I don’t know why I remember the month my mother picked up smoking. Up until then, only my dad smoked. He grew up in a poor rural town in Northeast China where cigarettes were a traded commodity in companionship, in belonging. You don’t reject a cigarette from a loved one.
So when my mother started smoking, I felt that suddenly the world had gone terribly wrong. I was a nosy child, always listening in the dark hallways at 2AM to get a full picture of the screaming going on in their bedroom. I’d read some of her emails a couple days before, since she often asked me to remember her passwords for her. I’m not sure why she didn’t think that I’d go through her emails like precious stones. But then again I had a penchant for digging up information not meant for me. Through these emails and some other context clues happening around my house, I deduced the reason for this Great War and kept it buried in my throat like a rock.
The smoke swirled so thickly in the bedroom that I couldn’t see my mother’s figure in the bed. I remember her hand floating back and forth a couple times, nonchalantly, before stubbing out the butt of her cigarette on the side table. Throughout my whole childhood I feared my mother more than anything, so naturally I immediately stormed to my father and demanded that he stop smoking. I think I was unable to reckon with the possibility that the detestable habit was coming from her. He laughed in a harsh, disbelieving way and said “it’s your mother this time! Go ask her to stop.” I fumed, not sure what to do with myself other than to repeat my request. My world was tipping on its balance - I couldn’t comprehend telling my mother to stop anything.
Eventually she did stop. I think she was trying to make a point, in the heat of the tunnel-vision of self destructive anger and melodrama. I will remember empathizing with her 12 years later, when after a fight with David I wildly daydreamed about wandering barefoot through the streets of Berkeley at night and throwing myself in front of cars just to prove a point. I don’t even remember what I was angry about - it wasn’t important.