The human brain is a fickle, little thing. It’s capable of all the world’s greatest achievements and its atrocities. It’s capable of unparalleled gentility as well as undesired cruelty. For reasons unbeknownst, it has a tendency to forget the most important details that a person strives to keep yet it will eternally recall the most trivial ones. However, it never fails to remember that which people want to forget.

The sun was nowhere to be seen, casting darkness over the warm day. Large, fearful clouds littered the sky. The smell of rain kept the small suburb’s residents inside. The house was quiet. Her family was too. She remembers all these details with precision. They stand tall like billboard signs she wished she had read. She had been playing a silly game with her younger sister. They were laughing, bodies shaking with happiness.

“Girls, come here.” Their father’s voice popped the bubble of imagination. The two froze, fearing that they were in trouble. They jumped from their positions on the ground and ran to their parent’s room.

The two entered the room, jumping next to their parents on the fluffy, king sized bed. They scrutinized the faces of their parents, searching for any traces of anger. There was none. Instead, there was something else—something she couldn’t define. It scared her.

“Are we in trouble?” Her little sister asked, looking back and forth between their parents.

The adults shared a glance and her mother began speaking.

While she spoke, the world slowed until it stilled. She can’t recall how her sister reacted. All she remembers is how time stopped.

Life didn’t change much at first. In fact, one couldn’t tell anything was out of the ordinary. Her father went to work. She and her sister went to school. And her mom still took care of them. After a while, she had even considered that this whole ordeal would be quick and painless. She wondered if maybe this wouldn’t be that bad.

She had managed to shut it off. She had been able to take those scary thoughts and sad feelings and lock them away. She didn’t let herself dwell on it. She lived, playing the role of unaffected. She never talked about it.
As time passed, as the effects of the cancer started to show, she couldn’t play dumb. She couldn’t look at her mother and pretend not to see. Appointments became more common. She had to watch as her hair fluttered to the ground. She had to watch as the energy was drained faster. She had to watch as the cancer took hold.
That’s when she began to hate. Everything. The cancer. The world. God. Herself.
She would hate the cancer for making her heroine hurt.
She would hate the world for not caring and continuing life as if it all was okay. She despised her classmates for not knowing. She couldn’t stand listening to them whine about their healthy, safe parents.
She would hate God for just watching and letting it happen. She refused to pray, convinced He had abandoned her family.
Most of all, she would hate herself. She hated that she wouldn’t help out enough, that she couldn’t cure her mother. She would wait till night came and she would scream into her pillow, tears flowing freely. Tremors would attack her body. She wouldn’t stop until she fell asleep, hands clenched around the tear stained pillow.
And still she couldn’t react so passionately in front of her family. She maintained her cool composure, acting unaffected. People couldn’t tell what she was going through. She had retreated from honesty and hid in a callous shell. She adamantly refused to let outsiders see these raw, true feelings.
Months passed and the hate grew until it was a part of her. Even after the treatment ended---after her mother was saved, she continued feeling hate towards herself.
Days would pass as the vehemence lay dormant. Everytime her head hit her pillow, however, the emotions were ignited and roared until she fell into an exhausted slumber. Every night was played this routine like a sick record spinning over and over.
She cannot pinpoint when, but slowly nights of freedom from this pain appeared. She would fall asleep after contemplating the trivial aspects of her school days. She didn’t think about this change because those harsh nights were still occurred. When she was in school, she stopped looking and hating the lucky children in her class. Instead, she started to enjoy the little things like a stupid joke or a sunny day.
One day, months later after the nights of sadness faded away, the pain stopped. The place in her heart for hatred was gone. Sometimes she thinks its because she was able to mature. Sometimes she thinks it’s because she can’t hold a grudge.
She had forgiven the world.
She had forgiven God.
She had forgiven herself.