giving the cleaning company up to Catherine. A child! Albeit someone being raised by a family friend and then a relative—somebody rather—down the street. But still. A little girl. Catherine chewed, half-enjoying her snack. The peanut butter and jelly weren’t tasty anymore.

If only her mother wasn’t just another rich person living on planet Earth. Many children, even the bullies at her elite boarding school, were invited into their parents’ lives through hugs, kisses and apologies for wrongs done. However, Catherine blinked, finishing. That’s not me. That’ll never be me. 

The plate was yanked away, and Catherine stared, brow furrowed, at her mother. “What’s going on, Mom?”

“Honey,” she pressed a button, “I need you to hurry up—”

“So you can tell me how glorious it all is?” Catherine rolled her eyes to the ceiling. “And how amazing it would be if this seventy million foot high ceiling is going to have a famous painting on it!”

“Honey.” Her mother walked around the long table, and dragged out a chair. “You are amazing. You run your business—”

“Our business!” Catherine shook her head. “The cleaning company was ours. I just took it up to show you that I could. But maybe I can’t. Not without you!”

“You can!”

Her mother’s ignorance angered Catherine. She hurled out of her chair and dashed away, her mother calling after her. She flung open the door, charged down the steps and ordered some bodyguards to send her home. Once she had stepped back into her house, Catherine called the cleaning company. They picked up. Surprised, Catherine proceeded to tell them that she needed everything to be shipped from her mother’s house to her own home.

“It’s for sale. The house is up for sale!”

“Really?”

“Yes! My mother’s selling the whole thing.”

Then Catherine proceeded to convince the bodyguards to hire real estate agents to sell the home to, yes, her, Catherine. She said Margo’s aunt and family were homeless. So, she lamented, they had no place to stay—until she, Catherine, would give them a home.

Five months later, the house sold. Her mother moved into a nearby apartment. Confused and worried for her daughter, she called Catherine, asking her about her vases, statues and other precious materials.

“It’s mine now. Your moving company’s giving it all to me!”

Catherine hung up amidst her confused answers, and waited for her mother’s professional moving company to relocate all her stuff. Soon, a couple of sons, Margot’s aunt and her husband, two cats and a dog all cheerily embraced the huge house, thanking Catherine’s mother profusely for such an astronomical gift.

“I didn’t sell it!” The mother kept saying, but they refused to be so polite. As the weeks went by, the family soon realized they could not pay the huge mortgage unless the aunt joined her niece in the cleaning company. She wanted a great job (and great pay). But why, she had realized, should she work for someone who basically lied to her company, her family and her mother? Catherine didn’t deserve the glory of giving a gift to Margot’s family. Catherine, the aunt demanded, should give the mansion back to her mother!

Catherine claimed her mother should be proud she even visited her.

Her mother, happy she at least found a place, said she’ll come visit Catherine or that Catherine could move down here to South America. She was still confused, but Catherine told her it was for the best. Her mother didn’t deserve such a house. She just filled it with stuff.

Catherine spat that she wouldn’t even if she had to. She was going to chuck her mother’s possessions in the trash. That way, her mother’s neglect would go down the toilet along with her materialism. Her mother wouldn’t be distracted anymore.

Feeling this retort was like a gunshot to the heart, her mother silently tapped End Call. Tears formed in her eyes, and she sat down.

Catherine doesn’t deserve this life. She’s my daughter. The mother picked her head up. Maybe someone else can have the mansion. I just need to hug my own daughter! She made a trip to North America. Catherine answered the door, and saw her mother in a simple dress.

“Go home!” Catherine slammed the door. Her mother made reservations at a hotel and called her once she settled into her room.

“Honey! Please—”

“I want myself right now.” Catherine hung up and tossed the phone. It clattered onto a table, but Catherine was too busy getting ready to watch TV to care whether the phone cracked or broke or whatever. Once she settled down with a blanket and a box of Cheez-Its, Catherine laughed at the characters’ funny antics. Hours later, another phone rang. Rolling her eyes, Catherine huffed, ripping the blanket away. She walked up to the phone, read its caller and then pressed the green button. “Hello?”

“Yes, this is Margot’s aunt. I’m calling Catherine.”

Catherine frowned. “What’s going on?” 

“Catherine, dear, you’re lying. You lied about the house. You stole your mother’s stuff! A thief and a liar. I can’t believe you. More importantly, I can’t trust you.”

Catherine retorted. “I don’t have time—”

“I’m sorry, but, Catherine, you are way too young to be playing games. You should be sorry! No family friend of mine is going to get away from this situation. I’m explaining this matter to your mother.”

“Fine.”

Catherine waited. Tapping her foot against the floor, Catherine sighed deep and long. Finally, her mother answered.

