Remembering You

Memories Awakened

I grabbed him and lifted him with all my might, dragging him to my mom.

"Momma!" She was wearing pajamas, and she looked down at me with annoyance at being interrupted. Her hair fell in messy rings around her unkempt face, and what could have been a pretty smile twisted into a sneer.

"What," she asked harshly.

"Can I get momma?" I begged her, proudly showing me the awesome toy. She huffed and pushed me away.

"We don't have five dollars, Anna. It costs too much," she snapped, turning back to the shopkeeper, who looked at me with pity. He was an older man and familiar as if he were family of some sort, yet the way my mother talked to him wasn't that of family.

"She can take it, it's fine," the old man said kindly. My mother rounded on him, angry at him for stepping in.

"Oh, so you can give out free toys but you can't help me with my rent which I NEED. Where is she gonna keep that toy if we don't have nowhere to sleep?" My mother asked him, yelling at him that fast. Then as soon as her anger hit, it seemed to leave, and she looked him up and down.

"Oh, I see. You want THAT. What's your fetish?" He looked even more horrified and shook his head vehemently.

"I don't need any of that, I just simply don't have six hundred dollars. If I did, I would give it to you, I swear. I don't want to see little Anna go without a home, either. We're barely holding on as is," he explained earnestly, biting his lip nervously at the direction the conversation had taken.

"Fine then. You know what. Take her, then! She's a fucking annoying little shit anyways," my mother yelled, throwing a toy on the counter at the old man viciously before stomping off and out of the little shop.

I just stared at my toy giraffe, confused how to get it to the car by myself.

"Momma?" I whispered quietly, seeing her car take off. I wanted to stay in the toy shop forever and play with all the fun toys, but I wanted her too.

"It's alright, Anna. I'm calling some people to help, but in the meantime, you can play with any of the toys you want. Are you hungry? You look hungry. Let me get you something to eat. I don't think she's fed you in weeks from the look of it," he said, more to himself than me. I just sat down in the toys, wondering if she had left because I had asked for too much.

**End Flashback**

I gasped, coming back to reality, feeling shaky and out of sorts. It was the first memory that had come back to me, and it wasn't a pleasant one at all. I had been anxiously awaiting my memory to return, but now I wasn't sure I wanted more memories.

"Anna, what about this?" Enrique asked, holding up some vibrant red and blue plates that were so much more interesting than the plain white ones that we had.

I smiled weakly and nodded. "Perfect. The more color, the better," I said, shaking my head to get the horrid memory out of my mind. That was why I was so nervous to spend money, it seemed. I was extremely poor as a kid, clearly. Maybe that was why I lived in total white also; I evidently grew up in quite dirty surroundings based on my mother's short but impactful part in my memory.

Knowing why I felt so nervous made me relax in the oddest of ways, and I was able to finally and buy what we needed, which I decided was a lot.

When we got home, Sera and I enjoyed every second of decorating the house and her room with warm and vibrant colors, breathing life into every room of the apartment.

"I bet this isn't what you expected to do today. Help me decide what decorations to put where," I commented to Enrique while we put the various animal statues out.