It’s been over 20 years since the very much rued incident happened. However, 20 or so years ago nobody thought of it as an incident. Well, our perceptions of what’s normal and not weren’t the same. Actually, when I think about it, the real incident then, as we interpreted it, was not the incident I mentioned earlier. It was why the incident happened in the first place. It was my son’s fault back then not my husbands.  Now, however, after 20 years, I can’t even look at my husband’s face. I just can’t forgive him. In fact, I hate him. I truly hate him. Back then, I actually supported my husband’s decision. Yet not long after, I knew that whatever he did, I would never forgive myself for not stopping it. On the other hand, there was my husband. He didn’t show the slightest grief for the first ten years. In the latter half, however, his feelings too had changed towards our dear departed son. His mind had been stretched and expanded, proving that every mind regardless of stubbornness and prejudice is malleable, for he was unparalleled in both. Now he did mourn for our son. “I wish this had happened before.” –talking about the reform- he always said when our son’s name was mentioned. Still, he never had the courage to confess, not even to himself, that he wasn’t completely “clean-handed”. In fact, when I think about it now, it is rather surprising how he never went to prison, or even a trial. If it happened today, he would be facing hatred from all who approved of his act 20 years ago. 20 years. 20 freaking years. It’s crazy how fickle the world is, and of course the people. Never once did he say, “I wish I was more patient” or at least anything that begins with “I could have…”. I remember him condemning the people on TV, “Perverts!” he used to say. The more the perverts, the angrier he was. The more they came out the worse his temperament got.

 

    Our son, on the other hand, was beloved by all who knew him. Especially by his father. They watched TV together every morning while I made pancakes. The same episodes of the same TV show repeated 7 times a week. Yet they enjoyed it. They enjoyed each other’s company. They enjoyed each other. They just did things so that they would be spending time together. Until the incident.

 

    It was mid Sunday the fifteenth of October. Chris was already 15 with his sixteenth birthday being the sixteenth of October. “Tomorrow”, I thought, was going to be a special day. Only, I thought good special. Yet the day started just like it did last year. He was out with his friends while his father too went out to buy him brand-new spikes. That was his tradition. Every year he would go out and buy the newest model of spikes, and Chris would pretend to be surprised, with his mouth wide open smiling, and his eyes in disagreement. He was ever so distant, as if in the inside, his mind was having this discourse going on. This argument that could never end. This debate that lingered. I’ve asked him numerous times to open up. I was his mother after all. He could tell me everything.

 

   I can’t recall Chris playing football with his friends. Not even once. In fact, I think I’ve never seen him with his spikes. He carried them around in his backpack and had his “so and so” football friends whom I’ve never seen. Yet the shoes, although I’ve never witness it happening, were always kicked in mud and dirt. They even had holes on them sometimes. “How?” was the question I want answered. “Why?” was the question I asked my husband when he said “we” were going to buy spikes. “He never uses them.” I would say. My husband’s answer? “You don’t know that so just shut up and bear with it woman!”.

 

      Later that day our son came back with a friend. Only the friend was quite old when compared Chris. “I have to tell you something mom.” Chris said. “I’m in love.”

 

      I wanted to disown him. I wanted him to disappear. He couldn’t be my son, not this way. After I have done everything the right way, this was utter betrayal.  He was cold hearted. He wasn’t worthy of being my son. But we could solve this, I thought. Him telling me was the first step. Now we would kill this disease at its crib.

 

     The one mistake I begged god to take back was when I told my husband about this. That followed Chris being sent to the armed forces. “He would be cured there.” He used to say.

 

     It had been almost a year. It was weeks before Chris’s return. With that said, it was possible for him to come any minute because he didn’t need to stay there a full year. The general could let go of him anytime he wanted and it was “volunteer” work. 

 

    I watched the news every day, just in case somebody might have died in a war and they would announce his name the same day. No announcements were made the whole year. There wasn’t a single war or even a proper street fight during that year. That was my consolation. He couldn’t be dead, and he had been cured of his illness. Everything should have been fine.

 

   It was past his birthday, 17th of October, and Chris was now already seventeen. I heard knocks on the door. I rushed to the door, knocking down lambs on my way. I was just so excited. My son had returned. I opened the door, and there was no one at all. I looked around and my Chris wasn’t there. Must have been a lousy joke. But no, there was a bag. This brown, decrepit bag. I lifted it up. There wasn’t a note attached or anything. It was so light.  I opened it and there were military clothes with a note attached on it: “Your son fought bravely in the war.”