3. The Family Jewels

Despite the soul-crushing embarrassment of being around Drew when others were present, we still had our tender moments. We often bonded whenever we went out to run errands together if I wasn’t locked in the car, waiting for their return.

Drew often lost track of time whenever they perused for clothes at our local shopping mall. They loved taking their sweet time as they hand-selected matching shirts, bottoms, and blouses for me to wear. Everything Drew diligently selected for me had to be perfect, since I was meant to be their picture-perfect child. Since Drew doted on me so much, I tried to return the favor by pointing at an outfit I thought they would enjoy wearing. However, these attempts would be met with immediate dismissal, as Drew was content with clothes they had owned for decades. Drew wasn’t one of those self-obsessed, vain people, a judgment they often delegated to me claiming I was “high-maintenance.” However, deep down, I felt that Drew never bothered dressing their body because for some reason, they were ashamed of themselves. Their diligence for perfection served to quiet some of the sadness they held within themselves. So instead, Drew would dress my body to embody that unattainable perfection and serve as a vessel for their forbidden joy. Though I enjoyed being lavished endlessly by Drew and watching their eyes twinkle with glee, I would also find it exhausting to have to keep putting on a show of being their little doll. On the rare occasion that my friends came over, their jaws would drop at the sheer amount of clothes I owned, each article of clothing folded perfectly and stacked in its proper place.

When I finally got the chance to accompany Drew shopping for clothes, as they pushed me in my little stroller, a wave of panic hit me when mall cops suddenly swarmed us and pinned Drew against the wall, handcuffing them. I couldn’t comprehend why the police, who were meant to protect good people, were treating my caregiver so roughly as they man-handled them. Wasn’t Drew a virtuous, diligent person? My voice grew hoarse with crying as the officers walked behind us and pushed me in my stroller into the Macy’s jail cell. We sat there for hours, Drew silent with shame and barely making any eye-contact with me as I witnessed one of their most despicable moments. I stared at their goose-bump ridden left arm in that chilly, air-conditioned room, a waft of stale air entering my nose as the officer occasionally glanced over at us with a pierce gaze before going back to their paperwork. In the future, whenever Drew and I had run-ins with civil officers, I would squeeze their hand tightly in mine in defiance towards the officers as they questioned if they knew how to speak English or suggested that they should go back to their own country. I hoped it would give them strength in their moments of weakness. Drew never liked talking much about those confrontations with me afterwards.

Despite their secret impulses and stingy attitude, Drew could be an endless giver to the people around them. They always gave cash when beggars approached us in parking lots and would often accompany a single mother to court when she was fighting with my classmate’s father following a messy divorce. Drew was interesting in that way, paradoxically self-serving yet also self-sacrificing. As I would learn, their giving-tendencies were also put to good use when it came to my grades. To ensure that I would get an A without a minus in each of my courses, Drew would spend good chunks of money on gifts for my teachers. Sometimes, they would even give them tickets to see me perform in the Nutcracker show my ballet company would put on every Christmas.

“After spending so much money on that ticket, I’m sure that you’ll be able to pass history this semester.”

“But isn’t that bribery?” I asked. “If we’re giving gifts and expecting the teacher to do something in return…”

“What?! NO! How could you say that?!? You’re such a silly child, saying such nonsensical things. It’s not bribery, I just think it’s fair that after all that money we spent on them that you should get an A in history this semester. Hopefully they’ll be grateful and good to us after we’ve been so giving to them. You know, if you were a better student we wouldn’t have to get such expensive gifts for your teachers.”

Drew loved getting involved in my schoolwork, since any failure on my part would be perceived as a failure of them as a caregiver. When I had wanted to write for my young author’s assignment about a girl faced with different doors to choose her way in life, Drew insisted it was too abstract and lacked substance. They instead pitched for me to rip-off swan lake, a story I was familiar with from ballet. There’s a story with clear good and evil, since morals are supposed to be simple, or at least, that’s what they learned from the books they read growing up whenever they needed to escape their unhappiness. Since I didn’t have time to illustrate my work, my other caregiver, Emerson, was enlisted to fill in the gaps. In Drew’s eyes, what they were enforcing was “the right, responsible way” to be an involved caregiver. They were proud to utilize tiger parenting tactics, citing Amy Chua’s memoir despite never reading the book in its entirety.

A biology worksheet once asked us to argue whether we believed a turtle was a good parent. Since the question involved parenthood, Drew, of course, had strong opinions about what I should answer. I initially wrote about how I believed a turtle was a good parent, because it would painstakingly bury its eggs in the sand and leave its offspring behind so predators wouldn’t kill its babies. Drew objected, asserting that the turtle was a TERRIBLE parent since it was selfish to abandon its unborn offspring like that, without a care of what would become of them. When I tried to argue that turtle’s lives are drastically different from humans’ lives, Drew turned to Emerson for support. Emerson meekly nodded his head in approval. I hand-copied Drew’s response into my worksheet and turned it in the next day.

Drew demanded that every second of my life was to be spent studying or on extracurriculars, while they would undertake the menial, dirty chores around the house. I was SO privileged to have the luxury of being useless around the house, unlike them, Drew would often remind me. How lucky I was that my hands were soft, unlike theirs which were dry and cracked from all the dishes they had washed for our family. The moments that I did want to do some chores on my own were always met with,

“Well, you’ll do it the dumb way, and I’ll have to clean up your mess. I’ll just do it for you. Stop wasting your time and get back to studying!”

Whenever I voiced my concern over how I was falling behind my peers, Drew would be deeply hurt by my accusations.

I was an ungrateful, spoiled brat who didn’t realize all the sacrifices they made for me, because I didn’t know any better. After all, they gave up on a career just to be a full-time caregiver to take care of me. I could never be half the caregiver Drew was to me if one day I had kids of my own, which I definitely needed to do if I wanted to fulfill my purpose of extending our family legacy.

2. Playing God

4. Royal Crypt