EIGHT TARGETS
22. The Voice of the Heart Rihana
I'm Rihana. I idolized my mother very much and I aspired to be like her. I was born to a conglomerate father. With his wealth, he managed to lure my mother. My father married my mother in his homeland who was a Thai citizen at that time and brought her back to Indonesia. You could say, my family is quite harmonious. My father was the heir to the number 1 television company at the time and my mother was a reliable journalist, although in the early days of his arrival in Indonesia, my mother had to struggle in learning Indonesian.
But that happiness doesn't last long. By the time I was 5, my father was suffering from leukemia. I was a kid then, so I can't remember very well. But from then on, my father became sensitive and angry. The slightest thing would be the cause of his anger. Maybe that's when my childhood trauma started. Along with the condition of the sickly Father, the company did not run smoothly. Grandpa should ask for funds here and there from investors to improve the state of the company. But everything doesn't seem to be going well. Grandpa was often drunk. And it got worse when my grandmother died.
What happened to grandfather and grandmother made the father become more stressed and eventually resulted in his poor mental condition. My father became more angry. He often broke things in the house. Maybe that's what left the only maid in our house who was left and was the longest-serving in our house after we dumped the others because financial problems couldn't last we decided to stop working at our house. Stay me and my mother shoulder to shoulder at home, taking care of Dad who is getting worse condition.
Seeing the condition of the company that was on the edge and could no longer be saved, my mother joined NTV News which was still new at that time. I am so grateful to have such a smart mom. Father's inability as the head of the family was successfully borne by Mother herself. I don't really understand why Dad was so upset about Mom's decision to move from ZTV to NTV. Isn't it natural to leave a company that can't be saved again before drowning with him when the opportunity comes? Because thanks to Mother, this family can still meet the needs of his life.
Not being able to stand the treatment of the father who became increasingly, Mother finally decided to divorce him and took me with her when I was 9 years old at that time.
I saw after the divorce, Mom was always sad. Mother every night sometimes drunk and unceasingly call out the name of Father. I can still remember, though my memory is faint, how gentle Dad was to me when he was healthy when I was very young. But what does all that mean? As soon as I remembered Father, only the memory of his rudeness and his poor treatment of us dominated my memory. I don't understand why Mom still loves you like that? My poor mother.
After the two of us left home, we were shoulder to shoulder in order to survive in this cruel world. Mother had to fight desperately to lick to the rats in the tie to get a higher position. As for me, I also did the same to the mice. I also try all kinds of ways, from changing my appearance and speaking to be liked by them, to detail things like pretending to like what they like, though most of those hobbies are something that disgust me. But I'm good at acting. I was good at playing my part so that in the end, I was allowed to enter their circle.
At the age of 11, Dad breathed his last. When I saw Dad's body, I felt a little relief in my heart. Ah, with this, the burden that had been making my mother suffer had finally gone as well, I thought. I realized I was a cold person.
In the puberty period in Junior High, the behavior of the depraved rich children is increasingly becoming. As a person under them, I was always oppressed and always told strange things. I also tried to adjust it by keeping a fake smile on my face for a bigger purpose. It's nothing more than the burden my mother had to bear, I thought.
A golden opportunity arrives when Araka declares her love for me. I immediately accepted it because he as the one who stood at the peak of power these depraved people were the perfect shield for me to take refuge in. When he dumped me, I didn't care and adjusted the flow. The important thing is for me, she stays by my side and becomes my shield. When she wants to go back to dating again after getting bored with her ex, yes I accept it, and when she wants to break up, I also follow her wishes. We often break up in relationships, but I don't care. With Araka beside me, my life among these monsters became safer. Well, although not entirely safe. They also still often demean me because of my social status that is looked down upon by them. My father was also a conglomerate. No matter how successful my mother was, in their eyes, I was just a subordinate working for them. I survived in that state despite the pain. I no longer want to go back to the state of having nothing where we have to curry favor by humbling ourselves to do anything for the sake of being able to eat. There has been so much that my mother and I have done to get in and survive in this vicious cycle.
Maybe that's why when Dios came into our school with the Young Master Sok Bijak standing guard at Junior High, I spontaneously hated him. He did not need to try his hardest to get his current position. He never once had to curry favor with Kaiser to maintain that position. His social position was naturally obtained with Kaiser treating him as an equal friend from the start.
If the world is going to treat us unfairly, let me make it fair myself, I thought.
Once, Dirga, one of Araka's best friends, clashed with Kaiser. Here's opportunity. Finally the chance I've been waiting for to avenge my heartache on Dios may come. Dirga is grumpy, high-minded, selfish, and always feels more powerful than others so it will be easy for me to pump it up.
I also began to run my tricks by luring evil ideas to him.
“Wah, why Kaiser can immediately become a core player on the basketball team even though it is still class 1? Didn't you not get to play basketball? Not even just Kaiser, there was another one, what else was his name? Dios?”[1]
“That's because I used to be rejected by pretentious class brothers who were afraid of being rivaled by my prowess!” Dirga replied angry.
Seeing that expression, I was so excited that I bit my own lips so that my laughter would not come out. Funny thing is, this Sok kid. Do you think how good you are? I continued my provocation to him.
“Lantas, is the 2nd grader who is now willing to be stepped over by a pretentious junior? You guys aren't going to do the same thing as your senior did to you? Wow, you guys are so kind!”
Hearing my words, Dirga's face was immediately flaming red. Really, I can't stand laughing anymore.
NB: [1] Rihana deliberately changed the story a little for his purpose, even though the 1st class child who became a core player in the first team was Andika where Dios was only a backup player in the first team