Whether I wanted to coax the truth out of my parents or confront them and press them for answers, it would be difficult.
The Skinny Guy was perceptive. He patted my back and tried to comfort me. "Maybe things aren't as complicated as you think. Aren't parents all like that? Sometimes they worry over nothing. Maybe your mom and dad just..."
He racked his brains, still trying to come up with something reassuring to say.
I cut him off.
I knew my parents. Growing up, I'd always thought of them as introverted. They could talk to people and had a few close friends, but apart from family—apart from us siblings—everyone else was an outsider. No matter how close they were to someone, they kept a polite distance.
They hardly ever went to get-togethers with coworkers or friends. They rarely joined the group chats in the evenings, either. The few people they kept in touch with were friends they'd known for years. Even so, their social circles had nothing to do with us siblings.
Some of their coworkers and friends had children our age, but whenever my parents attended a wedding or banquet, they never brought us along. Even when we were little, they wouldn't take us to those events. Usually, one of them stayed home to look after us.
If they were like that with coworkers and friends, they were even more distant with relatives.
I couldn't even remember the last time I'd seen any of our relatives. We always spent the holidays together, just the four of us.
I still remembered when they turned fifty. I'd wanted to throw them a birthday celebration and asked what they thought, but they turned me down outright. They hosted a dinner with friends instead. When they came home that night, they celebrated