An Unpleasant Family Dinner

I abruptly woke up gasping for air. I had no trouble breathing as I had while in the paralysis dream. Feeling groggy, my vision was blurry and so I rubbed my eyes. I was drenched in sweat. Slowly getting out of the sofa the cold floor turned my warm feet into cold ones. The unpleasant feeling of chilliness made me go into my closet to find a pair of comfortable wool socks. Quickly my feet regained their warmth making me comfortable and a bit drowsy again. I wanted to lay back in my bed and watch some videos, but I knew it would end up with me falling asleep. I wandered around a bit and looked outside of my window, where I saw my sister's car.

―so she has decided to come home today, that's nice I guess

My sister wasn't home a lot because she would argue a lot with my mom about what I first thought to be unimportant things and she has a boyfriend so she stays at his house a lot, that might be the main reason. My sister is a kind, emotional and very straight forward person, so she's bound to start arguments, but I am so glad I have her in my life. She might be the only person I can talk to about my feelings, that will actually listen, and it actually feels genuine. Like she is actually listening to what I have to say.

I was still at a loss at what I should do now though. After thinking about what I should do, not a single conclusion to my thought arose. I ended up sitting back into the sofa I had just slept in and stared blankly at the black TV. There was nothing displayed on the black tv, although if someone saw me, they might have thought there was something on it. heard a lot of noise in the kitchen and before the noise I smelled a pleasant smell. It smelled like chicken, I quickly assumed that she made Chicken fillet with rice and salad, or something along the lines of that.

―I guess it's about time to go downstairs

"___, ___, Luqita, Dinner is ready.

Somehow, I knew my mom was about to call my brother, my sister and me down for dinner. She wasn't expecting me to be the first one down though, she wasn't even expecting me to be down for dinner in time at all. That's what her face said at least. "oh, look who's finally decided to eat with his family" I had already assumed she was thinking something like that, I didn't think she would say it right out though. I doubt she had any ill intentions, it's just that her humor is a bit different to mine. A sudden pain in my head appeared and everything I saw got a much brighter. It was someone had turned on the brightness in my eyes to max. I clutched my hand to my forehead while practically wobbling to the table, I sat down next to the chair I knew my sister would sit in. "are you alright" my mom said. "Yeah, just a headache. Don't worry about it." I then heard my brother coming down the stairs and my sister opening her door to come eat dinner. "yo! How you doiiing" she said with a wildly exaggerating the last word. "fine" I mumbled. My brother didn't say much, he usually doesn't. He is a very shy person with a couple of problems himself, but he is very smart and will probably be the wealthiest out of the 3 of us unless he somehow messes shit up.

When the dinner was served, I realized I had been right, it was chicken, rice and salad. Happy with the choice my mom had made, I looked hungrily at the food. I picked up my knife and fork to cut the chicken into multiple tiny pieces. I poured soya sauce over the white rice, coloring it in a black and yellowish color. Using my fork, I scooped up some rice with a piece of chicken. I put the food in my mouth and the taste of heaven was now softly attacking my tastebuds.

"…!"

A sharp stinging pain in my side caused me to spit out my food. "Fuck man", I looked towards the obvious culprit – my sister. "What the fuck was that for?" "No reason, I just thought I would get a funny reaction out of you."

―so annoying

I thought. But even though it was slightly annoying it didn't really bother me all that much, in fact it had pretty much the opposite effect. To get revenge I folded my hand into a fist and "gently" punched her side. "why'd ya do that?" "Well, you pinched me hard as shit in my side, I just had to get you back for what you didn't and it wasn't even a hard punch, so why you bitching about it?" She didn't reply with words but instead with a punch back, it wasn't a hard punch, so I didn't bother punching back.

―I just want to eat my chicken in peace

I decided to ignore her punches. It hurt slightly, but at the same time it was nice. These small comedic moments helped me out, they made me happy, even if only for a little bit. It made life worth living.

My mom's lips curved upwards and spoke "you know, if that was you a couple of years ago, you would probably have lashed out Luqita." "You know, years ago yo― aaand I think it's time to change the subject." My sister was quick to change the subject knowing where the conversation was heading. I didn't have the courage to raise my voice and say, "can we talk about something else?" whenever she brought up how I used to be in the past. I was too ashamed and embarrassed tell her not to bring it up. My elementary school days was probably my best days, but it was also when I hurt the most people. I used to be a person who lashed out at things pretty easily and was close to ruining the relationships I had with people several times. Even now I have an urge to lash out like I did back then, and I'm scared that those relationships already have been ruined, that the people I seem to be on good terms with only pretend that they are to make me not lash out. But, now I'm different I have learned to stay calm and drown my anger and let it sit within me until a day passes where I cry my lungs out. In the last 2 or 3 years though, it hasn't been angering that has caused my sudden breakdowns. Sleep deprivation, expectations, paranoia, anxiety, overthinking, hallucinations, and pills have all been reasons for my stress and depression.

