Pride

Dear friends,
Enjoy reading but don't cry!

********************

IT'S BETTER TO LOSE YOUR PRIDE TO THE ONE YOU LOVE, THAN TO LOSE THE ONE
YOU LOVE BECAUSE OF PRIDE.


A heart-warming tear-jerker of a story about TOTAL MARITAL
MISCOMMUNICATION!! A fatal misunderstanding and the person
who loves me the most in this world is gone foreve! r. This
is a true story, taken from "Family" (dictated by LD,
edited by LSX, translated by SaFe. With grammatical editing
by Totikz).

Cruel misunderstandings, one after the other, had disrupted
the blissful footsteps in our family. Our original ad noble
intentions of having Mother enjoy some quiet and peaceful
moments in her remaining years with us went terribly wrong
as destiny's secret was finally revealed at a stiff price
and before we knew it, every thing became too late.

Just two years after our marriage, hubby brought up the
idea of asking Mother to move in with us from the rural
hometown and spend her remaining years with us. Hubby's
father passed away while he was still very young and mother
had endured much hardship and struggled all throughout her
own life to be able to provide for him and see him through
to a university degree.

You could say that she suffered a great deal and did
everything you could expect of a woman to bring, her son,
my hubby to where he is today.

I immediately agreed and started packing the spare room
in the house, which has a balcony facing the South, to
let her enjoy the sunshine and plant some greenery. While
going through my chores, Hubby stood in the bright room,
and suddenly just picked me up and started spinning me
round and round over his head. As I begged for him to
put me down, he said: "Lets go fetch mother."

Hubby is tall and big-sized and I love to rest on his
chest and enjoy the feeling of him picking me up any
moment. Whenever we had an argument, and both of us
refused to back down, he would pick me up and spin me over
his head continuously until I surrender and beg for mercy.
I became addicted to this kind of panic-joy feeling.

Mother brought along her countryside habits and lifestyle
with her when she joined us. For example; I was so used
to buying flowers to decorate the living room and she
could not stand it and would often comment: "I do
not know how you young people can spend your money,
what do you have to buy flowers for? You also can't
eat the flowers!" I would often smile to her tirades
and would usually say: "Mum, with flowers in the house,
our mood will also become better." Mother would continue
to grumble away and hubby would just smile: "Mum, this is
a city-people's habit; slowly you will get use to it."

Mother would usually stop saying anything. But every time
thereafter, whenever I came home with flowers, she would
ask me how much the flowers cost . I would tell her how
much and she would shake her head and express displeasure.
Sometimes, when I came home with lots of shopping bags,
she would ask each and every item and how much they cost,
I would tell her honestly and she would get even more
upset. Hubby would playfully pinch my nose and would say:
"You little fool, just don't tell her the full price of
everything and that would solve it."

There began the friction to our otherwise happy lifestyle.
Mother hated it most when hubby would wake up early to
prepare the breakfast. In her point of view, how could
the man of the house cook for the wife? At the breakfast
table, mother's facial expression was always like the dark
clouds before a thunderstorm and I would pretend not to
notice. She would use her chopsticks and make a lot of
noise with it to show her silent protest. As I was a dance
teacher in the Children's Palace and I was usually
exhausted from a long day of dancing around, I did not wish
to give up the luxury of that additional few minutes in
the comfort of my bed and hence I decided to turn a deaf
ear to all the protests mother made.

From time to time, mother would help out with some of the
housework, but soon her help created additional work for me.
For example: she would keep all kinds of plastic bags
accumulate them so that she would sell them later on, and
that resulted in our house being filled with all the trash
bags; she would scrimp on dish washing detergent whenever
she was helping wash the dishes. So as not to hurt her
feelings, I would quietly wash the dishes again.

One day, late at night, mother saw me quietly re-washing
the dishes, and "Bam", she slammed her bedroom door and
cried very loudly in her room. Hubby was placed in a very
difficult position, and after that, he did not speak to me
during the entire night. I pretended to be a spoiled child,
tried acting cute, but he totally ignored me. I got mad and
asked him: "What did I do wrong?" Hubby stared at me and
said: " Can' t you just give in to her once? We couldn't
possibly die eating from a bowl however unclean it is, right?"

