Life through the silver linings
A list of missings
Article and art Maya Rajan
Content Warning: Self harm, Domestic violence, substance abuse, murder, suicide
my little brother spoke until he was two. granted, you don't say much when you’re two, but now he’s 16 and has never said anything more. when my parents were still married, i used to wake up in the room next to him. i’d stroll in, eyes still puddled with sleep, and i'd see a toddler in a crib pointing out to the pond, quacking along with the ducks. now he’s 16, a foot taller than me, pounds heavier, and unable to quack. i see tik tok self diagnostics of 15-year-olds calling themselves autistic because they can't do long division, i feel a part of myself sear. my little brother’s not able to say a word to me. all i know about him is he loves thomas the tank engine and cries when he can’t understand the world around him. it's been 14 years since he lost his words. sometimes, i’m even glad. glad he can’t speak truth to my fears; that my dad isn’t always sober around him, that my mum can lose her temper, fear that he is too scared to utter any words he may have, just as i was, and am. but this relief comes at the price of severe guilt. guilt that i didn’t speak up soon enough. guilt that i ignored the shooters under our car seats. guilt that i didn’t use the words i had to protect my little brother from a world that was all too flawed. i miss morning quacks and gentle touches. i miss being taller than him. i miss when things were simpler.
when i was a kid, i always went to my dad when i had an accident, because i knew my mum would get mad. when i got older and i was in trouble, i always talked to my dad, because i knew my mum would scream. when i was a kid, my mum threw a remote at me because i couldn’t get my vocab homework done. when i was older and a doctor pointed out that my wounds were self-inflicted, my mum asked how i could do that to her. when my dad saw the scars, he asked me where they came from, and as i struggled to come up with an answer, he just let out a half laugh and walked away. we never talked about it again. recently, my dad drank his weight in alcohol and put me in a dangerous situation. when i told my uncle, who tried to protect me, my dad assaulted him. the next day, cops escorted me through his house to grab my things and escape to the springs; i felt the betrayal i had committed, both to my abolitionist self and to the man who raised me. i was just trying to stay safe. a couple years ago, my mum told me about when she called the cops on my dad when he was drunk and hitting her; she told me about how he put my older brother and i on each knee, asking, “are you really going to get their dad arrested in front of them?” she told the cops to leave. i thought this was hyperbole until i saw his 2010 battery record with an ex-girlfriend. i miss knowing less.
delirious middle school sleepovers hold a special place deep in my heart. times where Diz and i would stay up all night, singing songs from glee and watching vines, high off of the happiness that only exists when sleep is being neglected and voices are lowered to prevent an angry parent’s appearance. we would eat lunch with our friends in our least favorite teacher’s classroom, brainstorming what we would wear to the next dance at our town’s teen club, or gossiping about what a classmate wore to the last. when we were 15, we would take any chance we got to take a train into the city, whether that meant coming up with a short film we wanted to shoot or making up a friend we wanted to visit. we felt so old with our six-dollar mochas and knock-off designer bags from Chinatown. three years later, Diz’s dad murdered her before turning the gun on her mother and then himself. this happened almost four years ago and i still can’t make it make sense. i miss her so much, and i miss missing her so much. i know deep grief isn’t sustainable, but i can’t help but feel shame about not thinking of her every day anymore. weeks after her death, i found myself paralyzed, unable to move in the middle of a crosswalk. my subconscious holding such intense grief in my body that, maybe, it would rather me be hit by a car than move on without her. no one tells you how to handle that type of loss, that young and violent and unexpected shock. i would wake up in the middle of the night, my body wet with sweat, my face soaked in tears. i would faint in the middle of math class and get lectured on the importance of staying present, especially before the ACTs. every morning when my alarm went off, i prayed to a god i didn’t believe in that the springs in my mattress would break free and pull me inside, protecting me from the world around me, the type of world that let my best friend die when we were just kids. my last texts with her are from the day before she was killed, hours before even; we were texting back and forth about how great senior year and spring break was gonna be. she said ‘ily’ before going to bed, and i forgot to reply. i didn’t believe in any sort of afterlife until she died, but i don’t know how i’d continue on if i didn’t start. i don’t think of her life in heaven, nor do i think of her as an angel, but rather a soundwave. every once in a while, i can hear her through my friends’ laughs or the bells of a church. it’s not comforting so much as a yell from a far away place, a plea to remember. i never want to forget her, and i never will, but i also find myself straying from looking at photos of her, shying away from listening from anything that could have her voice in it, because i still don’t know how to exist in a world where my best friend got murdered by her dad weeks after her 18th birthday. his contact name in my phone was “Dad #2.”
