Rayne

She stood in front of the door of the house she grew up in, which was also the house where she was bullied by her own parents. Admittedly, she did always enjoy the fact that the door was black and had a golden door knocker. But after using said knocker, nausea overcame her.

Her mother opened the door. She was about to talk, but suddenly shut her mouth, before restarting:

“Rayne!” The woman attempted to smooth down her own long brown hair, which was flowing due to the wind.

“I’m only here to say goodbye to Josh.”

“Well, come on in, love.”

Love? Ugh. She rolled her eyes. She hated to pretend that nothing ever happened under that roof.

“I love the name that you chose.” Her mother spoke, while they waited for Joshua to arrive in the living room. “You did always love the rain.”

“That would have been lovely to hear five years ago.” Rayne replied, her tone inexpressive.

“The things your father did and said were awful, but I really did try stopping him.”

“There is no but!” She bit her lip and stopped herself… But broke loose. “You stayed married and living with someone who kicked out your own daughter!”

Rayne aggressively gestured with her hands.

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“You know what? I cannot do this. Tell Josh I’ll call him.”

She began walking towards the door, already regretting allowing herself to let things out.

“No. We’re doing this.” She heard her father’s deep voice. He was walking in the room with Joshua by his side. “Rayne. We’ve been trying to apologize all this time. Now you’re going to let us.” He paused.

Rayne didn’t walk out but didn’t move closer, either. He went on:

“Do you remember Kai? He had an internship at our company at the time. I casually told him I had kicked you out that weekend… Do you know what he said?”

Everyone had tears in their eyes, Rayne had hers gliding down her face. The door was so close, but she wasn’t leaving now. The conversation was going to happen. She clenched her jaw and heard the words spilling out of her father.

“He said he wanted to leave the internship because he wasn’t going to work for a homophobe. He said ‘I’ve known you for 10 months, I thought you were better than this’.”

He ran a hand through his short grey hair.

“Do you remember Yoshimi? He had been working for me for years, I commented with him how silly Kai was for quitting… But Yoshimi wanted to quit, too! Turned out he is gay, too!”

He paused, looking down at his wrinkled, veiny hands. The wedding ring on his finger nearly cut his blood circulation.

“I hated them both… And you. Yes. For a while, I hated you because I thought what you were was wrong, and also I felt you guys had betrayed me. Like ‘I thought I knew them, but they pretended to be something else. They hid it from me!’.” His accent grew thicker, as his memories spiked his anger.

Joshua moved to sit down on the side of the couch, and his mother moved to sit on an armchair. While Rayne and her father remained standing many feet apart, almost motionless.

“But that was simple-minded of me. I, now, know I was the wrong one. I can’t…” Tears start gliding down his face. “I can’t tell anyone who they should love or who they should be. What name they want to be called. How they want their hair or anything. And I can’t judge or hate them- I can’t hate or judge you just because of who you love or who you are.”

He appeared to have been done talking, but Rayne couldn’t say a word. She couldn’t even move. She simply kept attempting and failing to hold her tears in.