After that incident, for a long period of time, mother did
not speak to me again and you can feel the awkwardness
of the situation hanging in the house. During that period
of cold war, hubby was caught in dilemma as to who hew
would please. In order to stop her son from having to prepare
breakfast, mother took on the "all important" task of
preparing breakfast without any prompting.

At the breakfast table, mother would look at hubby happily
eating his breakfast and would cast that reprimanding
stare at me for having failed to perform my duty as a wife.
To avoid that embarrassing breakfast situation, I resorted
to buying my own breakfast on my way to work.

That night, while in bed, hubby was a little upset and
asked me: "LD, is it because you think that mum's cooking
is not clean that's why you chose not to eat at home?" He
then turned his back on me and left me alone in tears as
the feeling of unfairness overwhelmed me. After some time,
hubby sighed: "LD, just for me, can you have breakfast at
home?" I was left with no choice but to return to the
breakfast table.

The next morning, I was having porridge prepared by mother
and I felt a sudden churning in my stomach and everything
inside seemed to be rushing up my throat. I tried to
suppress the urge to throw up but I couldn't. I threw down
the bowl and rushed into the washroom and vomited everything
out. Just as I was catching my breath, I saw mother crying
and grumbling very loudly in her dialect, hubby was standing
at the washroom doorway staring at me with fire burning in
his eyes. I opened my mouth but no words came out of it, I
really didn't mean it.

We had our very first big fight that day; mother took a look
at us , then stood up and slowly made her way out of the
house. Hubby gave me a final stare and followed mother down
the stairs.

For three days, hubby did not return home, not even a phone
call. I was so furious. Since mother arrived; I had been
trying my best in putting up with her, what else did he want
me to do? And for no reason at all, i kept having the
feeling of throwing up and I simply had no appetite for food.
Coupled with all the events happening at home, I was at the
lowest point in my life.

Finally, a colleague said: "LD, you look terrible, you
should go and see a doctor." The doctor confirmed that I was
pregnant. Now it became clear to me why I threw up that
fateful morning and a sense of sadness floated through that
otherwise happy news. Why didn't hubby, and mother who had
been through this before, thought of the possibility of this
being the reason that why I threw up that day?

At the hospital entrance, I saw my hubby standing there. It
had only been three days, but he looked haggard. I had wanted
to turn and leave, but one look at him and my heart softened,
I couldn't resist and called out to him. He followed my voice
and finally found me but he pretended that he didn't know me;
he had that disgusted look in his eyes that cut right through
my heart. I told myself not to look at him anymore, and hailed
a cab. At that moment, I had such a strong urge inside me to
shout to my hubby: "Darling, I am having your baby!" and have
him lift me up and spin me round in circles of joy. What I
wanted didn't happen and as I sat in the cab, my tears rolled
down my cheeks. Why? Why our love couldn't even withstand the
test of one fight?

Back home, I laid on the bed thinking about my hubby and the
look of disgust in his eyes. I cried and cried and wetted the
corner of the blanket. That same night, the sounds of the
drawers opening woke me up. I switched on the lights and saw
hubby with tears rolling down his face. He was removing the
money from the drawer. I stared at him in silence; he
ignored me, took the bank deposit book and some money and left
the house.

Maybe he really intended to leave me for good. What a rational
man, so clear-cut in love in money matters. I gave a few
dried laugh and tears started streaming down again.

The next day, I did not go to work. I wanted to clear this
out and had a good talk with hubby. I reached his office
and his secretary gave me a weird look and said: "Mr. Tan's
mother had a traffic accident and is now in the hospital."
I stood there in shock. I rushed to the hospital and by
the time I found hubby, mother had already passed away. Hubby
did not look at me, his face was expressionless. I looked at
mother's pale white and thin face and I couldn't control the
tears in my eyes. My god, how could this happen?

