His knuckles were bruised, from the punches he blew all my life. I think the physical abuse stopped somewhere at age 17, but the emotional and mental continued on to my adulthood.
The war started again the year I was turning 25, two years after finding someone I wanted to marry. The way my father agreed to marry us in front of my partner's parents, but looked down on me behind them. The things he said about me thinking I was so mature, that I'd gotten big-headed since being with this person.
My mother insisted on a traditional process, which includes a merisik. Something from the olden days, the guy's family comes to the girl's home, knock knock, we'd like to have your daughter as our son's wife.
My mother insisted on it, my father refused it, and I was caught in between. I didn't want it either, but when the day came, I still wished for him to be around instead of lying about having to work.
Then circuit breaker happened and the battle was taken underground, behind closed doors. The torment continued, adding on to the migraines I had from screwed body clocks and niblings shouting in the house all day. My father banging things around when I walked into the room, getting up from the dining table when I sat at it, my engagement day when again, he 'had to work'.
Getting engaged was only the beginning, it was a big step forward but it was only getting harder. I know he always saw me as a burden, maybe from the fact that in Islam, as a father he was responsible for my deeds. If so I never understood why he was so angry seeing me change for the better. His words, Dia ingat dia dah ada matair dia dah besar, tattooed on my mind.
After trying to keep silent as long as I could, I finally tore his banners down when I started fighting back. Since he was treating me like an adult daughter not worth respecting, I thought I'd act that way. I was, after all, fighting for a future with someone who actually treated me like a person.
I turned 25 in September 2020 without a single acknowledgement from him. It wasn't my first birthday where he had ignored me, but it would be my last being his responsibility in the name of Islam. Tears on the mental letters I wrote him because deep down, I still felt a little bit sad about it.
The year I was turning 26, the year I was to be married, our father-daughter relationship still didn't improve. It was difficult not having that bond, seeing that as a father, he had to be heavily involved. He continued leaving the rooms I walked in and stopped acknowledging me completely.
I eventually did the same, bombs coming closer, until Melonsoy happened. He finally remembered I existed, but for the wrong reasons. I turned chairs over and he yelled at me, I didn't know for certain if he would lay a finger on me one last time, but I left the house before I could find out.
I truly commend my partner for the way he helped me through things. Being the middleman between two hot-headed egos. Nobody else could plow through the situation like he did, so patient and firm. The way he drew up good faith treaties for two people adamant on drawing curtains closed instead.
24th of May, 2021, I told myself my parents still hated me nine years after my teenage angst. I walked from paya lebar mrt to my refuge, my grandmother's house, and I finally burst into tears. Tears that were held in from the past several months, the tears for 17yearold me who thought things between us would get better by this time.
19th of June, 2021, I left my house as my father's responsibility for the last time. To my wedding venue, where people braided my hair and put layers of makeup on my face. Masking the restless nights that precede what should have been every girl's happiest day. The flowers in my hands for the life I was about to start.
From the moment my partner said my name in full, from the handshake my father gives him to seal the deal of giving me away. That was the moment I as a burden was lifted off his shoulders, and he finally loved me again. As a wife, I gained a husband and in-laws who treated me like everything. As a daughter, I gained back my father but it was too late to ever be a priority to him anymore. Because in his eyes, I am finally my husband's problem first.
So I know now that in the great war between father and daughter, I never could've won.
References: playing victim (2020) https://109blackaxesii.blogspot.com/2020/05/playing-victim.html?m=1
melonsoylia (2021) https://109blackaxesii.blogspot.com/2022/11/melonsoylia.html
green light of forgiveness (2022) https://109blackaxesii.blogspot.com/2022/09/green-light-of-forgiveness.html
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