300 Words, One Life: Breaking the curse

On the outside Malaysia is the epitome of an average college girl.

On the outside she appears happy and everything is ok.

But on the inside, the smile that shines through her eyes threatens to give way to the tears she fights to hold back.

No one knows she has a kid at home to take care of. No one knows that she’s struggling to keep up with her bills. No one knows how lonely she feels inside.

She does a good job of hiding her feelings but the things she does to take her mind off of reality make her feel worse.

The void that a faceless father left unfilled is taken care of by more faceless men she uses to help fill it. Literally.

Sharing her body makes her feel better temporarily. She longs for attention and they give it to her. Most of them are simply satisfying their own desires but feeling alone is not something she can handle.

Emotions become attached too easily and she finds herself falling, unable to let the fact that she’s falling alone catch her before it’s too late. Then she hits rock bottom.

She cries to herself, knowing she isn’t a good role model for her son. She wants to be but a generation curse has evolved. Her mother wasn’t a good role model either.

She always told herself she would be different from her mother. She wouldn’t submerge herself in a degrading life to find short-term relief.

Yet as she examines her life she can’t help but see a recurring pattern. As a child she thought of her mom as a hero. Her flaws weren’t evident. But Malaysia is an adult now and sees clearly.

She’ll be a mother her son can be proud of and finally break the curse.