The unexpected can turn your world upside down. It can leave your life in disarray.

 

Coping with the turmoil can be impossible, as you will see in . . .

 

 

Mommy And Daddy Dearest

 

This is a story that begs to be told, but to date has been shrouded in mystery. It is a tale about two different people, with divergent lifestyles, who end up together.

 

Mommy’s birth baffled both friends and family. Her father, who came from money, always dressed in a pinstriped, three-piece suit and shirt decorated with a colored tie, and never disrobed. A gambler, who bet on the horses and played in weekly poker games, he did not come home until late most nights and never seemed to be intimate with his wife. Could this man have produced a child?

 

As she grew up, Mommy was very bright and challenged her teachers in a way they could not understand. She looked at them with disgust in her eyes. She was a queen and they were the peasants in her kingdom.

 

Daddy’s parents were poor and struggled to survive. He let the system dictate his every move. He knew no other way.

 

In his day, all children of good breeding were right-handed, but not Daddy. This, however, was not acceptable. With head bowed, his teachers brandished a ruler across his knuckles to dissuade him from being a deviant. He tried, but he could not change.

                      

Mommy and Daddy went to two different high schools at opposite ends of the city. However, as fate would have it, their paths crossed one day in early October, as Daddy road his rusted, silver bike down the street through Mommy’s neighborhood.

 

Daddy was sixteen and Mommy fourteen, at the time. As she sat on the front stoop of her two-story brick house, with two other girls by her side, Daddy sped down the middle of the street. As he waved his hand trying to get her attention, he did not look where he was going and crashed into a parked Cadillac. He was quite banged up, but he seemed to have succeeded in getting Mommy’s attention and winning her admiration, as she ran toward him to help. Some believed it was love at first sight.

 

Seven years later, these two lives became forever entwined as they walked down the aisle, with “Here Comes the Bride,” providing the musical backdrop. People applauded as the couple recited their vows and kissed with a passion that all believed would provide the foundation for a long and happy future together. The smiles on their faces made an unforgettable impression on those in attendance. A union made in heaven, they thought.

 

But life does not always work out the way it should. Mommy and Daddy had two children, a boy first and a girl two years later. But these births did not turn out to be a blessing. For blackened skies seemed to place dark shadows on the lives of these children. Adrian, the boy, kept to himself, as distrust welled up inside his head and anger twisted his gut. He had a distorted picture of life and how to deal with the demons that tortured his soul. Evelyn, the girl, flaunted her body in a way that made boys salivate and lust after her. A temptress, she drove them wild.

 

Mommy cringed at the way Evelyn dressed, leaving nothing to the imagination. Time and again the school principal called to tell her that Evelyn’s behavior could no longer be tolerated, but Mommy was powerless to do anything about it. Evelyn frightened her in a way she did not understand. And Daddy ignored the misbehavior of his daughter. He wanted nothing to do with it. In so doing, he alienated Mommy.

 

However, he did try to speak with Adrian, but the door to Adrian’s mind remained closed to Daddy’s efforts. Adrian’s eyes were empty and his heart cold. He did not speak much. And when he did, his anguish frightened Daddy in a way that caused him to tremble. Mommy, too, could not find a way to enter Adrian’s world. The doors remained shut, as he slipped deeper and deeper into himself.

 

The wall between Mommy and Daddy grew larger, forcing them further away from one another. They said little, as they struggled to keep from drowning in an ocean filled with waves of discontent. This family of four drifted into nothingness. Could anything be done to save them? They stayed within themselves and none of them knew how to call for help. A wretched present and the notion of a bleak future haunted them.

 

Then one day, something strange occurred. A vision appeared—one all members of the family could see. A window opened to a sunlit garden filled with beautiful flowers and singing birds. Warmth flooded in touching them in a way they had never experienced before. A rush of hope ran through their tortured minds. They had a chance to escape the living hell that had befallen them. A portal to freedom from the ghosts of their past opened . . . but did they have the strength and courage to travel through it?

 

 

Copyright © 2021 Alan Lowe. All rights reserved.