freshman year, my tiny mathias double used to host upwards of 30 people for pregames. gaggles of 18 and 19-year-olds would crowd into the room, equipped with red solo cups, ready to flood them with our handles of Skol and Seagrams. we would walk, five across, out of the building and stumble into whatever sweaty house was throwing that night. i would spend hours drifting between friends and countless strangers, sharing sips and secrets, all to be unpacked the next morning at a hungover brunch. sophomore year was filled with psychedelic packed weekends, coupled with self assurance that it was fun, and not a dilution of the self. during breaks at home, or weekends visiting friends in bigger cities, i’d spend my late nights in crowded clubs and dingy dives, feeling my feet get more stuck to the floor with each shot i took. i explored new places with old friends, picking up new ones on the way. now, i visit my parents in a new country i never experienced in a pre-pandemic world. my boyfriend and his friends share stories of loud crowds and exciting venues that i have never visited because of the restrictions. i studied abroad in a place that has a 9 p.m. curfew and city-wide shut down of restaurants, bars, and clubs, and i spent my late nights smoking out of a window, hearing my roommates play pizza box for the 50th time outside of my door. i have missed so much, and missed out on so much, and feel profound guilt for feeling this way during a time that so many people have lost their jobs, homes, and loved ones. i know that big picture, my life has been impacted a miniscule amount by a pandemic that has dramatically changed the course of so many lives, but i also know that i don’t experience my day-to-day life in the big picture. i feel sad, then i feel bad about being sad, then i feel a numbness that i fear will last for years, because being numb is a lot easier than processing. i miss crowds and late nights and being able to see people’s faces. when i watch movies and see a character walking through a grocery store or a concert or an apartment complex hallway without a mask, i feel a deep sense of dread for the present and the future.
life is vastly paradoxical. a pandemic has stolen parts of my 20s i’ll never get back, and has also given me things i could have never dreamt of. i have spent months living in new and beautiful places with people i love dearly. the financial hardships my parents faced from covid led them to a new country. the first time i visited, i left the friends i hopped around various homes and states with for the first time in months, and i landed in a cold, dark, wet country, depressed. it was a goodbye to so much: my friends, my independence, all the places i called home during some very turbulent times, only to be met with more turbulent times with my family in a new place where the sun rose at 9 a.m. and set at 3 p.m. during my 10-day quarantine, unable to leave the house and missing my friends because of the seven hour time difference, i turned to tinder for my social interactions. i had no intentions of ever meeting someone, i just wanted conversation and validation when life was feeling bleak and lonely. and somehow, that mindless conversation and validation turned into an infatuation with someone who seemed too good to be true; someone who i could talk to for hours about music and movies and memories that suddenly felt new to me. we met in person on a cold beach in december. we sat and watched as the ocean performed for us, sharing beers and shy glances before he leaned in to kiss me. i spent most of high school and college kissing as many boys as i could, trying desperately to be desired, clinging on to that illusion of a feeling for dear life, and always being inevitably disappointed. i learned to mold myself into whatever i thought someone wanted, camouflaging myself in different interests and aesthetics like a chameleon. there was the jam band phase to appeal to my first kiss who loved Phish, all the lacrosse games i faked interest in for some scrawny misogynist to look at me, and all the first and second-year hookups i pretended meant nothing to me for the sake of keeping up with college casualty. i spent so many years feeling hurt and unlovable, questioning if it was because of my race or my weight or some fundamental personality flaw. but on that cold beach, i felt a warmth completely new to me, an ease and sense of comfort i had no name for but had longed for for so long. this warmth radiated across miles and between phone screens, it survived through months spent in different countries and time zones, culminating last summer in the place we first met, with the words ‘i love you’ slipping out of both our mouths on a rainy scottish night.
