The Indian Girl

Shh! Hide!

I had been speaking to Nikhil for quite a while now, we even had a few phone calls. He was talking to me about his family recently and sharing about how chill his family was. Especially his mom, he'd often tell me how their relationship was more like that of two friends that mother and son.

That got me thinking and my head was swirling with thoughts about my mother, yeah, anything but chill. The first incident with her, as far as I can remember, was when I was probably 7 years old.

I remember we were sitting in the lawn of a club, with one of dad's friends. We all were there, mum, dad, my brother and me. My brother was only 3 years old then.

Dad and his friend sat there drinking almost the whole time while my mother was taking care of my brother and me.

I think mum whispered something to him but he just said "sure you can take care of that."

The entire evening, she spent feeding us and taking care of us but dad was busy with his friend, enjoying. It wasntwasn't and uncommon scene really, the woman takes care of the children, the man earns and well, that.

Not that dad didn't care about us, just that he wouldn't really take care of us.

My mother had been worn out from all the household chores she'd done and was looking forward to an outing where she could relax a bit. Clearly, that wasn't happening.

She told me a couple of times when I was older that there were so many times she expected dad to help her, support her and be with her. But he wasn't.

Before that particular day, there had been several instances of fight before between them when the arguments would turn into huge fights but it was nothing compared to what was coming.

After a while, when my mother asked if we could go home because she was tired, he said but he wanted to hang out with his friend a little more. He then said, " you've been at home only na? You didn't go out to get anything or do anything today, right? Let's sit a bit more and then we can leave."

It was then that something in her snapped.

She got up, held our hands and left. My father took a few seconds to notice what was happening but by then my mother had moved quite far.

It was quite dark outside and that made it difficult for my dad to locate us. My mother hurried us behind a car and asked us to remain quiet.

She hid us behind and whispered to us, "hey, we're hiding from dad. You're not to make any noise at all, okay?" And as soothing as it may sound, it wasn't. The tone of her voice set panic in my heart.

My heart sunk when I could hear my father calling for us but we couldn't respond.

I didn't know what was happening or why it was happening, I just wanted it to stop. "Make it stop! Something, someone just make it stop!" was going on in my head.

As dad was coming around the car, our mother pulled us behind a different one and said "Shh! Hide! We have to hide!"

It seemed like a sick game of hide and seek, one that I did not want to play.

One that made me sick to my stomach and even today when I think about that instance, something in me sinks.

When my dad finally found us, I didn't know whether to be relieved or not because I had a strong feeling that it would NOT go well.

My dad started asking her, pleading her to let him know what had he done wrong, why had she run away like this in the middle of the dinner, why like this?

She stood there with tears in her eyes, with an aghasted look on her face.
"You really don't know what happened in there?"

He said he didn't. She said how she couldn't believe he was saying that or the fact that he was so damn insensitive.

My father asked her continuously what happened. About the 20th time, she yelled at him. She yelled all that she was feeling bad about, from being usually the only one taking care od the kids, to doing household chores and being told that she didn't do anything and the fact that the dinner was supposed to be for her too. It was supposed to be her time off too!

Dad apologized to her several times, he said he would take care of us and try be a little more aware of what he was doing. He said he wouldn't do it again.

Truth being told, he did. And not just that, several other things too. It was usually small things.

But it was these small things that hit my mother the hardest because she would bottle up and up and up till only a little spark was required to burn the entire compound of oil that she had collected.

With it, would burn not only her anger, but also us. Parts of all of us. Parts that we'd never get back because they vanished. Parts that left burns when they were taken. Fragments of a family that never was a whole.