It was a cold, dark night. The cool night breeze swept into my room through the open window, the sashes that cover it, flying lazily into my room.

I could see the stars from my position, lying on my side of the bed, my hands under my head, and thinking.

How many stars can there be in one sky?

The same question rang through my head every night since we migrated here to California. How many problems can one have in one lifetime?

Probably too many to count.

It's been four years since we moved out from our house in Pag-asa, Quezon City, Philippines. I used to love it there. I used to love lazily walking around in my knickers at the house because no one sees me anyway. Just my momma and papa. I used to like my life with them too. Used to.

My momma and I had moved here the summer of 2002. I remembered crying that day. It was a start of a new world. Don't say it's cliche'; it is. But it's true. I was leaving a world that I loved and knew at just the simple age of fourteen.

My school's alright; I can get by. I have my own friends, dear and loved as I am.

Everything shattered two years ago.

I'll remember that night forever. I was brushing my long, brown hair in front of the mirror after dinner that night. I was about to go to bed. My momma knocked and came in. It was her habbit, knocking and never waiting for an answer, just rushing into things. She showed me divorce papers.

Since the day that momma had showed me that god-forsaken document without our knowledge and consent, I hated her. I didn't like to show it. I usually hide back my own bad feelings, even to other people. But I know it crept out a few times before, like an ugly butterfly fighting to get out of it's coccoon.

What I hate most about the situation is that my momma defends her decision to me everytime I try to confront her about it. Her reasons are these: it's going to get complicated, or she just wants to move on.

Everytime she tells me about my papa, everything bad he did since fourth grade, she doesn't think about the fact that I'M getting hurt everytime I hear these things.

We've been here for four years, and they're basically and technically separated now. Why have to put it all on a god-damn piece of paper? It's not going to solve her problems of trying to move on! As an analogy, it's like ripping the birth certificate of someone doesn't kill that person. Why does she have to do this?

Why? Why does my momma want me separated from my papa? Why does my momma think that signing divorce papers is the only way to end her problems? Why does she seem to want my papa, for some reason, to rot in the Philippines? What exactly is momma's reason?

No answers ever occupy my mind. Just questions.

Only hearing my momma's side, who is mentally and physically stressed out from work constantly, these are my views. I know my papa is known for being a gambler, and a woman-er, and he's known to value his sisters more than his family. But I still love him.

Sadly, that's the only thing I can offer him, being miles apart and being confused as I am now.

What's going to happen now?