
Back to the summer of when I was seventeen—Mom is still here, and my leg is still intact. Everything is still salvageable. It feels so good!
I stand at the corner of the second floor, where I feel phantom limb pain occasionally in my lower leg.
Down in the living room, a heated argument is unfolding.
Dad watches Mom coldly: "Let’s get a divorce."
He tosses the divorce papers onto the coffee table.
Mom is shocked and confused.
She asks, "Why?"
I can’t help but smirk inside. Why else? It’s because Dad’s first love, the one he’s been holding onto for years, has come back to the country.
He’s in a hurry to go back to worship her.
His married status just doesn’t look good, and he feels like it’s an insult to his first love.
He sends her flowers, cars, and houses, but even that doesn’t seem enough. He probably thinks that giving her the title of Mrs. Chavez will make things right.
So, in a rush, he comes back to get a divorce.
What a heartless, selfish old man!
Doesn’t he even stop to think—when his family was in trouble, who pulled him out of the mess?


