———

It's been three weeks since that terrible, terrible family talk when my mother told us what a situation we were in. It has been three weeks, and the food in our fridges and pantries are almost all out. Our food is almost all out, but my mother has spent so many hours calling people and calling people and getting whatever help she could from them. She has called everyone we know so far, and gotten many pledges of support. Let's just hope that it's enough.

It's Saturday now. It's Saturday, and my sisters are off at friends' houses, trying to make our food stretch by partaking in theirs. I don't really have any close friends, so I'm just sitting on the couch. It's a nice couch. It's a soft couch. It's a soft and nice couch and I kind of like sitting here, just thinking my thoughts.

As always, my thoughts run melancholy. My emotions run melancholy. Everything inside me runs melancholy, and there is very little that I can do about that, despite all my hardest efforts. But still, I don't feel as guilty for feeling sad right now, not as much as I usually do. Because the Universe knows that I have plenty good reason to be sad right now. We all do.

"Zia," my mother speaks to me, grabbing onto my forearm and leading me away to my room, "I need to talk to you."

She doesn't grab me like this very often. Her voice is urgent, is almost furtive, and her eyes are darkened. Her whole expression is darkened. Fear spikes in my heart. What is about to happen right now? It can surely be nothing good. But my mother wouldn't hurt me, would she? Of course she wouldn't hurt me. My mind is sure, but my guilty, traitorous heart is not so sure.

"What is it, mother?" I ask her, voice soft and conceding.

"I have to talk to you about our financial situation," she presses. "I'm sure you know how much trouble we're in."

"I do. Why?" This is not looking good. Is my family in more trouble than I thought? What are we going to do about this? Why is she telling only me? What can I do about this?

"Well, I talked to our friends and family. They are supporting us, but they do not have the money to support us fully."

"Oh no." My eyes go wide. "What will we do now?"

"That's what I meant to talk to you about," she starts. "We have enough money to pay off the mortgage, and that comes first. Because without the mortgage we'll be out on the street and I won't have a job."

"That's good."

"And we have enough money for food. But here's the thing, we don't have enough food for everyone."

"Oh no. What will we do?"

"I can feed your sisters. But I can't feed you more than one meal a day. You will have to eat your lunch at school and then just wait after you come home. Just wait for these few months to be over."

"Um ... excuse me?" I cannot believe what my own mother is saying.

"You will have to eat one meal a day, okay?"

"Okay." I reply. And really, it's the only thing that I can say. It's the only way I can reply. Because she's my mother. She's given me so much. How else could I possibly reply to her?

"You can do that, right? For your sisters and for me? So that we have enough to eat?" Her voice is almost pleading, but it also has a firm, pressing quality to it. And as always, I cannot deny her. I cannot deny her at all. Not even a bit.

"Of course, mother."

"I knew you would answer in this way. I knew that you would understand. You're a good girl. A righteous girl. You make the right decisions and do what is proper and decent and just."

"But mother ..." I begin.

"What is it, child?"

"If I said no, then what would you have done?"

"Then I still couldn't have given you food, I'm sorry. I have to make sure your two sisters get enough food."

I don't quite understand why she's singling me out to be the one that starves. I don't quite understand, but at the same time I do understand it. I understand it in the back of my mind, in the small, rebellious part of my heart that has been plaguing me since I was young. I almost cannot believe what's going on. But my worst fears are coming true.

"Mother," I begin, trying to keep the fear out of my voice.

"What is it, my girl?"

"Why am I the one that has to go hungry?" I know I am not really supposed to ask this question. I know I am not really allowed to ask this question. I know I am only allowed to go along with what my mother wants. But I cannot help but to ask it anyways. I just ... I just have to know why.

"You know about debts and owing people, right?" There is a bit of forced, fake brightness in her voice. "You know that you must pay back the people who have helped you, right?"

"Yes, mother."

"We'll this is your way to pay me back, to pay this family back, for all that we have helped you over the years. See, we took you in and fed you and clothed you and sheltered you, and you need to pay us back for all that. You need to pay us back by making a sacrifice."

"Okay, mother."

"You're a good girl. I know that you can make sacrifices for what is good and right. And I know that you can pay back your debts."

