Daddy Dearest

“We’ll live somewhere else, away from Dad, ok?”
I nodded silently, nonplussed about what was going on. I was convinced that none of the confusion appeared on my face, but that was the time I didn’t know how impossible it is to hide things from Mum. I was nine that day. Time has changed since. Now I understand, now I can figure out things. Admittedly, what Mum talked to me about did not happen. We, Mum and I, did not move out and we don’t “live somewhere else, away from Dad.”

Visitors find my house a strange place, because the two women here, Mum and I, are never seen talking to the man, and somehow the atmosphere suggests that we never do. My house is a strange place. We don’t talk to ‘Dad’ — the word only symbolizes a blood relation, the quotes refer to the irony that the word means nothing to me. He can force any child to become an adult overnight.

Anyway, I have been able to assemble the pieces of my young memory to chalk out the story about my father. He lost his job when I was seven because the company he worked for closed down, or split up, or changed ownership, or downsized — you get the general idea. He set up a law firm after that, because he thought himself good enough — only he wasn’t. To cut the dark story short, I’d just say that failure followed, lots of it. So psychologically, he’s a mighty frustrated man. Like the office-going crowd, he leaves the house every morning, returns in the evening and stays at home on Sundays and other holidays — only nobody knows where he goes.

To me, he’s everything evil: greedy, rash, devoid of self-respect and dishonest in addition to being frustrated.

We live in the same house. Mum and I never talk to him. I am asked ‘to ignore him and act like he doesn’t exist.’ Stupid policy, if I ever heard one. I have maternal relatives residing nearby. They don’t have the time to spare me an ear: one that’s not deaf, that is.

I was fifteen when I was verbally abused for the first time — not by some mean school mate or a spoilt bully but by ‘Dad.’ Of course, I was asked to ‘ignore him and act like he doesn’t exist.’ The abuse still happens. He damaged appliances once when we were out for a few days. I was asked again to ‘ignore him and act like he doesn’t exist.’

Aunts and uncles find the situation too trivial to act upon. They are too busy with their corporate life and home-making. But never too busy to read out the list of things that I ‘must’ do for Mum once I get a fat-salary kind of job in the corporate world. I have to do that stuff to compensate her for suffering under ‘Dad.’ All in all right now, we can’t move. And he won’t move. Who wants to part with freebies and luxuries?

My aunts and uncles all believe we should not rock the boat but endure the situation until the equation changes. I can hear their empty rhetoric even now, “How come you all let it come to this?” The ever popular response goes something like this, “God, how emotional can you be?”

Some relatives even have a spiritual perspective on it, “It’s your destiny, your karma. Just focus on your duties towards Mum, ok? Pray to God, it’ll get better.”

Am I a strong person? I have started to cry against my ego. Recently I felt a pang of fear. I have started to feel I have reached the saturation point. I have begun to wonder how much more I can take. No, I guess I don’t have a reservoir brimming with strength, after all.The impact of it is that I am a shock-absorbent sort of person. Indifferent, some would say. Cruel, some might say. Numb, I say. My father and relatives — they don’t really matter but Mum means everything, though.

“We’ll live somewhere else, away from Dad, ok?” I was nine the day Mum uttered that promise. I am nineteen today. Ten years have passed since I heard these words said. Ten years since it should have happened, but didn’t. Ten years is a long time. Is there any redemption? I hate the man who made my life a hell. I loathe the people who let it happen. I’ll probably forget the details with age. Maybe I’ll forgive them. I think I will, some day. But not today. Not tomorrow. Not in a long time.

Some day I’ll have kids of my own. I’ll teach them to fight against injustice. I’ll tell them never ‘ignore and pretend.’ They won’t have to go through any of this….I promise myself.