THEY’RE FINE. WE’RE FINE.

During an internet chat two days ago, Friend A asked: “How are your parents?” (or maybe it was “Are your parents okay?”) Anyway it was a simple question, but I deliberately chose to give it a slip.

Because simple as it was, I couldn’t readily answer that. Just like I couldn’t answer Friend B’s question a long time ago, which was “Are your parents divorced? Or separated? Why do they blah-blah-censored?”

Maybe Friend A didn’t really mean to go that far. Maybe he was simply asking whether my parents are well, in terms of their health. Still I couldn’t answer that, because just a few hours before that internet chat, my mom called long-distance, telling me about the surgery she’d have to go through at the end of this month.

“The biopsy went well. They removed a small tissue and examined it. Turned out that it was ‘suspicious’. Pre-cancer. So I’ll be having a surgery soon,” she said chirpily. She sounded as if she was telling me she would be having her usual hair-colour treatment or manicure.

“I’m doing fine. I’m very okay,” she assured me.

She was back in Jakarta yesterday, and this morning she ran out the house upon hearing my starting up Cathy. She wanted to say good-morning and have-a-nice-day. (She once told me she was so sorry that she couldn’t see me off to school everyday when I was in high school, because she always woke up an hour after I left).

This morning she smiled at me, asking whether I would like to bring some cakes to work. I looked at her, she was so beautiful, her mahogany hair was shining. Her light brown eyes were sparkling. I might be subjective, but to me she is an eye-candy.


Looking at her beaming, I couldn’t help thinking: is she being optimistic, or is she really okay? Is she pretending everything is fine, the way she pretends that her marriage is fine all these years?

And what should I do?



My dad acts like nothing bothers him either. Is he sure that mom will be okay? Is he worried about the surgery and all the implications it will bring to our lives? Or maybe he is just pretending, the way he did when he said “I didn’t hit my girl” after he hit me with his bare hands and a broom and saw me bleeding. The way he did when he said “What did you do? Did you fall off a chair?” upon seeing my bruises the next day. The way he did when he said “What do you mean? I never hit you,” when I said “no-I-didn’t-fall-off-a-chair-these-bruises-are-there-because-you-had-beaten-me-yes-you-really-beat-me-good.”

As for what I should do, I guess I’ll follow my mom’s lead. I’ll stay optimistic, or I’ll pretend that I’ll stay optimistic. I’ll tell Friend A that my parents are okay.

I’ll really be able to pull it off. Why shouldn’t I?

After all, I was raised by two great-pretenders.