Andrew - Lucky or not?

HIS POV

I was a prodigy from a young age yet it did not matter to me because I never received ‘love’. Though I was showered with attention and warmth by my nanny and the servants of the household, it did not matter because not once had I heard a word of genuine concern from my father or slept in my mother’s lap. As a matter of fact, it was on rare occasions that I met them. To them, I was their heir but not their son, at least that’s what seemed to be the case.

I often heard the maids or servants whispering in hushed voices past bedtime, that I was lucky. Lucky! Is this what is called being lucky? Maybe that seems to be the case to the outsiders but deep in my heart, I know that all I want is someone who loves me to the moon and back, cherishes me and annoys me with the words “Andrew is silly. He is dumb”

I won’t mind being mocked at if that meant I could have a family that didn’t throw lavish birthday banquets but wished me wholeheartedly. A family that gave me warm smiles even when the temperature outside was chilling down to the bones, and a family that asked me how I felt and not how like an unrefined and unmannered brat I was; that’s the family I desired for yet the expectations on my shoulder didn’t allow me to have the luxury of dreaming.

As  a child I fantasized about being a sailor, voyaging through the seas or discovering new lands that had escaped the human eye or being a scientist and inventing ‘genius potion’. But at a tender age of 4, my schedule for the rest of my schooling years was fixed.

4:00 a.m. - Gymnasium

6:00 a.m. - Weapons and armaments technology

8:00 a.m. - Breakfast

10:00 a.m. - Science classes

12:00 p.m. - Etiquette class

1:00 p.m. - Lunch

2:00 p.m. - Mathematics class

4:00 p.m. - Business studies

5:00 p.m. - Commercial studies

6:00 p.m. - Languages

8:00 p.m. - Dinner

9:00 p.m. - Bedtime

With a schedule as hectic as this, it was impossible for me to find a moment of peace to myself. Waking up even before the alarm rang and sleeping as soon as I hit the bed and passing out from exhaustion became a habit in a span of ten years. It felt ordinary to be praised by the tutors and the workers, yet I never heard my parents praise me like an ordinary kid’s parents would. I … was jealous. Jealous of those that didn’t own a house but had a home, those that didn’t have parents but a family, those that couldn’t afford food but slept with a stomach full of love.

To me, life was a chaotic routine of rising before the sun and drifting into sleep out of tiredness. Despite all this, I … never hated my parents because I knew that to them I was the means to continue their legacy, so I didn’t mind the fact that they didn’t care for me. Perhaps them not liking me (which I knew to be true and not an assumption) was also my fault...

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