This makes sense. What she's saying makes sense. She's not withholding food from me because she doesn't love me. She's not starving me because she doesn't love me. She does love me. She's just withholding food from me because it is the good, right, and just thing to do. She's only doing it because it's what's moral and proper to do. She's just following her morals, not her heart. And of course, she has to follow her morals, not her heart. She still loves me in her heart. She still does. But still ...

"Why do I owe you a debt and my sisters don't? You raised them as well." I know I am asking too many questions. I shouldn't be asking so many questions. I silently curse my traitorous mouth.

"I brought your sisters into the world," my mother explains. "And thus it is my job to take care of them and provide for them and raise them. It is not a debt that they're procuring, because it is simply my responsibility to take care of them, it is not something kind and generous that I am doing for them that I did not have to do.

"You on the other hand though, I didn't bring you into this world. You are not someone I have to have responsibility towards. And yet I took you in anyways. And yet I provided for you and helped you and fed you and sheltered you and raised you anyways, even though I didn't have to. And therefore everything I did for you was an act of kindness. An act of kindness that you have to repay somehow. You owe it to us. We had no obligation to give you a home, and yet we did. In fact, without me taking care of you when you were weak and helpless and defenceless, you might have died. And so you owe us your life."

"I understand," I tell my mother. But do I truly understand? I should understand. Everything that she said made perfect sense. She had to take care of my sisters. But she didn't have to take care of me. And so I absolutely do owe her, don't I? She's right. Of course she's right. She's wise and caring and kind and just, and of course she's always right.

"I'm glad you understand, my girl," my mother tells me. She smiles fondly at me, and I smile back at her. I love her smiles.

She leaves me in my room, and closes the door behind her. I hear the lock clicking shut from the outside, and my heart skips a beat in fear. I quickly calm myself down though, telling myself that my mother would of course have a good reason for locking the door. Of course she would. She has a good reason for all that she does. And the only reason that I am locked in is because I have a good reason to be.

I go to my soft bed, and I curl up. I hug my knees to my chest and lie against the pillow, on my side, looking at the forest outside the window. The trees are beautiful. They have always been beautiful. They try to soothe my soul as much as they can, and I wish they could succeed more than they are. But still, I am deeply thankful for these trees from the very centre of my core.

There is no-one here right now, so I allow myself to cry. I can allow myself to cry. And I can allow myself to miss the things that I have no right to miss.

My mother is right. She's so very right. She's very smart and wise and knowledgeable and learned. She is a pillar in the community, helping all the people around her. And she has so much knowledge from so many places. She knows very well how the world works and what each person's place is within it. She knows very well what roles we are all supposed to play and how we can all play these roles. She knows very well what roles I'm supposed to play and how I can play these roles. She knows what my place is and I must believe her, I must learn from her. I must believe her and I must learn from her so that I too know what my place in the world is and how to play the role that I am supposed to play, that I am obliged to play.

She's right. She didn't have to take me in. She didn't have to take care of me and protect me. And yet she did. She did take care of me and protect me for so long. She took care of me so well. And she will take care of me again once this emergency is over. She did not have to do any of this. She was not obliged to do any of this. And yet she did it anyways. She did it anyways out of the kindness of her heart because she is just such a kind person, and she is raising her children as well to be such kind people.

She didn't raise my sisters out of the kindness of her heart. She raised them because she was obliged to. Because she was obliged to take care of them. Because she was obliged to love them. A mother is obliged to love the babies that come out of her body. A mother cannot help but to love the babies that come out of her body. Annabella and Riviera are children that she is compelled to love, that she is obliged to love. So her loving them isn't a great act of kindness, it is simply expected.

Yet her love for me is not simply expected. It is something she chose to bestow upon me. And so I owe her. I owe it to her to help her. I owe it to her to help her family. I owe her in a way that my sisters don't. And so I am obligated to make sacrifices for this family, to go hungry for this family, so that my sisters can eat. Because they are not beholden to this family in the way that I am. They do not owe my mother in the way that I do.

So I curl in on myself tighter and I cry. For some strange, unfathonable reason, I feel so very betrayed. I cannot stop feeling this way.