i’ve spent a long time looking for home. i never know what to tell people when they ask where home is. is it the house i grew up in? the space of innocence that existed before my parents got divorced and their lies started unraveling? is it the first apartment my mum moved into afterwards, and the coldness that came along with that? is it her next house, the one that i blacked out at during a family barbeque? the one she sped away from to pick me up at a hospital in the city when i ended up there with alcohol poisoning after sneaking out one night? was it my dad’s apartment in New York? the place where the world started feeling bigger and i, freer? sometimes, i think it might be my Massachusetts boarding school where i learned to raise and be raised by my friends. sometimes i think it might be CC, but those sound depressing. Juno said, "i never realized how much I loved being home unless i'd been somewhere really different for awhile." i don’t think home is really a place. the only time i really feel home is when i’m with someone who lives across the world from me, the person who has given me that sense of ease and comfort, the person i love the most on this planet and miss more than anything. when i am with him, i find myself clinging onto every word he says, grasping onto each of his exhalations as if they are my lifeblood. sometimes, i find myself missing home so much it feels hard to breathe. i get so scared of how much i love him, home. everytime we say goodbye at the airport, i wish so desperately that i could shrink and fit into his pocket, living in his hands forever. when we are thousands of miles and several time zones apart, i’m constantly breaking down, feeling his absence in every moment. i’m sure people will call that overly dependent, but i have spent so long looking for love and home, i have spent so much time feeling lonely and insignificant, and i have finally found someone who makes it easy to breathe. i recently realized that the past year is the first time in a long time that i haven’t wanted to die once, and, though i hope we never end and that i can remain home forever, i think even if we did, i would keep this newfound love of life, because i now know the incredible surprises it holds; the unpredictable people, places, and feelings, the euphoria it’s capable of, no matter how fleeting.
i wake up every morning in a house full of people i love, in a city i have called home for the past four years. we all share the same egg pan and spatula during breakfast hours. when there’s avocado in the house we spoon it out by the quarter, always saving some for another person. i walk two blocks away to meet someone who started as a random class partner freshman year, who i have since lived in two states and a different country with, and we spend all day making art together. i run into people i love every time i walk out of a door or across a patch of grass. i have countless memories sprinkled all over this little campus, this spread-out city. when i feel lonely, i just watch videos of my friends scream-singing in our kitchen or in the car. i look back at pictures from fun run and synergy parties and i only feel good. when i feel stressed, i have the tendency to forget about all of this. i snap at people, i want to be alone, i forget to thank my roommates for leaving a light on every time they know i’ll get home late. i rush through a dinner i know someone has put time and love into, i get caught up in the demands of a three and a half week system rather than reveling in the joy spoon-fed to me each day. the little pleasures never cease to amaze me when i get caught up in the rose tint of nostalgia. will i ever get the chance to spend so much time with so many people who bring me so many smiles? when again will i start and end every day with the knowledge that love is sewn into the creaks of my home? i have been raised by my friends since i was 16, and now i am 22 and still growing so much from their mere presence. i have learned so much about myself and the world from the people i have met here, even the shitty ones; even the ones who aren’t shitty but i no longer call friends for reasons i no longer remember. i am already starting to miss all the things it has taken me years to learn to love. i get so angry at myself for being petty. it feels like one of the harder things to do when surrounded by so much care and comfort. sometimes, when we are making dinner together, splitting up tasks of dicing, auxing, sizzling, and washing, or when we open our home to an army of lovers searching for good music and fizzy drinks, i get so caught in awe. awe that this is my life, and that it will only be the life i hold so close to me for the next couple of months. awe that, in the entire course of the universe and its history, this is where i ended up, and these are the people closest to me. awe that this is all real, and it’s mine. there is a way to live in the silver linings, to hold and caress pain while finding ways to put it aside and pick up joy instead, or to juggle the two together, endlessly balanced. there are days where my brother says a new word with a cheeky smile, as if he’s just holding back, teasing us until he reveals more. there are times where i see my dad as the flawed, but infinitely loving person that he is, and my love and missing of him transcends all fleeting resentment. there are instances where the only cure for my sobs is my mum’s voice, and she becomes my best friend. there are moments where i hear Diz’s laugh in each of my loved ones, and i know her love transcends her earthly presence. there is a future where i don’t have constant goodbyes with the person i love, where we live together and have friends for dinner and listen to good music and are always on the verge of happy tears; a future worth living for.