Throughout the funeral, hubby did not say a single word to me,
with only the occasional disgusted stare at me. I only
managed to find out brief facts about the accident from
other people: That day, after mother left the house, she
walked in daze toward the bus stop, apparently intending to
go back to her old house back in the countryside. As hubby
ran after her, she tried to walk faster and as she tried to
cross the street, a public bus came and hit her... I finally
understood how much hubby must hate me, if I had not thrown
up that morning, if we had not quarreled, if... In his heart,
I was indirectly the killer of his mother.

Hubby moved into mother's room and came home every night
reeking of liquor. And me, I was buried under the guilt and
self pity and could hardly breath. I wanted to explain to
him, tell him that we were going to have our baby soon, but
each time, I saw the dead look in his eyes, all the words I
had at the brink of my mouth just fell back in. I would rather
he hit me real hard or give me a big and thorough scolding,
though none of the events that happened had been my fault at all.

Many days of suffocating silence went by and as the days went
by, hubby came home later and later. The deadlock between us
continued, we were living together like strangers who didn't
know each other. I was like the dead knot in his heart. One
day, as I passed by a western restaurant looking into the glass
window, I saw hubby and a girl sitting facing each other and
he very lightly brushed her hair for her. I understood what
it meant.

After recovering from that moment of shock, I entered the
restaurant, stood in front of my hubby and stared hard at
him, not a tear in my eyes. I had nothing to say to him, and
there was no need to say anything. The girl looked at me,
looked at hubby, stood up and wanted to go, hubby stretched
out his hand and stopped her. He stared back at me,
challenging me. I could only hear my slow heart beat, beating
one by one as if on the brink of death. I eventually backed
down, if I had stood that any longer, I
would have collapsed, together with the baby inside me.

That night, he did not come home, he had chosen to use that
as a way to indicate to me: Following mother's death so did
our love for each other follow. He did not come home anymore
after that.

Sometimes, when I returned home from work, I could tell that
the cupboard had been touched - he had returned to take some
of his stuff. I no longer wished to call him; the initial
desire to explain everything to him vanished. I lived alone;
I went for my medical checkups alone, my heart broke again and
again every time I saw a guy carefully helping his wife through
the physical examination. My office colleagues hinted to me to
consider aborting the baby, I told them No, I will not. I
insisted on having this baby, perhaps it was my way of repaying
mother for causing her death.

One day, I came home and I saw hubby sitting in the living room.
The whole house was filled with cigarette smoke. On the coffee
table was a piece of paper. I know what this was all about
without even looking at it. In the two months plus of living
alone, I had gradually learned to find peace within myself.

I looked at him, removed my hat and said: "You wait a while,
I will sign." He looked at me, mixed feelings in his eyes,
just like mine. As I hang up my coat, I kept repeating to
myself "You cannot cry, you cannot cry..." my eyes hurt
terribly, but I refused to let the tears to come out from
there.

After I hung up my coat, hubby's eyes stared fixed at my
bulging tummy. I smiled, walked over to the coffee table and
pulled the paper towards me. Without even looking at what was
written in the paper, I signed my name on it and pushed the
paper to him.

"LD, you are pregnant?" Since mother's accident, that was
the first time he spoke to me. I could not control my tears
any further and they fell like raindrops.

I said: "Yes, but its ok, you can leave now." He did not go.

In the dark, we sat, facing each other. Hubby slowly moved
over to me, his tears wetting the blanket.

In my heart, everything seemed so far away, so far that even
if I sprinted, I could never reach them. I could not remember
how many times he repeated "sorry" to me. I had originally
thought that I would forgive him, but now I couldn't. In the
western restaurant, in front of that girl, that cold look in
his eyes, I will never forget, ever. We had drawn such deep
scares in each other's heart. For me, it was unintentional;
for him, totally intentional. I had been waiting for this
moment of reconciliation, but I realized now, what had happened
in the past was gone forever and could never be repeated. Other
than the thought of the baby inside me that brought some warmth
to my heart, I was totally cold towards him, I no longer ate
anything he bought for me, I didn't take any presents from
him and I stopped talking to him. From the moment I signed on
that piece of paper, marriage and love had vanished from my
heart.

