Unfair fate

I’ve heard people,movies,books,stories always refer to fifteen as the early teenage years.according to them fifteen is seen as easy.when one is fifteen though grown enough to understand the way the world works, but still very young to carry its weight .I grew up believing that too .i still think back to when my family still felt like a whole sentence ,instead of an incomplete one.a sentence cut short suddenly,a period no one prepared me for. My name is Julia, and this is how my story begins. It was just few months to my fifteenth birthday when everything suddenly changed.my new normal was about to set in or rather my family’s new normal .i was in the third year of high school,I always dreaded the feeling of sitting down in classrooms that often smelled like chalk,dust and cheap perfume while having to pretend having an interest in quadratic equations when it felt like my life was rearranging itself without my permission. My parents had just gotten divorced. It’s been 8months now ,so they weren’t newly divorced. There was no slamming of doors,or yelling at each other anymore,they were divorced in a kind of way that feels permanent,like a scar that had suddenly stopped bleeding but never really heals not fades.The kind people expect you to be “used to by now.” They were high school sweethearts.Everyone loved saying that part of the story like it made the ending poetic. They met at the age of fifteen.ironic the same age I turned when they decided to part ways,they fell in love ,shared lunches,and borrowed notebooks ,they were soulmates and eventually promised each other forever before they even knew what that meant.Forever it turns out ,has conditions. My dad fell out of love .That was the phrase my mum always used,her voice flat ,like she was scared that the truth might shatter if she said it too loud.He never cheated ,He didn’t disappear overnight.He just stopped loving her ,slowly ,quietly ,Until one day he chose to fall in love with someone else instead. And then he got married to her. That part no one expected .” Did he really fall out of love though “ I would often say to myself. While my mum struggled to heal and move on he othe othe hand ,moved on faster ,faster than I learned to explain it to people without my chest and throat tightening . I have a younger brother, Jeffery ,He is ten .still young to believe that adults know what they are doing .jeffery handled the divorce differently.but I overthought everything.He adapted and could tell which weekend was dads turn to have us over and the nights which were mums,and which version of our family he was supposed to be on a a given day. I envied him for being that way . My morning always had the same routine .my alarm would go off at 6:00am and I’d lie in bed staring at my rooms ceiling ,while listening to hum of our house ,with no footsteps from dad getting ready for work ,no smell of his usual morning coffee drifting down the hallway .now it’s simply silence and sometimes hearing my mum cry softly behind her bedroom door when she though I and Jeffery were asleep. This morning started off the same way .wardrobe .a printed skirt and a blue shirt.put it on and brushed my hair into something neat and presentable,grabbed my backpack.In the kitchen my mum stood by the counter,she was preparing something that looked liked oatmeal that she would end up not eating .Her eyes looked tired,exhausted in a way that sleep could not fix. “Morning ma”I said She smiled ,but it didn’t reach her eyes. “Morning Jules.” Jeffery rushed in moments later,half dressed for school ,already talking about a science quiz he hadnt studied for.life moved on for him .even if it felt stuck for I and mum.The walk to school was crowded and loud.mum couldn’t drive us to school yet .and I do not enjoy taking the school bus so I prefer walking instead.friends laughed ,couples held hands ,and teachers stood at the gates welcoming students .To everyone else it was just a normal day like every other day . But to me it felt different.it felt like I was torn between two versions of myself. One version tries to appear as a normal fifteen year old girl and the other version carries questions that I hadn’t figured out how to ask. Did love always end? Is forever really what they say it is? If my parents love story could end after all those years .after all those memories ,what chance could anyone else possibly have? At school people knew . They always do ,divorce had it owns war of spreading without having to announce it .some of my class mates treated me gently ,they obviously thought I might break .others chose to avoid the topic entirely like nothing happened,scared that they might unknowingly say the wrong thing .And then there are those who said things like “At least they didn’t fight all the time “or “At least your dad still comes around “. The walk to school was crowded and loud.mum couldn’t drive us to school yet .and I do not enjoy taking the school bus so I prefer walking instead.friends laughed ,couples held hands ,and teachers stood at the gates welcoming students .To everyone else it was just a normal day like every other day . But to me it felt different.it felt like I was torn between two versions of myself. One version tries to appear as a normal fifteen year old girl and the other version carries questions that I hadn’t figured out how to ask. Did love always end? Is forever really what they say it is? If my parents love story could end after all those years .after all those memories ,what chance could anyone else possibly have? At school people knew . They always do ,divorce had it owns war of spreading without having to announce it .some of my class mates treated me gently ,they obviously thought I might break .others chose to avoid the topic entirely like nothing happened,scared that they might unknowingly say the wrong thing .And then there are those who said things like “At least they didn’t fight all the time “or “At least your dad still comes around “. At least ? As if pain should have a scale. When the final bell rang for the day .I didn’t feel relief ,because going home meant facing my mum who hadn’t been able to hold the pieces of herself together.home meant pretending I was okay with weekends now divided between households .with a new wife and a stepmother I barely knew.with a future that no longer matched with the one I’ve always imagined. That night ,while I lay in bed ,I stared at my phone ,and a message from dad popped up .i knew it would be something simple: “How was school? " Or see you this weekend Jules “. I didn’t bother to open it Instead ,I sat with my thoughts that I’d never dare say out loud. If fate was supposed to be fair ,why did I feel like it has already been decided against us? No one would have prepared me to know that this was only the beginning.and fifteen would be the age I started understanding how deeply unfair fate could be and how much would be demanded from me before the end.