Day Fourteen
Tell us about your Mum and Dad?

When I was younger, back before we knew of the heartache that would find us, my Mum and Dad were everything that your parents are supposed to be. They were so loving and kind, always there for me, always doing their best to make something of our lives. We were like every other family that I knew; we had dinner together, we went to the beach in the holidays, we argued over who was going to do the washing up. We were just another wonderful little slice of normality.

Everybody loved my Mum, it was impossible not to. Our house was always full of people whom she was friends with; some who stopped by to discuss work, others who just wanted to gossip over a cup of coffee. When I was little they had all seemed so grown up to me, so glamorous. I wanted to grow up to be just like them, to follow in their high-heeled footsteps. Of course I admired my Mum most of all; I looked up her in every possible way. It seemed to me that she had the perfect life. That she was life.
My Mum was everything to everyone; she always had enough time for every single person in her life, no one ever felt as if they were going without her attention when they needed it. She was so intelligent, clever in every aspect of life. Independent and headstrong and fuelled by the greater good. Nothing could ever stand in her way, truly a force to be reckoned with. My Mum had a heart liked no other, and she used it to stand for what was right, for the best of men, and for the innocent. She made the world a better place simply by being a part of it.

And my Dad, everything about him was fun loving and carefree. We would spend Saturday afternoon's together, just the two of us, little Katie Beckett and her silly old Dad. During those afternoons, spent making a den in the front room or rollerblading in the park, it felt to me as if the whole world had been created especially for us. I never wanted them to end; I never wanted to grow up.
Back then it was as if nothing could ever hurt me when my Dad was around; he made the world feel safer. No problem was ever too big, or too small, he was my protector. When I'd fallen out with my friends, or gotten a bad grade on a test paper, he was there. He made it better. He was brave in ways that I have always longed to be; courageous of heart and open to love. He was my hero.

But, as you all know by now, our lives didn't turn out how any of us had expected. When my Mum was murdered, I lost everything that I had ever known, and there was honestly a time when I thought that my life had ended on that fateful day.
My Mum was stolen from us, taken from this world too early, before anyone was ready for her to leave. It crushed my Dad, shattered his heart and his mind, and turned him into a man unrecognisable from the hero of my childhood. My Mum was gone, and my Dad was broken. I lost both of my parents in a single moment of heartless violence, and that is something that I still struggle with today.

My Dad is better now, healthy and strong, but he isn't quite the same. He loved my Mum with all of his heart, I mean, my goodness did he love her, and I don't believe that anyone can ever fully recover from a loss that devastating.
He is still my Dad, and I still love him unconditionally, but every day I miss the person who he used to be. I miss the brightness of his eyes and his happiness that knew no bounds. I miss him not only for myself, but also for my Dad. I wish that he didn't have to suffer, that he didn't know such tremendous grief, that his heart wasn't broken. But life doesn't work like that; we don't get to pick and choose our pain. We can't always end the suffering; sometimes we can only distract from it enough to make life bearable.

When I think of my Mum and Dad, I try to think of them as they were all those years ago, before the world as I knew it was broken beyond repair. I look back to the time that we had together, to the happiness and the love and the life. We experienced more joy in a single day of our lives together than some people do in an entire lifetime, and for that I consider myself very lucky indeed.
I don't dwell on what might have been. I can't. It is the 'what ifs' that will get you in the end; they'll bury themselves deep into your soul and rip it to shreds. They'll steal your heart.
You have to cherish the memories that you have, enjoy them, but you can't live your entire life within them. You have to keep going, you have to hope for a better life.

So, here is to my Family; to my Mum, to my Dad, and to me; an ordinary family, who together experienced an extraordinary love.

To be continued..

I hope that this story is still seeming Beckett-ey? ..sometimes the more that I write, the more like me I sound (if that makes any sense).
So, please let me know what you thought? - good or bad.

& keep sending in any questions that you have for Enquiries ..something that you would like clearing up from these challenge days, or something utterly unrelated :)

Thank you for reading,
Katie