Sometimes, hubby would try to come into the bedroom, but when
he walked in,I would walk out to the living! room. He had no
choice but to sleep in mother's room.

At night, from his room, I could hear light sounds of groaning,
I kept quiet. This used to be his trick; whenever I ignored
him, he would fake illness and I would surrender and find out
what was wrong with him, then he would then grab me and laugh.
He had forgotten that last time I cared for him and was
concerned because there was love, but now, what was there any
more love between us?

Hubby's groaning came on and off, continuing all the way till
baby was born. Almost everyday, he would buy something for
the baby, infant products, children products and books that
kids like to read. Bags and bags of baby stuffs were stacked
inside his room till the room was full. I know he was trying
to use this to reach out to me, but I was no longer moved by
his actions. He had no choice but to lock himself in his room
where I could hear his typing away on his computer keyboard,
maybe he was now addicted to web surfing, but none of those
mattered to me anymore.

It was sometime towards the end of spring in the following
year, one late night, I screamed because of a sudden stomach
pain, hubby came rushing into the room, it was like he did
not change and sleep, and had been waiting for this moment.
He carried me and ran down the stairs, stopped a car and
held! my hand very tightly and kept wiping the sweat off my
brows throughout the journey to the hospital.

Once we reached the hospital, he carried me and hurried into
the delivery suite. Lying on the back of his skinny but warm
body, a thought crossed my mind: In my lifetime, who else
would love me as much as he did? He held the delivery suite
door opened and watch me went in, his warm eyes caused me to
manage a smile at him despite my contraction pain.

Coming out of the delivery room, hubby looked at our son, and
finally at me, his eyes filled with tears of joy and he kept
smiling. I reached out and touched his hand. Hubby looked at
me, smiling and then he slowly collapsed onto the floor. I
cried out for him in pain... He smiled, but without opening
that tired eyes of his...

I had thought that I would never shed any tear for him, but
the truth was, I had never felt a deeper pain cutting through
my body at that moment. Doctor said that by the time hubby
discovered he had liver cancer, it was already in terminal
stage and it was a miracle that he managed to last this long.
I asked the doctor when did he first discover he had cancer?
The doctor said about 5 months ago and he consoled me, saying:
"Prepare for his funeral ."

I disregarded the nurse's objection and rush! ed home, I went
into his room and checked his computer, and a suffocating pain
hit me. Hubby's cancer was discovered 5 months ago, his
groaning was real, and I had thought that... the computer
showed over 200 thousand words that he wrote for our son:

"Son, just for you, I have persisted, to be able to take a
look at you before I fall, is my biggest wish now... I know
that in your life, you will have many happiness and maybe some
setbacks, if only I can accompany you throughout that journey,
how nice would it be. But daddy now no longer has that chance.
Daddy has written inside here all the possible difficulties
and problems you may encounter during your lifetime, when you
meet with these problems, you can refer to daddy's suggestions
... Son, after writing these 200 thousand words, I feel as if
I have accompanied you through your life journey. To be honest,
daddy is very happy. Do love your mother, she has suffered,
she is the one who loves you most and also the one who loves
me most..."

From play school to primary school, to secondary, university,
to work and even in dealing with questions of love, everything
big and small was written there in my hubby's computer. Hubby
had also written a letter for me:

"My dear, to marry you is my biggest happiness, forgive me
for the pain I have caused you, forgive me for not telling
you my illness, because I want to see you in a joyful mood
waiting for the arrival of our baby... My dear, if you cried,
it means that you have forgiven me and I would smile, thank you
for loving me... These presents, I'm afraid I cannot give them
to our son personally, could you help me to give some of them
to him every year, the dates on what to give when are all
written on the packaging..."

Going back to the hospital, hubby was still in coma. I brought
our son over and placed him beside him. I said: "Open your
eyes and smile, I want our son to remember being in the
warmth of your arms..." He struggled to open his eyes and
managed a weak smile. Our son, still in his arms was happily
waving his tiny hands in the air. I pressed the button on the
camera and the sound of the shutter rang thought the air as
tears slowly rolled down my face...

THE END.