Chapter 3: Dreams

I'm scared. Scared to dream. Scared to look at the sky again. As I glance to the unknown, my favorite place in the world, I tend to get drifted away and thoughts just keep on flowing. I don't know if that place would make me happy again.

I'm lost in words. I'm lost in my place of being. I tried to escape. Run away and let it fade out by itself. But it comes back ever now and then, in my dreams, in my thoughts and in my every sight.

Sometimes one of those dreams would be trying to hit my dad in the face for some strange reason. May be it's because I still haven't forgiven him for what he did to my mum, to my family, my brothers and to me. I raised my arm swung it as far back as I could but it felt really heavy as I tried to give him a blow to the face. I could really feel my heart pumping really fast as if I was running a marathon. The adrenaline was really in my veins. But my arm swung in slow motion and as it reached to his face I had awaken, with my heart still beating thunderously. I really don't know what it means but this dream doesn't occurs once or twice. He did try to make peace. I did try to give in. Welcome him again, I'm not sure sincerely or not. But I am trying. Yet, why does it still happens?

When ever I walked around and looked at a family goes out to eat, at McD or KFC or just a simple hawker stall I would smile and think back about my childhood and never thought how happy my family and I was back then. The picture of my mum and dad would joke around at the front seats from where I was at the middle back seat have been locked in my mind. They sincerely laughed as he teased some things about her and she would pinch him on the arm and pretends that it hurts so bad, then she would apologized about it. They laughed out loud. He would say to keep it down because it might awaken all of us at the back. My brothers would be sleeping beside me but I kept my one eye half open witnessing what I thought would last forever.

I took things for granted at that time. The times we eat in or out. The questions they would ask about how's school or the movies I watched with my friends, the things that they would do for me. I would never appreciate it then, but I do now. There were times that I actually felt love, unconditional love for my parents. I can vaguely remember it. May be it was when I was really small, six or eight or ten may be, not so sure. I missed my Dad dearly when he had to go for weeks to the USA for training. Then when he came back there would be a luggage full of LEGOs and basketball cards. I felt like I was the luckiest kid in the world. My mum would cook me breakfast everyday, egg sandwich with hot milo before we go to school. Sometimes I hated it and took it with me for the road and throw it away. Then I realize it now. She actually wakes up in the morning before any of us cook some water in a big pot and pour it in a bin in the toilet and mix it with cold water so that all of us can have a bath with warm water. I think it's all of these little things that slip out of my mind when I was a kid and never realize what are the things that they wouldn't do to make me and my brothers happy.

Would I want to have a family again under one roof? Hell, I'd kill for that. But the thing is it will never be the same. I've thought of it for a very long time. I've tried to salvage it and it failed. I regret it now that I didn't try hard enough. May be it's a burden that I would have to carry for the rest of my life now. I would do anything not to see my mum broken hearted any more. I couldn't imagine the confusion my younger brothers had gone through to see our family broken up like that. I still think that they have never understood what actually happens. It did affect them in many levels. It is the biggest nightmare that every kid wouldn't want to experience. If I had the toughest time of my life, what was going through their minds must be ten times worst. And I wouldn't want that to happen ever again.

I guess it's fear that made me decide that it's not the right thing to patch things up anymore. Though it can be done but the consequences could be worst. May be it is fear that makes me to be like I am now. I face it everyday but I'm still scared, I still runaway from any problems that I face. It isn't right, it will not make it go away nor it will actually solve itself. I tried to face it however scared I am. That's why even though I'm scared to dream again but I face it everyday.