Water fell from the dark navy blue sky like a stream of tears that fall from hurt eyes after a stabbing pain enters the heart. I grab tightly onto my grandmother's hand, walking to the handleless gates. Silver, white lights, a chill in the air, all do not help my nervous heart feel any calmer. Why do I have to leave my family? What is going on? 

“Say hi to your mom when you see her for me, will you?” wondered my grandmother. 

“But you’re my mom,” I replied. I have no image of another mother circling my mind, to me, she is my mom, to me she is everything. 

As we stepped foot inside the building, I became unusually aware of everything, as if to record it in my brain forever. Small sweaty palms in the hands of my grandmother, my pink shoes making squeaking noises thanks to the salty tears outside the door, my heart beating fast, my eyes burning from the rain I made happen for the past two days. Not knowing what came next was the worst part, or maybe it was that I actually had no clue where I was. 

Then, I was in the hands of a slim, tall, woman in red, red like the devil. Red like the color of anger, red like the evil in the world. She wore a hat, maybe she was covering her horns. Her platinum black hair was slicked into a bun, and red lipstick to match her skirt and blazer. She grabbed my hand with a smile, huh not the type of smile a devil gives you though. As my right hand was given to her, my left hand was ripped apart from my mommy. The rip of the hands I could feel in the center of my chest. 

My eyes screamed of tiredness, but the pain was too much compared to the soreness. 

“NO! I don’t want to go!” I yelled. 

But the tightness in my chest was countered with the tightness of the she-devil’s grip on my hand. 

I had to go, I had to follow her, she was 3 times my size of course. 

And then, there was waiting. Lots of waiting. She sat me in front of a window, well many windows. Actually, there were less walls and more windows. 

I turned my head towards it, hoping I could see my mommy and daddy. But all I saw was a bird the size of a house. With its menacing eyes, it stared at me. Its wings were so sharp they threatened to cut through me, the way they cut through my family. Its tail is so long, I bet it could fly across the seven oceans without a problem. It’s feathers…well, that was the problem, it didn’t have any. 

“Come on, it’s time to go” the she-devil sneered at me. Then, she took me…inside the belly of the beast. 

When the bird vomited us back out, everyone dispersed like fallen marbles. I moved with the crowd, and suddenly the red figure hunted me down once again, one last time. She took me to a desk, where I stared at the bottom of the podium as she handed the man behind the desk some papers, my papers, apparently, that she took out of my sparkly pink bookbag. 

 And then I met her. A shining beam of sunlight, sunlight that looked a little familiar, looked a little like me. But, an older version of me. No wait, a younger version…but of my mommy. She embraced me like the ocean waves absorb hot warm sun rays, and held onto me the entire car ride to my new home.
With her, was someone new. A man. I felt his nervousness shift the air around us. An uncomfortable, an unfamiliar feeling. Everything was different though, the air seemed cleaner here, the streets seemed clearer. Cold pierced into my skin for the first time, like when you touch a thorned rose. 

When we got home, well to a home, the woman sat me down. 

“Sweetie, I know you may not remember, but you’ve met me before, a few years ago” 

Unable to hear anything besides my own thoughts, I started weeping for my mommy. 

“It’s okay” she comforted me, “I am your mom too.”

Days passed, then months. My fear of my new mother waned, but the weariness of the man did not. He would ask, day and day again, if he could take me here, there, to get this, that. And each time I shook my head until my brain was scrambled and my vision unbalanced. I felt afraid, I felt like I would be ripped apart from my new mom like I was from the old. 

One sunny afternoon in the middle of June, he walked into my mom’s job. I was sitting beside her on a smaller stool while she took money and gave out snacks to waves of people. Sometimes, the people would even give money for colorful pieces of paper in hopes of receiving money themselves, a bit counterintuitive in hindsight to be honest. Nonetheless, when he walked in, my mom grabbed me out of the stool and explained, “Papa’s going to get you a bike so you can ride it in the nice hot weather. You wanted a pink one right?” 

A pink one, yes. With him, no. She spotted my furrowing brows and my pouting lips, and gave me a saddened expression, the type that mimics the words “please not again.” Despite her pleas, I vigorously shook my head once again. Then, for the first time, I looked at him after I was done scrambling my brain. Disappointment, sadness, tiredness, I saw it all in his eyes. He turned around left through the same door after saying “It’s alright, maybe another day.” 

As soon as he opened the door, he let in a breeze of guilt that coated me head to toe. I thought about it, and realized he reminded me of my dad back home, my much older dad. He was always there, always ready to take any chance to make me happy. If I could adjust to a new home, a new country, a new mom, why couldn’t I give a new papa a chance? Surely, a new family won’t replace the old. So, after a few minutes, I reached up and tugged on my mom’s light blue shirt, “I want a pink bike with papa,” I admitted. 

A smile bloomed on her face as does a flower in spring. She reached for the phone, and since that day, many chances were given. Memories with a new papa and a new mom are all I remember now. Family is complicated, and for a young child it’s difficult to accept all things new, but remaining open and compassionate can allow family connections to grow like vines, deeply rooted and beautiful.