wallet.txt

It was a shitty November morning when I woke up and got ready for high school that day. I put as much effort into my outfit as I did other days, which is to say absolutely none at all. I woke up at 6am, dragged myself out of bed, threw on whatever wasn’t dirty, and eventually returned under the covers to go back to sleep for another 30 minutes or so. I thought it’d be like any other shitty senior year morning. When it was time to go to school, I put on my raggedy old converse and trudged my way down the stairs.
I still remember it all. The wound has scarred over but it feels fresh to the touch, like it’ll hemorrhage blood again at any moment. I remember looking into the kitchen from the stairs. I saw my dad at the kitchen table and I immediately knew something was wrong. The way he looked at me with those eyes of his. He called me over and I knew his wasn’t going to be another shitty November morning.
Your grandma Eva is dead.
I remember it all. It felt like a sick joke. The way my fathers’ voice cracked immediately after he finished the sentence. He winced and looked away, cowering, hiding his watering eyes. There was a momentary silence, just a split second where everything was still. Even the air around us seemed to grind to a halt.
In another split second, the silence shattered like glass. My sister and I sobbed. My brother sobbed. My mother sobbed. My father finally let his hidden tears flow. We all acted in unison and our cries echoed off the walls on that shitty November morning.
At some point, my memory blurred. I don’t remember running away. I just remember being back in my room again, under the same covers I woke up from twice that same morning. I threw the covers over my head, hid from the world, and bawled like a scared little kid. My mother gently tried to coax me out. I didn’t hear her words though, just the sickly-sweet tone she used.
“You can’t make me go to school; I’m not going!” I screamed as my father peeled the covers off my shaking body. I was curled up into a ball on my bed, trying to burrow into my pillows.
My parents had a long talk with me. I don’t remember anything they said but they somehow convinced me to go back to school.
I don’t remember whatever it was they said in that talk but I do know they’re going to hell for it.
It was a shitty November afternoon when I went home to an empty house. My father was gone. My uncles were gone. My cousins were gone.
While I sobbed into my best friend’s chest at lunch, my father packed his bags. While I wept into my statistics worksheet, he loaded the car. While I tore up biology homework out of rage and frustration, he drove off. He drove off and left me and my entire heart behind.
They all packed up and left to go to Guatemala for her funeral. All of them, except me.
Mama Eva was the one who gave me my first bath. She was there when I took my first breaths, my first steps, my first words, my first honor roll report card, all the way to my first period.
All those firsts and my father never allowed me to say a last goodbye.
I have never seen my mama Eva’s grave. I only saw one picture from the funeral. Dad never bothered to send me any. I did get pictures, but only of him bar-hopping with my uncles.
After Mama Eva died and my dad came back to the U.S., he cleaned out her house and threw nearly everything out. I asked him to save me something of hers but he never did.
It wasn’t until two years later that he finally brought me something. It was an old wallet, embroidered in the traditional style of Guatemala.
It’s the only thing I have left of Mama Eva.