29. Mihir
MIHIR
I t had been two months and twelve days since I'd broken up with Sona. Two months and sixteen days since I’d discovered the letter. Two months and five days since I’d last spoken to my parents. I had lost my appetite, my sleep, and thirty pounds off my body. My life was now reduced to numbers. Facts and figures.
I worked round the clock because I had no life outside it. I ran twice a day, every day, because I wanted my body to be as numb as the rest of me. Lashing out at my associates and yelling at my staff had become my new normal. Despite the image I had put out for the world, the people who worked for me knew the real me. They knew the smiles behind the arrogance. They were familiar with the kindness past the cold-hearted decisions demanded by the business. Now they were terrified of me.
I had become the person I had projected myself to be all these years: ruthless, cruel, coldhearted.
A bastard.
That’s what I discovered in the letter that Friday in March.
While my parents were out enjoying an evening with friends, I’d gone back home. With the spare key I’d always had and the code to the alarm, I’d gained easy access to my former home. Contrary to the lies they had fed me, the closet in question was clean and well-organized. I had never doubted it. Mom would never allow it to get out of hand. I’d spotted that lame, evasive deflection from a mile away.
Bins and boxes were stacked neatly and labeled clearly with dates where relevant. I pulled out a box that said Mihir’s Photos , full to the brim with old pictures in weird colors, reflections of flash glaring back. A picture of my young, happy parents caught my eye and brought a smile to my face. They held me with pride, as if they had won a prize. I was stocky, even as a baby. I sifted through the box but found no sign of the said letter. They had hidden it away elsewhere. Or had they destroyed it?
Rummaging through the closet, my eyes landed on a box on the top shelf that I knew was a sure shot: Sneha-Arvind Photos . Mom knew I would treasure those. My heart raced as I heaved the box off the shelf onto the floor and knelt beside it. Inside were three albums of different sizes and several stacks of pictures held together with rubber bands. I opened the bulkiest, which held pictures from their wedding ceremony. They looked like movie stars from yesteryears. I gushed at the beauty of my young parents.
After going through all three albums and the loose pictures, I still hadn’t found the letter. I was about to give up when something struck me. I went back to the clunky album and surveyed the contents again. One particular picture of the smiling, happy couple was bulging at odd angles. I looked behind it and found the elusive letter tucked between two pictures in the old-fashioned album. Carefully, I retrieved the yellowing paper.
The script was Devanagari, the language looked Hindi, and the blue ink on the page had bled through to both sides. My Hindi reading skills were out-of-practice, and the condition of the paper made it difficult to decipher the individual letters. Walking up to Dad’s study on the second floor, I switched on his desk lamp and stared at the letter.
By now, I realized my parents hadn’t written it. Given my limited skills in the language, they wouldn’t pen one for me in Hindi.
I started reading one letter at a time. Knowing the spoken language helped, and I used the internet for the rest. At least I could get the gist. If my parents hadn’t written it, why had they concealed it but wanted me to find it after they were gone?
When I was through, I refused to trust my translation and interpretation. I went through it again, twice. I sent Sameer pictures of a few words I thought I had gotten wrong. Of course, I didn’t tell him about the letter. Meticulous like my dad, I began jotting down the translation on a letterhead from his desk.
I had just scribbled down the last word when I heard the door, followed by the characteristic double chirp of the home alarm. Armed with the letter and my translation, I marched down the stairs with angry, determined steps.
My parents were in the living room, but Mom had spotted the open closet in the hallway and the boxes strewn on the floor. She spun around and saw me. Her face turned pale as Dad grabbed her arm to steady her.
“What does this mean?” I demanded firmly, holding out the oily, yellowish paper.
Mom slumped on the couch, and Dad turned his attention to her.
“What is this, Mom?”
“She doesn’t feel good, Mihir. We can talk about it later,” Dad said sternly.
“Later?” My roar was so loud the echoes came back to me twice. “ Thirty-five years later?”
Mom startled, then looked at Dad and patted his hand. He sank beside her.
“Is this true?” I demanded.
They exchanged nervous looks.
“How much did you understand?” Dad asked.
“All of it!” I bellowed again. “Is. It. True?” I enunciated.
Dad returned a nod so slight it didn’t seem like he had moved at all. They weren’t looking at me anymore. Their gazes had sunk to the floor.
“Who am I?” I asked.
“You are our son,” Dad said, looking up at me for a brief second.
“And this woman?” I held out the letter again.
“Your birth mother.”
“Are you my father?”
He met my eyes this time. “We are your parents, Mihir.”
“Are you my biological father?” I rephrased.
He turned his eyes to the floor and shook his head.
“Who is my father?”
Another shake of his head.
“I don’t understand. Was I adopted?”
He nodded.
“No, Dad,” I demanded. “I need you to explain it in words.”
My anger had now turned into tears dripping down my face. Unable to bear my condition, Mom wept silently. Dad stayed calm, but I noted a gentle tremor in his hand when he held Mom’s and clutched it tight.
