When I was ten, my father married for the second time. My stepmother quickly got pregnant and gave birth to my father’s son. I became a free babysitter, cook, and cleaner all in one.
The family addressed me as “Hey, you. I wore clothes that had long been too small for me, and my brother got new toys every other day. When he grew up, I was deprived of my personal space: I was moved to the hall, and my brother was given my room.
Perhaps the only thing I am grateful to my father for is that he immediately put a stop to all my stepmother’s attempts to get away with it. But no one forbade moral humiliation. Every day I heard that I was ugly – no one would ever want me, and that I was stupid – I would never get an education and would work as a cleaner.
My stepmother told me every day that I would only be tolerated in this house until my eighteenth birthday, and that on my birthday she would throw me out on the street.
I spent all my vacations at my grandmother’s house. She, too, considered me the “black sheep” of the family. She cursed the day her son married my mom and was glad my mom was gone.
I always wondered why I wasn’t just institutionalized, like an orphanage.
Six months before my 18th birthday, I overheard my father talking to my stepmother, and it all made sense to me. My stepmother said that I would never agree, and my father assured her that he would persuade me to sign over the apartment to him and she would have nothing to worry about.
Well, he was wrong. My stepmother had something to worry about. I was no longer bothered by their nagging and poking and prodding from my younger brother.
I used to dread my coming of age, but now I looked forward to it.
At my birthday party, all the people involved were there: my father and stepmother, my grandmother, and my stepmother’s parents.
After my first tea and cake party in eight years, I was told to get ready. When I asked where I was going, my grandmother answered. – my grandmother answered:
– Today you are all grown up. From today on, you are responsible for your own actions. Also, today is the day when you will thank your family for everything they have done for you. Now you will go with your father to the notary and give him the apartment. You inherited this apartment from your mother, but it wasn’t supposed to be like this. She promised to write a will for my son, and she gave it to you. But you will do your duty now, get ready.
Their faces were so solemn that I could hardly contain my laughter.
– Yes, Grandma. I will thank my family for all they have done for me. As a thank you, I won’t put them out today, but give them a week to pack. Time’s up.
Oh, what began. I was being rebuked for ingratitude, my stepmother was screaming that she had raised a snake, my father slapped me in the face. Stepmother’s parents started saying that they warned her about the ingratitude of other people’s children. My grandmother said I had nothing sacred and left, slamming the door.
They moved out. Moved in with my grandmother.
A few days later, my father came over. He gave me a piece of paper, said that since I hadn’t given up my apartment, I had to pay off that debt, and he left.
I opened up the piece of paper and there was a list:
Food – 324,000.
Clothes – 54,000.
School supplies – 14,000
Hygiene items – 2,660
White goods – 4,620
Communal allowance for the apartment – 64800
Total: 464080.
What about the fact that parents are obliged to support their minor children? Apparently, my father did not care about that at all.
I got a job and for six months now I have been giving one third of my salary to my father every month, in order to pay off this debt.
It would take me about seven or eight years to pay it off. But then I would be completely free.
