When the assignment said to write about loss, I seriously couldn’t think of a thing. I was going to go full fiction but something came to me at the last second. I hope this is not too sad. Thanks for reading.

I’ve lost everything because of you. I’ve even lost my freedom, all because of you damn health insurance. Now I can’t even leave the country without getting investigated.

-Mom

This is her new favorite line whenever she’s angry.

True, she had lost almost everything but had she thought about what I’ve lost? Did she ever think about the life I was leading while she was so busy earning money? Did she ever feel bad that I was getting bullied at school and no one was doing a thing about it?

In my opinion, loss is a powerful thing because once you’ve lost it, you can never get it back.

I have lost many things, more than I can count.

At age five, I lost my father. At age seven, she dropped me off at my grandparents and left for the U.S. I had fallen ill soon after but my grandparents were too stubborn to believe I was sick. I could had died if my aunt hadn’t come to school to check on me.

I can’t remember how long the high fever lasted. It felt like an eternity, day after day, night after night of head throbbing and chills. My aunt took me to several doctors who made me gulp down a handful of pills. It didn’t help. Fortunately, my fever eventually subsided.

My relatives call me melodramatic, that I exaggerate my feelings a lot, that I like to tell stories. In their views, telling stories is like the boy cried wolf. That’s why they almost never believe me when I tell them I get bullied in school. Maybe sometimes I am melodramatic but doesn’t everyone exaggerate their emotions one way or another?

When I read the first Harry Potter books many years back, I realized the first few chapters were almost a mirror image of my childhood, that is except for living in the cupboard part. My clothes were purchased for one or two bucks in the smelly supermarket while my cousin’s clothes were purchased at the department store. My ratty outdated attire was often a laughing matter at my school. I was always second best next to my cousin and nothing I do would get any sort of recognition.

Everyday, I began school at 7:30 am and didn’t come home until 5:30 pm. Then did homework until midnight, sometimes even later because I’d be suddenly chased out of the apartment by my aunt’s feather-duster during dinner either for eating too slow, accidentally spilling something or even for reaching my hand into my mouth to reel out the fish-bone that’s choking me.

In a word, I wasn’t living the life any seven-year-old was supposed to be living. I was forced to grow up before I had to. I had lost the time when I was supposed to go to the park, be active, and do other things that a seven-year-old was supposed to do.

Instead, I had to baby-sit my cousin, I had to know just the right things to say in all situations, I had to know how to make a conversation, and the worst, I couldn’t complain. I had to know all those things without being taught and I was to solve all problems myself. I was seven and everyone was expecting me to be an adult.

The next three years was difficult. I was constantly being bullied and humiliated at school by both teachers and classmates. I’ve never felt I belonged there and the worst thing was, I had no one to talk to.

I guess now stay tune for the next part.