If you missed my first update there is a link to the index here.
January 3rd
I hoped to understand whats happening around me but I only feel further from everything. This last week has been the most isolated I’ve felt since I was left here. It’s not a nice story but it’s been a long time and I figure here is the best place to put it out to the world. It’s the only outlet I have right now.
19 years ago my parents decided we’d go on a trip to Latvia- the first time I’d ever left America. I was ecstatic, a 12 year old prepared to experience something outside of my own bubble of suburbs. My parents were both Latvian, I was finally able to have a little insight into what their lives were before me. I wasn’t the closest with my parents but we never had any major issues. It was like most relationships a soon to be teen would have with their parents.
The first few days were amazing, I got to see and do things I’d always talked about, it seemed like they were doing everything they could to make me happy. We went to foreign stores, ate food I’d never seen with my own eyes and walked through the most beautiful architecture. It made me want to be the perfect daughter. The next few days were different. My dad went missing for a few hours here and there and I noticed his hushed conversations with my mother. I figured it was holiday stress, I was too captivated by everything around me, too young to think my parents had anything but good virtues. The last day came around and I was reluctant to pack my things, life was going to be the same thing I’d had for the last 12 years all over again. That’s all I thought about, how ‘terrible’ our little suburban life was. My parents were unsettled- even as a child I could them dodge eye contact, murmuring between sentences instead of being the outspoken people they always were. The last thing I remember was leaving the little hotel on the corner and slowly drifting into a sleep. I now see that this was their intention. The hotel was roughly 20 minutes from the airport, I was too lost in my own childish desires to stay here just a little longer to realise we’d been driving for almost an hour.
I woke up in a house I didn’t recognise. At first I wasn’t panicked, it wasn’t a threatening place, I almost felt at home until I realised there was no one beside me. Rain pattered against the window, trying to squeeze through the silicone. The floorboards flexed under my weight groaning after every step, every doorknob was brittle to hold. The stairs were right outside the room I was in and I could see into the kitchen through a little glass pane. I saw two figures speaking on the other side but couldn’t make anything out. I assumed they were my parents and we’d made a detour, I assumed that was the only plausible outcome. I went down the stairs and opened the door to be welcomed by two strangers. They knew my name, they knew where I was from, they knew how I got here. They could see I was distraught, I didn’t know where to start but I just wanted to run. They promised to explain to me, they promised they were no one to fear. I had no other option than to stand and listen to every word spill out their mouth.
They spoke about how my parents were scared of raising me, how they had decided I’d become too much to handle. They wanted to leave me somewhere where I’d be happy, but where it’d be too hard for me to ever find a way home. I was in denial. I know I was never the model daughter but there was love there. I thought there’d always been enough of a relationship between us. I spent weeks, the first few months trying to leave, trying to escape this new life being force fed down my throat.
The people taking care of me, Cathy and Jackson, they were resilient throughout it all. They put up with my denial, with my relentless desire to leave. They accepted the resentment I held for them until I realised they weren’t the ones who deserved it. I slowly saw how cynical my parents were, offloading me when I became too much. A couple my parents barely knew were their first choice. I grew into my new environment as time passed and I accepted Cathy and Jackson as people who truly wished to help me. They didn’t speak about the things out there surrounding us for the first few years, but they always made sure I was as safe as I could be. As I got older they did their best to start educating me on the world around us but no lecture prepares you for what you’ll see. I hold a lot of what they said in those first few years very close to me and I never let it slip my mind.
My anger toward my biological parents will never fade, but I may as-well put it on the shelf for whenever I may need it in the future. I have a lot to talk about when it come to Cathy and Jackson but I’ll keep those stories for when they feel right to tell. I think I’m going to spend the next week on deciding what the best course of action is, I don’t want to rush into anything. Preparation has always been one of our human advantages and I’m not going to waste that. I know there may not even be something supernatural at work here, but I’ve had a few too many close calls over the last few years to let my guard down. I’ll update again hopefully once I’ve figured out what’s going on, if I don’t update maybe I didn’t prepare enough. Isn’t that lovely.