World Anti-DrugTransnational Internet contest - "Maya"

We stopped living with my father, when I was 2 years old. He was very jealous, drank hard and beat mom every day. He didn’t let her work. She had to hide her face and hair under the kerchiefs because of his jealousy. Mom’s brothers punished him for this couple of times, beat him to death, but when sobered up, he came back, went on his knees, repented, and she forgave him again. The city in Ural, where we used to live, was very small, so everyone knew each other. That time it was a shame to remain alone with two kids.

I don’t really remember that period in our life that we lived together, but some episodes remained in my memory. I remember how he attacked mom with knife and because of this, I got into the hospital once. I had some heart problems. I was saved, but for the rest of my life the bright, zigzag vein on the left breast would remind me of that.

Even when my parents were already separated, I continued visiting my father. I was small and really wanted to be close to him. Mom’s brothers didn’t let him come close to the house, but I often went to the grandma’s place, where I met him sometimes. I could stay there for hours and wait for him to come. Although he never loved me and never accepted me as his daughter. He said: “The woman is a prostitute in other words”. He never bought me any present, even a candy, but always taught me to convince mom to let him come back and live with us.

He loved my brother very much. He always bought him expensive gifts. Gave watch and bicycle. However brother always returned them, he never took anything from him. He hated our father. He was five years older than me and he clearly remembered how he had to run to our relatives across the whole city to ask for help, so the father wouldn’t kill our mom. Mom had scars from his beatings for the rest of her life.

We lived in the shared apartment with two other neighbors and one common kitchen. We had no knives and forks. When our neighbors opened the door to the father, they didn’t let him come, before searching, so he wouldn’t bring something sharp. Cause sometimes he managed to hide the stone or some whet in the pocket.

When I was 10 years old, we left that city. Every summer, I visited my grandmother, but rarely met him there. He didn’t marry afterwards. He became an alcoholic and lived where he chanced to be. By 50 he became deaf and died in loneliness, haven’t changed his treatment towards me. For the whole my life, I have spared him.