What do say when you find out that fairy tales aren’t real? That they simply just don’t exist. That in real life, things aren’t as perfect as they look on the outside. That everything you thought was true just turned out to be one big lie.

I turned my face away from my mother, towards the tinted window of the car, I watched the rain drops pelt against it, as the trees and highway raced by. I thought about my Mom and Dad, I felt my eyes start to cloud as I tried to fight back the tears, my mom was not going to see me cry about this divorce, she was not going to see how much this hurt me. “Mom?” I asked in a quiet voice, I could hear it slightly quivering, I’m sure she heard it too, she didn’t mention anything about it though. “Yes?” she said not looking away from the road. “Did you think Dad was the right person for you when you married him?” I said not turning away from the window. She didn’t speak for awhile, I watched the sign for Baltimore pass by in a rush. “No.” she said bluntly, her voice was regretful. I turned to her, she looked like she was about to cry, “Then why did you marry him? Why did you put us through this?” I said my voice rising slightly. Her voice cracked  “I was scared Katie, scared to be alone, I was scared of being lonely.” She finished I could see a single tear running down her face. I turned to the window fighting back tears myself. I got in control, wiped my eyes, and asked the window quietly “How did you know he wasn’t the man for you?” I was scared to hear the answer, but listened anyway. “I don’t think we should be talking about this, I don’t want you to hate your father.” she said. “Tell me please.” I whispered. I looked up we made eye contact for the briefest second, I could see how much deep sorrow and regret she had, she looked completely broken. “Please, tell me.” I whispered again, looking down at my hands. It seemed a million years before she finally said “Ok.”

“I should’ve known from the beginning he wasn’t a good guy, but I learned much later, too late. The warning signs were there. I hated his family, I thought they were close minded, and racist, and his father had an awful temper, he scared me. My parents didn’t like him, they thought he was too old for me, and not a gentleman at all more like an obnoxious, self righteous, prideful, crude boy. But I hated my parents then, and I hated them for lecturing me like I was some sort of child, I knew what I was doing, I was a grown woman, and to spite them I dated him some more, even though I knew something was off about him. I ended moving out of the house and into his apartment, things got pretty bad after that, he would go out every night and come home drunk” she paused “ the things he would say to me, I couldn’t repeat to you. Just thinking about it makes me cringe. I wanted to leave and I told him so, he begged me to stay, he promised things would get better, that he would get better. He said he loved me, that he would do anything for me. Those promises were completely empty, he didn’t get better at all.” I turned to the window hiding my tears from her, and my stifled sobs. This was real life, all this time, ever since I was a little girl, I thought my parents loved each other at one point. It was all a lie. This, was the cold hard truth. “I was miserable and I wanted to leave but I didn’t want to move back in with my parents. So I tried to stick it out some more, hoping things would get better, after 6 months of him coming home drunk every night, I finally decided to leave, I was leaving that night. He called and asked if we needed anything from the store, I told him we needed sour cream. 10 minutes later he comes in the door with the sour cream, in his hand and tells me to open it.  I opened the sour cream and in it, in a nasty plastic bag covered with sour cream, was an engagement ring. Before I knew what what was going on I had the ring on my finger.” Her voice broke she was crying too. “He didn’t even ask me, he just assumed I would say yes. He insisted on calling all are parents, I tried to tell him to wait until the morning but he wouldn’t listen. The next morning my parents tried to talk me out of it, I was angry at them for butting into my business, and told them to just be happy for me. But on the inside, I was miserable, I was screaming, I knew my parents were right, but I was too prideful and stubborn to admit it.” her voice was quivering. “I wanted out but I didn’t want to hurt his feelings and admit that my parents were right. By the time I decided I didn’t want to go through with it, it was my wedding day, and I didn’t want to waste all my parents money and disappoint everyone. My wedding day was the worst day of my life.”  she finished. I tried to hide my silent tears, for what seemed like eternity, the car was filled with a silence weighted with my moms regret, her mistake. Finally in a broken voice she said “Katie, never settle for someone who doesn’t deserve you like I did, you are worth so much more than that. Wait for that right person, and never date someone just because you are lonely, and don’t be afraid to say no, ever.”

In real life there are no happily ever afters, just tragedies, hidden by a perfect facade that we want the world to see.

Photo by Lovestruck