It's Saturday and dad is back from his business trip.

He was early.

Mom had gone out to run some errands, expecting him around 4 pm.

He came home around 2 pm, put his suitcases on the floor, his coat on the hanger and sat down on the sofa. I was sitting in the armchair right opposite of him, where I had been working on a reading assignment for my English class.

He didn't look at me once. He didn't say a single word.

It was as if I didn't exist.

I didn't know what to do. So I just sat there and looked at him, unable to talk, unable to get up and leave, unable to show any kind of reaction at all.

I don't know how long we had sat there in silence until the door opened and mom came back. She nearly dropped her shopping bags when she saw him. She took in the situation for a couple of seconds, locked eyes with me, and understood. Completely.

Because she walked over to me, stood behind the armchair I was sitting in and put her hand on my shoulder.

Dad looked at her, then looked at me.

That was the moment when I couldn't take it anymore and started crying. Suddenly, all the emotions from the previous weekend were flooding me like a tidal wave and I thought I had to drown unless I got some kind of release. So I cried and cried and cried.

After what felt like an eternity, I locked eyes with dad and saw that he was crying, too.

He then got up slowly and walked over to me. He patted my shoulder, kissed mom on the cheek and walked out of the room.

Mom looked at me and said: "It's gonna be okay."

I really, really want to believe her.