“Who am I?” I asked again, the impudent tears now rushing brazenly down my face.
“You are our son,” Dad repeated, maintaining his calm composure. “Nothing can ever change that.”
I didn’t know what I had hoped for when I decided to confront them, but I felt like my heart was about to explode. I couldn’t do it. I rushed out of the house, the letter and translation in my hand, leaving my parents in agony.
My first instinct had been to call Sona. I needed her. I knew she’d understand what I was going through. But could she, really? She had loved a stranger because I didn’t know who I was anymore.
I couldn’t do that to Sona. I couldn’t drag her into this mess. If my parents were hiding the truth because they were ashamed, how could I expect Sona to love me?
She loathed drama. Anju’s catty appearance had nearly destroyed our relationship. What would she do with this? I had to protect her from this mess—from the stigma and the scandal—because the question remained: Who was I?
Was I an unwanted child? An illegitimate one? Was that why my birth mother had given me up? Had I caused her grief? Was I a source of shame for her?
The letter answered none of these questions. It only said my mother loved me and that she trusted my parents to give me a good home. Had my parents concealed this secret because they were ashamed of who I was? How could I trust them again? How could I trust myself?
My head and heart were brimming quickly with self-deprecating, negative thoughts. Was I worthy of anyone in my life?
My birth mother had abandoned me. I didn’t know who my father was. The parents who had raised me had woven intricate webs of secrecy around my true identity. Whenever anyone commented on how I looked like Mom or that I had Dad’s smile, they gushed and nodded in agreement.
I needed answers, but my tears were relentless. I was incoherent, physically and mentally. I didn’t know the right questions to ask my parents. My parents! The phrase caught in my heart and crushed my breath. I had thought nothing could make me love them less, and yet, here I was, driving away from them, leaving them in tears, alone to deal with their pain. What kind of son does that? The not-son son.
I flew along the freeway back to my home, mired in hopelessness. I did the only thing I could think of. I grabbed a bottle of scotch and stayed up through the night, reading and re-reading the letter and my translation until the liquor managed to incapacitate me.
My Son,
I am not sure when you will read this letter. The moment I realized I was pregnant, I knew I had to find you a good home, because I cannot care for you properly. Through the kind man who will deliver this letter, I found your parents. He assures me they are good people, and I trust him. Even though I have not met them, I know they are kind, because they agreed to accept you in spite of everything they know about me and the circumstances of your birth. They sent me gifts and clothes, money to buy food. I have given them the right to name you. I hope they give you a nice name. I know they will love you like I love you. It is out of love that I am tearing myself away from you, but you will always be my child. I will always send you love and blessings, wherever you are.
Your mother.
A persistent buzz from my cell phone woke me around noon. It was a call from Sameer, but I sent it to voicemail. The two pages lay crumpled on the bed beside a castaway glass and an empty bottle. Gathering the letter, I went to the study and used a laminating sheet to seal it.
I checked my phone—a call from Sona while I was asleep, a text from her asking me to call her back. Two calls from Dad, or the man I called Dad. No voicemail. No voicemail from Sameer either.
The coffee machine had dispensed a dark brew at its regular time. I poured it down the drain and programmed it again. Then, changing my mind, I picked up another bottle. I wanted to talk to my parents, but what would I learn about myself? What if I didn’t like what I learned? Like a moron, I drowned myself in alcohol until I passed out again. When I woke up in the middle of the night, a light headache whispered around my temples. Sona had called again. I was tempted to call her and cry my eyes out, but I didn’t.
Instead, I wandered online in search of stories of people who learned as adults that they had been adopted. Anecdotes and case-studies were rampant with the same sentiments I felt. A crisis of identity, feelings of shame and abandonment, loss and grief, and a certain distrust towards adoptive parents. Some LDAs—late discovery adoptees, that’s who we were—said they felt like they had never fit in with their families. They had known something was off.
I never had. I had never felt out of place. I had drawn my existence from my parents, who weren’t my parents at all. The only thing amiss was that neither had any musical abilities, but the discrepancy hadn’t been strong enough to raise an alarm for me. Why would it? I had no reason to suspect anything about them. Now they had betrayed me and my trust.
Studies said that adoptive parents also feared a loss. Loss of the child’s love, a loss of familial unity and loyalty, and potential emotional distance from their adopted children if they learned the truth. Sitting in my study at 3 a.m., I wondered what had motivated my parents to hide the truth from me. The deeper I dug into the subject, the more confused and conflicted I felt.
Against the waning shadows of dawn peering through my window, I made a list of questions I needed answers to. My brain worked best when I was logical and organized. Like my parents.
A hysterical laugh boomed through the quiet house at the thought. Every single thing in my life, I’d attributed to them. I had Dad’s smile, Mom’s sense of humor, Dad’s analytical brain, Mom’s dry wit. I thought I’d inherited Mom’s cooking genes.
Now, I knew that every single thing about me was a lie .