7 Secrets

Jace – Admired?

Me – yes, admired

Jace - Why?

Me -Because I think that such people are strong. Jace, you are a bright student with quite good grades. You have lots of reasons to not be, but you are. You should be proud of yourself.

Jace - Really?

Me -Yeah.

At his moment, his silence said it all. He was glad that I didn’t see him as a weirdo. He was reassured, almost happy, that I admired him for his difference. I tried to cheer him up after that as he still seemed a bit hesitant.

Me - You know, your experience could be a great plus to the

project.

I thought knowing his experience could be useful would cheer him up

Jace - Actually… I’d rather have this staying between us, if you don’t mind.

Me - Well, it’s your secret. If you don’t want to share it, I respect that.

Jace - Thanks. This will be our little secret. Just the two of us.

“Just the two of us”. Huh. It felt like the gap that was preventing us from actually connecting was gone. Or at least, it had lessened. We went on with the project, during which I asked him Questions about himself.

I did assure him that nothing would be added to the presentation, but that it was to help me understand better. He answered all of my Questions ‘to the best of his capacities”, as at least that’s what he said.

He told me how he was happy to at least have a home. He also explained as much as he could the reason why he was in foster care. Apparently, when he was seven, his mother died, giving birth to his little sister Aayat.

He also mentioned his father being very abusive. He described how, before he goes into foster care, he used to get beaten up morning and night by his drunken father, and how he would accept it only to protect his little sister.

Jace - I couldn’t let her get hurt. She’s everything I have, everything I care about. I’d give my life for her. She’s the one reason I kept going, the reason I didn’t give up. I wanted to run away. I even considered suicide. But I stayed for her, to protect her and give her a shot at a normal life. One night, my father came home extremely drunk and angry about something, I don’t know what. He found no one else than me to kick out his anger, literally. He took his belt off as he usually did. I knew what that meant and I didn’t really care anymore. But that day he beat me up more than he ever did. At a moment I couldn’t take it, I was fainting and for a second I thought he was going to kill me. Aayat panicked so she called the police. My father was arrested. Next thing I know I was in hospital with government people telling me we would be placed in foster care. I was 19 so I had just finished college and was supposed to go to university. They sent us both to a foster family here and some NGO is paying for my sister’s education and mine. I asked to change both my surname and family name to Jace Crawford, my sister only changed her family name. The aim was to erase all memories of our past. But she said her surname reminded her of mom, so she kept it, and I didn’t force her. She just started middle school now and is happy. She doesn’t consider the Crawfords as family, but she does love them. She misses India, but she’s happy.

I listened to him silently all the way through. What he had gone through, and where he’s reached, how could someone not admire him? Each and every one of his words were so full of pain and courage. How could he be so strong and so fragile at the same time?

A few weeks went on, we did the presentation and were the overall highest scoring. Funny thing is, I didn’t care about the marks. I had found a friend and so did he. We grew closer and shared everything.

Our friendship grew from nothing to having lunch together everyday. I still remember our first lunch, the day we received the marks for presentation. He wanted me to go out with him to celebrate. He took me to eat Indian as I mentioned it was my favourite. We talked a lot that day.

He wanted to know about my story, why I was in a foreign country. I told him about my parent’s separation, all the fighting and yelling that my sister and I had witnessed at home and I would cry every night begging for it to stop, how I would sleep at my grandparents’ to escape it all.

I explained to him that my grandfather was my only friend in the family, and how after he died, things started going south. He asked about my father, which didn’t surprise me. I described how messy our relationship was, how we didn’t even have a relationship until he realised I was leaving.

Me - I always felt like my father hated me and only loved my sister, and for good reasons. He always only praised my sister, I felt invisible. Right before I enrolled for university, there was this huge fight and we didn’t speak for months. I didn’t wanna see him or talk to him or hear his name. I forgave him when he started to actually make an effort to make up for what he did that made me so angry. I always felt like a burden to my family, the only kid in the whole family that doesn’t get straight A’s or isn’t perfectly well behaved. I always was a rebel. I guess I left Mauritius because I had no place there. I left to stop being a burden.

We kept on sharing our difficult pasts and how we survived. I also told him about that suicide attempt I made when I was 15, and how it was Kaleb that held me back from doing it again. We kept talking every day and every night, we supported each other through our difficulties. We didn’t need to make an effort to talk anymore, everything just came naturally. We even started sitting together in class, which of course, my friends noticed.

In class, there was me, Jace to my left, Kayra, Rebekah and Maya to my right, and Ryan and Chris at the back. The three girls teased me as much as they could, and embarrassed me a lot in front of Jace. But hey, that’s why they’re my friends, my sisters, that’s why I loved them. They were the most annoying, yet the most amazing friends I could hope for.

As for Chris and Ryan, they make silly comments at the back in a way that they make sure we can hear them. Especially Ryan, his comments sometimes just made me want to shoot him, in a friendly way.

Chris was calmer, but the rare moments when he talked, he said too much. Jace pointed out a few times how he loved sitting with us. Seeing and hearing us laugh and have fun made him feel better.

He slowly became a part of the band. He came with us when we went out and slowly became a part of my daily life until, eventually, he would become my life.