Prologue

With all of my possessions, my freedom is the one that I am most contented. It was the only thing I’m grateful for to my parents who left me to fend for myself.

I was just a kid when my mom chose her modeling career abroad over me. And it was okay because she still sees me during the holidays, and I still have my father who brings me with him whenever he travels.

But one night, he said that he needs to leave. He told me that they want me to learn to be independent, and this is the only way I could learn. I’ve never seen him since then.

And I believed them. They were just teaching me how to be strong, how to never feel afraid of being alone, how to pursue whatever you dream of. They made me realized how it’s only me who can free myself.

But when I grew up, I realized how they also taught me to feel. They taught me anger, sadness, and loneliness. I was born but wasn’t raised.

They made me taste freedom from a very young age that I have never got to know the taste of a rusty cage. And after three years in the island, the bluest sea, the whitest sand, and the chilly wind still didn’t feel like a cage to me.

Now that I am waiting for Hue to open the door for me and our child, I feel afraid and suffocated. The door that I’ve been waiting to open felt like the door to the real freedom. I thought I was close to being free again.

But when he took Kahel from me, that was when I got to know the taste of prison. I felt trapped with anger and fear of never seeing my son again. So, this is what it feels like to be imprisoned. To not be able to hold the child that made you want to live, to never be able to love the only person you’ve ever loved.

This is the opposite of freedom.