In All Our Glory and Imperfections: Chapter 1

Chapter One

   At eighteen years old, as 'pretty as I was', my mother decided that it was unnatural for me not to have a boyfriend. It was Saturday morning and my cheeks were still rosy from sleeping in too late. When I finally woke up my mother offered to take me out for brunch, and there I was sitting at Denny's with tousled hair and a mouth full of pancakes when she brought the subject to the table.

   "So, any handsome boys I should know about Charlize?" She nudged my fork wielding hand with the non-lethal side of her knife. I looked up at her and she stared back with an awkwardly over enthusiastic expression. I raise an eyebrow at her. She had brought up this topic twelve times in the past three years, four times just being these past two months. It was like she wanted me to have a boyfriend, that something was wrong with me, or her, because I didn't. I wasn't in the mood to explain to her, once again, my unchanging opinion about such thing. That I didn't need or want a boyfriend, because I knew exactly what that would lead to. Her sorely disappointed and me feeling guilty for constantly sorely disappointing. So I decided to try to veer the conversation away with my razor-sharp, witty tactics. a.ka. annoy the living bejesus out of her.

   "You're not going through that weird pop culture I'm-a-teenager-again phase, Right?" I asked after swallowing. "Because you know I'm not into celebrity gossip and boy bands, mom."

   "No. You know what I meant," she said swatting the air with an annoyed look, but the enthusiasm immediately returned with a smile. She balanced her chin on her palm and fluttered her lashes at me, "I was referring to real boys. Like the boys who go to your school."

   "Are you suggesting that the members of One Direction don't consist of 'real boys'? I knew that the conspiracy theories would eventually catch on. I'm a fan of 'brain-washing aliens' myself," I replied shoveling another mouth full of syrup drenched pancakes into my mouth. I was hoping that if I annoyed her enough she would drop it. "I mean, how could music that bad honestly be this popular. It has to be brain-"

   "Charlize Joanna Scarlotte." My mother said annoyed and she narrowed her all-seeing eyes at me. I could tell she was very annoyed too, by her usage of my full name. "Cut the crap."

   I sighed, seeing that she wasn't going to let it go no matter how relentlessly I tried to change the subject, and I answered with a drone and sharp tone, "No mom. I don't need a boyfriend to ruin my life."

   I decided to skip the part where she prodded me until I had her thoroughly convinced that I wasn't hiding a secret love interest from her and get straight to the part where I told her exactly how I felt about having a boyfriend.

   "Oh my God," my mother groaned her eyes widening, and she wiggled the end of her knife at me. I rolled my eyes. Here we go again. "This is my mother's influence, I swear!"

   My mom believed that my grandmother had been the main cause of my anti-male opinions, and it was partly true.  Having an over-bearing feminist like her around your entire life and you're bound to adopting some kind of caution when it came to men, but my grandma wasn't to blame for my distaste. It was actually my mother, herself.

   It all started when I was old enough to start wondering what had become of my father. He had been absent my entire life, or I couldn't recall any memories of him at least, so naturally I was curious. When I asked my mother about my dad she withheld at first, but eventually she told me the truth after long sessions of daily prodding. That my father was in jail. For spousal abuse. The revelation horrified me. How could my father do something so awful? It was probably my mother's famous next words that would be burned into the back of my brain to this day. Because he was an awful man, because all men are cruel and heartless. 

   Mom had said it in a fit of anger and pain, the wounds my father left still fresh on her heart even if the ones he left on her skin had long since cleared, and I knew that she didn't really feel that way, but no matter what I couldn't stop think about it. Throughout grandma's stories of her three marriages and mom trying to heal a wounded heart. It rang too much truth in the life of women around me. I didn't want to be hurt. I didn't want to be tied down and miserable like my grandma, who dreamed of becoming a pilot and traveling the world, until it was taken away by a man who she thought she had loved and old age. No man was going to take my dreams away from me. Even if it meant withstanding my mother's constant harassment.

   "Are you a lesbian?"

   "What?" I asked scrunching up my face.

  "Are. You. A lesbian?"

   My mother always came to these wild conclusions. I shook my head at her. "No. Not that there is anything wrong with that, but just because I don't want a boyfriend doesn't mean I'm not attracted to men, mom."

   I had fallen for countless numbers of men. Although, a vast majority of them were fictional characters from great adventure novels who were chivalrous and charmingly intelligent and perfectly non-existent, I was not resilient to my hormones when I saw an attractive man in reality. It was quite easy however, to ignore them once I found that they had the mental capacity of one of the lowly members of the monkey family. I have yet to find a man that I actually had to fight myself to resist.

   My mom looked at me for a long time until she finally released the breathe she had within her and sighed. Even longer still for her to smile and her eyes to soften. "I have a solution."

   "We kidnap a hot boy, clone him, and then raise the clone to be the perfect boyfriend?" I suggested jokingly.

   "How about no more visiting your grandma and I force you to start listening to One Direction and reading Seventeen magazine. Maybe then you'll appreciate the male species that God has so generously provided for us and clustered into teenager-approved musical groups."

   I hissed at her through my teeth.

   "No, on the One Direction? How about 'N Sync?"

   "Oh my God, mom. No." I said scooting away from the table. "I'm going to the car."

   I would not be subjected to hearing her suggestions of horrible boy bands, most of which who had disbanded for good reason, any longer. Or hearing her suggestions for boys in general. I had better things to do.