A true tale of Argentine life

Everything seemed to be perfect until a month after my fifth birthday. It was a rainy day of June. It was getting dark and there was the whole family about to have dinner: my mother, my father, my eldest sister and me. I was watching T.V. with my sister when angry shouts were heard from the kitchen, where my mother and father were. We could not hear what they were saying to each other because the TV was too loud. Suddenly, a shadow could be seen as the door shut with a slam. My sister and I looked at each other, we both had a puzzled look on our faces. We turned off the T.V. and went directly towards the kitchen to find my mother sobbing like a little girl. We gave her a huge hug but we did not ask anything since we both knew it was not the right moment to do so. Never did I hear about my father in my whole childhood again.



My mum was not able to get over this terrible loss . After this incident, she never uttered my father’s name again. Moreover, she destroyed everything that had to do with my father and their relationship. Unfortunately, my mother’s decision was against my own interest since I could not remember his features unless I was shown a picture. I wanted to know about my father in spite of the fact that I knew perfectly well that what he had done to the family was terrible. As my mother was not the right person to ask for information about my father, I turned to my sister, who was –at the time our father abandoned us- two years older than me. Being seven years old, my sister was not of too much help but, at least she remembered more events than I did.


Twenty years later, a rainy day of June, there were the three of us having dinner when we suddenly heard a knock on the door. At the beginning, we got paralysed with fear. Then, my mother took a wooden stick and holding it in her two hands, she ordered my sister to open the door. My sister did as ordered. Both my mother and sister were speechless at the sight of a middle aged man standing at the door. As I did not understand the situation I said: ‘Mum,who is he?’ and my mother answered with tears on her eyes, ‘your father, darling! He’s your father.’