My older sister was twelve years old when she stumbled upon those photos on his laptop. The first thing she did was tell our mom. I was six at the time so I didn’t understand what was going on. All I knew was that daddy was ‘friends’ with another lady and mom wasn’t happy about it. In fact, mom was very very upset about it. Then on, there would be fights at home, all the time, day in and day out. Daddy would go out and not return for days sometimes. I guess what’s to come was inevitable. A few months later mom filed for divorce and it took her nearly six whole months to convince him to sign the papers.
My seventh birthday came and daddy was gone. It was a split custody and I was happy about it. I was always more fond of him than her. I got to see dad every other week, it was the week I longed for. He was a graphic designer and an artist of his own making, and I was fascinated by that. When we were together we would go eating and shopping, he would tell me about his work and how he did what he did. Affectionate and doting, he was the best father any little girl could ever ask for. He always showered me with love and gifts, buying anything and everything I asked for. You could even say he spoiled me. Yet, as time passed by and I grew older, I understood what had happened and what was going on. I was older, but not old enough to know how toxic their relationship was.
Everything began to change when I turned twelve, that half-decade of split custody and routine doting began to shrivel/fade. Dad had lost his job, his savings, and his house and was forced onto the streets. He couldn’t afford to spoil me the way he used to. When I would go see him, he barely spent or bought me anything. That period was different, he was different. He was struggling and my mother at that point wanted to help him, he was her ex-husband after all. But truth be told she too had her own battles to fight and two other mouths to feed. Unfortunately for him, her pride and self-respect mattered more to her than the sympathy she felt for her ex-husband. It was then the tables turned.
Both my parents were avid mark-six players. Even when they were together, the lottery was a glimpse of hope for them to take that massive leap from middle to rich. Unfortunately for my mother, it was never in her fate.
During the period my father was living on the streets, his fortune struck and to my mother’s horror, he won the mark-six. Everything changed from there on, my father bought a number of apartments here in Hong Kong and some abroad too. He got married again and had new children. We didn’t see him as often anymore, he was rich and my mother wasn’t, I wasn’t. We began to live separate lives and I could feel the distance between us ever-increasing.
By the time I turned 16, things weren't looking good for us. Life was more a struggle to survive than to thrive. My mother worked full time and even then we barely made ends meet. We were now the ones struggling whilst my father became a busy man with a new life of his own. It was rare for me to even receive a call from him, let alone see him in person. I don’t know what the moral of my story is. In fact, I don’t believe there is any message to my life’s great tragedy. I guess life is random and not everyone wins at it. Good and bad things can happen to the most unexpecting of us and you just gotta roll with what you get.
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