[Olive branch]

Chapter Four

It is eight forty-two. I am four years old. Mummy is driving me to school; we’re passing under the big oak tree which scatters acorns all over the road sometimes in the year. Acorns crunch under my feet like the noise paper makes when you screw it up. Mummy is crying. I don’t know why, she hasn’t said anything for a while either. Eventually I can’t help but to ask her, even though I’ve been enough times by Daddy that when Mummy cries she wants me to be quiet and not talk to her about it. “Mummy,” I ask as quietly as I can without being so quiet she can’t hear me. “Mummy what are you crying for today?” Mummy lifts up her head slightly and sits straighter in her chair. “I’m not crying sweetie.”
I scrunch up my face and rub my eyes but when I look back at her she still has red puffy bits under her eyes and her nose is running. I am so sure she is crying. She looks just the same way I do when I cry. I shuffle in my car seat and I say very quietly again “Mummy.” She looks at me for a second then her attention flicks back to the road. “Mummy do you love me?” I ask.
She glances at me once more, “of course I do. I’m your mother. Every mother loves her own child.”

I learnt two things that day. I didn’t know that love was compulsory before then. That every child must love their mother and that every mother has to love their child. I thought love was an emotion but if I think about it as an emotion it doesn’t really work.
Because love means wanting to be with someone, no matter what they look like or what they have done. Love means trying to make people better when they’re ill and knowing they would do the same for you. Love means you think about that person a lot. I don’t think that if it was voluntary anyone would do it. Wives have to love their husbands. Mothers and fathers have to love their children. Dogs have to love their masters. People have to love God. People have to love someone for them to do things for them. My mummy doesn’t do any of the things I think of when I think of love as an emotion but she does try to look after me.
The other thing I’ve learnt is that it’s okay to pretend not to cry sometimes. Sometimes if it’s too hard it can be better to keep it inside and not spread it to everyone else. Sometimes it’s okay to lie to other people and even yourself if it helps you feel better.