end of innocence part 2

Framed by the light from outside, she walked in in a semi shocked look, asking us why didn’t we turn on the lights. as she tried to turn on the lights, my dad’s voice rang out, cold and angry.

“don’t bother.”

“what? why?”

“where were you?”

“at work! where do you think i would be?”

“didn’t it occurred to you that she’s only 5?”

“she’s old enough to take care of herself! she could call her aunts to come if she really needed anything.”

“the lights went off, she was scared, you said you would be home early. you just left her behind like this. what kind of mother are you?”

“eh, i need to work ok, so she can be fed and we have the money.”

“yer? well, how come she’s still hungry then?”

she turned to me in anger, “why can’t you make your own milk? are you so stupid?”

dad was even more angry and held me tight, “she’s only 5, what does she know? we never really taught her how to make milk before, and the electricity went out, she doesn’t even know where the switches are. the water had be cold. stop putting blame on others that you know was your fault.”

as it got more heated, i got more scared. i started trembling in my father’s laps, because i didn’t know what to do. i didn’t want them to argue, but i was so scared, i didn’t know what to say.

eventually, it got even more heated, and dad sent me back to bed, with my milk bottle in hand.

i tried to force myself to sleep.

hours later, mum walked back into the room, unshowered, crying, and turned away from me.

subsequently, there were more and more arguments, directly or indirectly related to me as my dad finds out more about how she’s working so hard, but ignoring me as a whole.

he never went back to taiwan ever since.

on the one hand, i was glad he was staying permanently, but as i often come home to find my mum weeping, i got sadder and sadder. i didn’t want my dad yelling at my mum. i didn’t quite understand the arguments then, but i wanted to make things right. one time, as she set crying on the couch, i clambered over and wiped away her tears.

funny part was, dad actually took a picture of it.

not so funny bit was how she pushed me away and told me to get lost.

finally i turned 6, and primary school started. it was a whole new experience. of course, being the idiot that i was, i was more than a little too enthusiastic. my mum tried to apply to all the top schools for me, but because i was being registered fairly late, things were going awry. also, my performance at kindergarten level was recorded as “hyperactive, disruptive, asks too many questions.” it got me turned away at many a school, and by the time i got to St Margaret’s, not only was i too late for proper registration, i had been turned away by at least 12 nearby primary schools, and this one was way in town. a good 20 mins or more drive, depending on the traffic.

the great part was they said since it’s so late, they don’t mind accepting me. the bad part was, on the day of class balloting, my mum got me there an hour late, so i got shoved into the first class, where the supposed elites were in. this class was full of the smarties, the richies and the parents that has huge influence in the school.

i was just a poor raggedy girl, who’s mum drove a station wagon and have a bad hairdo, bad dress sense, can’t speak a tad of english, and neither can i really either.

and i liked transformers.

in all my pre-schooling excitement, dad started training me for maths while i had packed my school bags. oo the stuff i tried to stuff into my school bag! because mum has bought lotsa things to wrap my books in, and various other articles that i obviously was not meant to carry, i simply thought i was supposed to bring all to school.

to be honest, this is where i think dad actually wished i was male. all my old toys, were guyish. battery operated trucks that i could sit in to drive around the house in, transformers, hot wheels cars… the list went on. of course, i believe my mum felt that way too, since she bought the more expensive ones.

going to an all girls’ school with transformers pencil case and school bag was getting a little extreme though. and i didn’t know how to fit in properly, since i was in a co-ed public kindergarden before. no one was way richer than me, so obviously that was a bit hard, since i never knew the importance of money, nor how much it makes us “more important” and etc.

the first week i was there, i got snubbed by the girls.

no one paid me more attention, i had less pocket money than everyone else. i tried to make friends with everyone, but because i was often late due to mom’s antics, they had see the car, see how i got yelled at by the teachers, and they had ostracise me.

by the second week, someone stole my pencil case.

the only silver lining in this ever increasing lonliness, was the form teacher i had back then. Mrs Chan. She was young, pretty, sweet and new to all this teaching thing. She was so kind to me, that it always never fail to brighten up my day.

otherwise, the teachers almost treat me the same way as the girls did. they had yell at me for the smallest thing, bad handwriting and what not.

one day, the most embarassing day of my first year in primary school, i had left my homework home, and i couldn’t hand it in. the Chinese teacher got upset with me. she made me stand to the right of her table, beside the door, beside the corridor that runs along the side of the school thats by the quiet road that the school was situated on. i was not used to being punished this way.

my dad is one who believes in corporal punishment. by the time i was 7, i had tasted the bad end of his cane, and i know how bad that feels. but to be standing infront of the entire class of snobs, and being stared at, smirk at, was more than i could bear. but it was a 30 min class, and accidents were bound to happen. by the 10th minute, i was trembling.

i had to pee.

i asked the teacher if i could go, she looked at me and sneered and then yelled at me, “when you’re being punished, you stay punished, don’t try and run away from it.”

5 more mins passed.

“please mrs ng, i really need to go to the toilet.”

“quiet la, i told you to stand there means you stand there. stop whining and trying to run away from it.”

i was only 6. up till that time, i haven’t mastered the art of holding my pee in.

i swear i tried my darnest. however, in the next 2 mins, warm water was felt trickling down my legs as i cried in humiliation. i didn’t dare to say a word because i knew she had be more angry, and i had be probably punished more, but a girl walked up to hand in her class work, and she saw.

“uh… teacher… eeeeee”

and she pointed to me.

and my teacher yelled at me, “how could you do such a stupid thing?!?!?!”

i did ask her to let me go to the toilet, no?

needless to say, my popularity dropped even further in class until one day, like a stroke of a luck thing, something came to me.

i found a 50 dollar bill at home.