Part 23

Kim searched deep into Pie’s eyes and what she found there completely seized her heart and battered her soul. She has never seen Pie that hurt; tears never stopped running down her cheeks, leaving glistening trails, mapping the full extent of her sadness. Neither she nor Pie has ever thought things could get this complicated. Everything that happened just now was a few minutes of terrifying moment in their life. Sushar, their growing up teenage daughter was all messed up, almost regretting her existence as part of the family.

            “Do you think our daughter is ashamed to have us as her parents?” Pie finally spoke after a long silence. Kim whipped her head instantly to her spouse, frowning to her disagreement.

            “No. She isn’t that kind of person.” Kim shoved away the thought as she soothed Pie again, her hair gently to her comfort. “She was just upset with her friends and wanted to be accepted by everybody around her.” Kim stated, sighing to her worry.

            “The fear that we have been anticipating for years have finally here and knock hard on our door, isn’t it?” Pie sobbed bitterly. That was it. They have foreseen the exact matter since the first day they have decided to raise a child. It’s the matter of struggling between the need of acceptance, the fear of rejection and desire to not care at all. All they wished was to have a good life, building a family with children and lived like any other couples but then, they were aware of every possible consequence of their wishes. Whatever they did, whatever they have planned would always seemed to be abnormal to people. The social discrimination towards them was unbearable.

            “We can handle it.” Kim said. “I can’t do this alone without you Pie. I need you.” Kim tilted her spouse’s chin until the latter looked at her. “Please be strong for our family.” She spoke in her low voice as sadness began to envelope her.

            “I’m scared.” Pie admitted. “I don’t want to lose you or even our daughter.” Kim understood it. Pie was trying to point out the things she has been saying to their daughter just now. “How could you tell our daughter to pretend that you have never existed? It was ridiculous.” Pie shook her head in disbelief.

            “I’ll be fine.” Kim said. “We’ll sort things out and everything will return to normal.” Kim assured it to Pie without any doubt. “All we need to do at the moment is paying a lot more attention to our daughter. She needs our support. We can’t let her face this alone.”

            “It must be really difficult for her.” Pie brooded. “She is suffering because of us, Kim. We were selfish and this is our karma. We chose to live against the nature and then shamelessly demanding for a life which is equal to normal couples. Perhaps, we should never include the choice of having a child since the beginning. We were just thinking of our own happiness but not the child’s.” Pie wept again.

            “No.” Kim disagreed. “Nothing is ever completely wrong, Pie. Never say such thing again.” Rage filled Kim out of sudden. “We can live as any other normal families. We just need to go through this together. It’s just a phase.” Kim tried to convince her spouse.

            “I’m sorry…” That was all Pie could utter before silence enveloped both of them again.

            “What can we do to ease the situation?” Pie queried, remembering Kim’s promise to her daughter about transferring the teenage girl to a new school.

            “I have a few schools in my mind. We’ll just have to check on them and make sure that our daughter is safe there.” Kim answered. “And I’ll make sure none of them bring up the matter about her background.” She said and Pie saw Kim grew tense with the thought.

            “Do you think it can make our daughter happy?” Pie asked still worried about Sushar. As far as she has ever experienced, transferring to a new school isn’t as easy as it sounds. Their daughter needs time to adapt herself to the surrounding and most importantly, she needs to start all over just to make friends with others.

            “What else we can do about it?” Kim sighed, burying her face into her hands. “Unless Sushar is willing to endure the discrimination and unfair treatments from her friends, we have no choice rather than getting her out from that environment.” Kim met her blunt end.

            “Sometimes, the only way to solve a problem is to face it, Kim.” Pie said causing Kim to taken aback with the words. “Don’t you remember the thing you have taught to our daughter?” Yes. She could recall it now. She used to give that kind of advice to Sushar.

            “I don’t know, Pie. I can’t think any of the best way to help our daughter right now. I feel useless.” Kim finally broke into tears. It wasn’t the first time Pie saw her spouse being such vulnerable and fragile, but this time she was all broken and messed up.

            “Calm down.” Pie held Kim close into her embrace. “I’m sorry that I made things difficult for you.” She apologized, feeling guilty to put Kim in such torturous moment. She supposed to support Kim, giving what was needed at time but what she has done just now was a slight mistake. She shouldn’t have said anything that could disturb Kim’s mind.

            *******

As much as Pie wished their morning would somehow turn a slight better, it only came to her disappointment when nothing changed. Even though Sushar has finally come out from her room, sitting there at her usual spot to have the breakfast together, the atmosphere around there wasn’t the same as the old days. There was no more briefing by Sushar, telling them what she was going to do at school for the day, there was no more chuckling from Kim when she listened to their daughter’s complaints about her exhaustive schedule and the most obvious part which has been missing for the day was, there was no more communication among them. Sushar chose to eat her breakfast in silent, fixing her gaze to the plate even though there was nothing left on it. Kim pretended that everything was fine as she read the monthly subscribed newspaper in calm but as for Pie, she found it was nearly impossible to ignore them all.

            “Are you ready for the new school?” Pie asked to their only daughter, breaking the awkward silence.

Sushar lifted up her head to see her mother once before she dropped her gaze at her plate again. She saw it herself that her mother’s eyes were swollen, obliviously telling her that the woman cried all night because of her. “I guess so.” She said in her small voice.

            “By the way, you’re going to Lee High.” Kim