Chapter 2
As the days passed, memories of my childhood resurfaced—vivid and bittersweet. I remembered how effortlessly I received the things I wanted, never once worrying about the sacrifices my parents made to provide them. My mother always ensured I had beautiful dresses, little luxuries that made me feel special, especially when I saw envy in my cousins' eyes.
Back then, I never thought about earning my own way. Responsibility felt distant, unnecessary. After all, I was their beloved child, their only treasure. They couldn’t control me—if anything, I controlled them.
My mother begged me to take my studies seriously, to work hard and shape a future beyond the slums. She saw the hopelessness in those around us—the empty stares of people resigned to a life without opportunities. She didn’t want that for me. She wanted me to escape the cycle of struggle, to rise above, to create a life filled with purpose.
But I didn’t listen. My parents' happiness wasn’t my priority. My freedom was.
I spent my days indulging in fleeting pleasures—sleeping in, drinking alcohol, spending my allowance recklessly on cigarettes, proving to my friends that their influence mattered more to me than my mother’s desperate pleas.
I lived in blissful ignorance, convinced that happiness came from rebellion, from escaping responsibility. And in doing so, I never realized the depth of their love—the sacrifices, the dreams, the unwavering hope they carried for me.
Barbara’s mother often felt a strange envy toward her cousins—despite them being poorer, despite their struggles being far harsher. They seldom had meat on their table, rarely owned new clothes, and barely had money to spend. They were trapped in poverty, but unlike Barbara, they understood hardship.
She, however, was blind to her own fortune. A free-spirited child, her heart and mind consumed by selfishness, too absorbed in her own desires to acknowledge the sacrifices her parents made.
Her father spent his nights drowning in alcohol, perhaps seeking an escape from the cruel reality of his beloved daughter’s directionless life. A man once full of dreams, now weary, defeated, exhausted from trying to shape her into someone responsible. But sickness crept in, its weight unbearable—his frail body weakened, and before Barbara could even grasp the depth of his struggles, he was gone.
His death left Barbara and her mother behind, alone in the world. Her mother believed his absence might change her, might make her finally wake up. But she was wrong. The loss did not tame Barbara—it unraveled her. She became even more reckless, even more defiant, as if her father’s departure had severed the last tether holding her back.
She was unstoppable now. And nothing—not grief, not guilt—could make her turn away from the life she had chosen.
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