I remember in 8th grade, I was 13 years old, and I told my mother that I have trouble going home from school. Whenever I walked by a person, I was scared of how my appearance was. It was like I could read their thoughts, they always thought that I looked ugly, that I walked weird, that my arm was placed in a weird way which I couldn't do anything about because it's permanently damaged. Their thoughts were always criticizing me, telling me how I was, telling me how I should be, telling me how much of a human piece of garbage I was, telling me that I could do nothing to change that fact. It was unfair why should I be criticized for something I couldn't change. I knew every piece of me, every cell of my body was complete garbage. I already knew all of that, I didn't need people to shove it down my throat.

When I told my mother, she responded with "Don't worry about it, it's just a phase, you know I used to suffer from anxiety. Well, I still do have some problems with it, but it isn't nearly as bad as it used to be. It was painful, so I know what you are going through, but don't worry, it will be over sooner or later."

―phase?

I was scared to tell my mother everything, I didn't want her to think I'm crazy. Still, I felt my blood boiling, but I quickly got a hold of it. At a fast pace, that anger I felt turned into sadness and confusion.

―why won't you understand? With all my heart I wished for it to be a phase.

Despite not having told her all my troubles I had expected that my mom would understand.

―You said it was painful so, why won't you try to help me like it is. Why Even if its just a phase, even if the pain is just temporary the pain is still present, it still hurts right now.

―Please mom, just please acknowledge my pain and do something about it, anything.

I wanted to scream those very words at her, maybe then she'd understand, however I couldn't.

The words never escaped my mouth, they were stuck in my throat. I couldn't say that to her. I don't want her to worry and I don't want her to waste her time on me.

―what do I want? I'm so confused and unsure. I long for someone to talk to and someone who will try to understand me, yet when I try to ask for help, I feel horrible and don't want that person to listen to me.

―I get so frustrated when someone misunderstands me, yet I'm so afraid of being understood.

Humans are contradictory creatures, and just like normal humans I too am contradictory. I say I want one thing, but I also want the complete opposite of that very thing. Though I know about how its normal for humans to contradict themselves, I still cannot comprehend why it is the way it is.

Anger and frustration resurfaced, and again I drowned down those feelings.

―How long until I completely drown myself.

I thought.

It truly did feel like I was drowning, even with my feet upon the ground.

I Curved my lips as I do every day. I buried myself with a great big smile.

"Il be alright now, Thank you for telling me that."

I lied.

I lie a lot.

When people ask, "how are you?" it's natural for me and most others to answer, "I'm alright, what about you?" regardless of whether or not that is the truth, however the other person will perceive that lie as the truth because that is what they know and it's easier to accept a positive lie than a hard truth.

Telling the truth or something that humans wish is the truth, is seen as morally good. I've heard that humans are motivated to speak the truth due to society's standard that speaking the truth is "correct", but is that really the case? Do people really desire the truth, or do they have a desire to believe that what they know is the truth? Humans have a strong desire to know the truth, and if you were to tell someone a lie that seemed believable enough, that person who desires the truth will be blinded by that desire, thus accepting and convincing themselves that the lie is the truth. Because of this, my mother will accept that lie blindly as the truth.

After that day, I never talked with my mom about my feelings ever again. How could I? She completely ignored what I felt, brushed it off as a phase. Even so, I still loved my mother. However, in this very moment I felt nothing but negative emotions against her. My sister wanted to talk about something different to lighten the mood and I appreciated her for that, but right now, I didn't feel like talking. There was an unpleasant awkwardness poisoning the air, food and myself. My appetite was lost, still I felt the need to eat. I didn't want to upset my mother despite what she just did. I wanted something at the table, but I was so damn tired I didn't feel like wasting my breath on speaking, so I made a groaning sound while pointing towards the chicken, signaling that I wanted more of it. My mother passed the chicken to me, I took it, internally saying thank you. When I was done eating, I went back upstairs, and booted up my computer to watch some videos.

While watching videos I told myself countless of times to start working on the task we were given by the teachers. No matter how hard I tried to do my work, I just couldn't. My mom asked me if I had homework and when I answered yes, she then followed up with "have you done your homework?" I told the "truth" "yes, I did them as soon as I got home." I even went as far as to show her a document where I had written a lot about something. That wasn't my homework though, it was just a lot of nonsense that I had written, but since she sat a far bit away from me she couldn't really read what I had written. She however was content with just seeing the many words I had written and saw it as me doing my homework.

―I really should start working on that task though.

That was my thought, though I never got around to doing it.