The Memory Thief | ONC2020 [AMBASSADOR PICK]

Chapter 3

"Mum?" Liliya knocked softly on the pine wood door to her mother's room. "Can I come in?"

Coughing erupted from the other side of the door, prompting Liliya to enter.

"Morning, Lily," her mother greeted her with a grating voice and a laboured smile. She immediately glanced down at Liliya's hands, in which she held the medicine.

"Morning, mum," said Liliya, sitting down next to her on the bed, as her mother struggled to sit up.

Liliya remembered a time when her mother had looked beautiful. Now, strands of hair hung listlessly down to her shoulders, its flaming red colour now faded and matte. Her once bright-blue eyes were dull with pain and medicine. Her body had turned scraggy and withered.

The cancer had broken her.

As soon as she sat straight, she held her hand out to the cup in Liliya's hand, drinking its contents eagerly despite its bitter taste. She breathed a sigh of relief, knowing it wouldn't take long for the potion to do its work and repress the pain.

"How are you feeling today?"

Although the answer was often the same, Liliya always asked. It had become much like a ritual. "Not great, darling. What about you?"

Ever since the new law that banned the harvest of the Ginkgo leaf, among other things, Liliya's answer had also been consistent. "I don't know what to do, mum," she groaned. "My clients come to me because of my specialism with the calming potion. If I can't give them that, they have no reason to come to me. I'm losing all of my clients."

I don't know how much longer I can pay your medical bills...

The thought loomed over them like a thundercloud, ready to strike any moment. She averted her gaze, busying herself with the now-empty cup, to prevent her mum from seeing her eyes fill with tears.

A pat on her arm made her slouch back onto the bed.

"Do you remember how you learned to read?"

Liliya raised her eyebrows, unsure where her mother was going. "No, I don't."

"You were four years old, getting ready to go to primary school, when our neighbour jokingly told you that you'd have to be able to read if you wanted to be accepted into school. You panicked, screaming and shouting, convinced that you wouldn't be able to go to school after the summer. You cried for hours."

Liliya snorted. "Yeah, that sounds like me. Do me a favour and don't ever tell Kit this story. She'll never let me hear the end of it."

"Do you know why I'm telling you this?"

Taken aback, Liliya's smile made way for a frown. "Uh... no," she admitted sheepishly.

"Then let me finish, darling," her mother said, patting her hand. "We were unable to convince you that our neighbour had only been joking. For days you barely slept. Until you decided to take matters into your own hands."

Liliya's eyebrows raised, but she remained silent.

"At some point you decided that you were done worrying. You snuck into your sister's room and stole one of her first school books. You spent the next couple of weeks teaching yourself to read."

"I taught myself to read?"

Her mother nodded. "Every now and then you'd come and ask us what a certain word was, but yes, you did most of it all by yourself."

She fell silent, as Liliya thought back to all those times she and her sister, Rosanna, had sat under the covers together, reading each other stories. Was this how it all had started? A faint ache throbbed in her chest at the thought of her sister. It had been so long.