“Mom, what’s taking so long? I wait for you all the time! Can you please listen? I’ll explain.”

“Honey…Margot’s aunt said you lied about the house!”  

Irritated silence.

“You need to—” 

“Mom, why must we have to war over our two different worlds? Why can’t we just live together?”

Catherine started picking at a hanging thread off of her shorts. “You can have your mansion back. You can have your stuff back. Margot’s aunt and family can move back home. But I want you to understand something.”

“Yes?”

“I took your stuff because you took yourself away from me. I lied because I thought maybe you’d want to listen to something. Something called this.” Catherine held the phone in front of her and pressed the red button. The screen blinked with the message Call Ended. Then she tossed the phone away.

The girl then ran into her bedroom, and sobbed onto her linen pillow. She cried and cried, wishing she had someone to call Mommy. Someone who would call her Catherine, not just a flimsy honey. Someone who would be her mother.

Minutes later, Catherine sat up and looked at all her mother’s stuff lying around her, disorganized. The faux dress lay on her bed. She got a call.

“Catherine, who are you? Really? A liar and a thief, or like a second niece? My relative? Someone I wouldn’t have to sue!”

Catherine frantically called her mother, asking for some money to go through with the lawsuit. Her mother said no. Catherine begged her. Still no.

Desperate, Catherine begged some from the bodyguards. No, he resisted. Catherine begged some from the cleaning company. Then she remembered—her own money! She dug it out, returning home from the trial without any of it. I gave my money away. And for what?      

Catherine returned to bed that night, a raincloud over her head. She lay there, scared. She had no other wealth besides her mother’s money. She jumped out of bed, and called her mother. She also strived to convince her to buy back her mansion. But her mother didn’t want it anymore. Her daughter needed to be honest.

“What is more important—money and stuff, or the truth?”

Catherine said she’d be honest if her mother loved her.

They talked. For a very long time. Catherine wanted to graduate with honors one day. Then she’d get a job. 

Before her fourth grade graduation next Fall, Catherine stood before her school assembly. She looked at her speech and gave a nervous smile. Looking right at Margot’s aunt, she drew a huge breath and began.

Dear Mom,

You’re my mother, not just someone I knew. Someone I know. Someone who is my relative by blood. Someone I can trust and know will take good care of me. Someone I can love.

I want you to understand that we are family. We’re to be together.

We have money, but we also have each other. We can come together. We may have been apart, but we can…

Catherine’s eyes followed her mother as she walked through the aisle of audience and up towards the gym doors. Exiting the place, she appeared upset—no, like offended and angry. Catherine stood there in the silence. She didn’t know what to do. Then she exploded, “My mother has been too rich to love me. I don’t think she could be the mother everyone else has. I don’t think she is even my mother.”

Then she got down from the podium, walked amidst the shocked rows of parents and students and ran towards the back of the auditorium. As Margot’s aunt drove her home, she said her mother could stay here in North America. Catherine would buy back that mansion.

“I forgive her.” The aunt reminded her. “I didn’t forgive my sister-in-law for abusing Margot until she got killed in a plane accident. You never know what could happen to anyone—especially a relative. You never know what could be your last words to them. Please understand—forgiving others is as important as others forgiving you!”                                  

Catherine learned Spanish and Portuguese. But she wasn’t her own mother anymore. Margot’s aunt became her legal guardian—after Catherine sold the mansion. She fought with Margot’s aunt before handing over the money.

Catherine fought with her mother. Her mother struggled to forgive her.       

“Can I?” Her mother tried.  

“Let me into your life—for good!” 

And maybe, they’d be together. Forever. 

Because that’s what mothers and daughters do, right?

She wrote letters again. To help her mother understand.

Catherine’s mother never forgave her daughter. She lived till her death—a few months later. Catherine sold the household items for more than her mother had everything worth. She strived to be honest. She slowly earned people’s trust. But Margot’s aunt warned her to be truthful to everyone.

Catherine struggled not to blame herself for her mother’s death, and to, instead, forgive her.

“You’ve made your own choices. Your mother made her own.”

Catherine’s letters and phone calls stopped. She eventually stopped criticizing herself.

“Be done trying to get your mother’s approval. Making the right choice is hard, but it’s possible. Your mother never forgave you because she could never forgive herself.”

“How—”

“Start being honest with yourself. Why can’t you do this for me?” 

Catherine looked at her. She stopped visiting her mother’s grave. She stopped criticizing herself.

I forgive you never escaped her lips. 

The aunt forgave Catherine’s bitterness.

“Sorry, but she doesn’t deserve it from me!”

Catherine threw herself onto her bed, clinging to one of her pillows. “Why can’t I? Why?”

Margot’s aunt comforted her.

And Catherine thought. Long and hard.