30. Mihir
MIHIR
S unday morning, I sat at the kitchen table in my parents’ home, staring into my mother’s crestfallen face. She seemed to have aged a decade in two days. She offered me coffee, but I refused. Dad had positioned himself beside her, his staunch figure set up to protect her from me, as if I intended harm.
“I need answers,” I said, staring intrepidly into their old eyes.
“Ask,” Dad said and crossed his arms. He appeared taller, powerful, more determined, unlike his usual gentle self.
“Who am I?”
“You are our son.”
Wow! He wasn’t going to relinquish that line anytime soon. I needed more tact. “Tell me about my birth mother.”
“She was a seventeen-year-old girl when she had you.”
“In Mumbai?”
“Yes.”
“Did you know her?”
“I met her through a friend. Your mother never did.”
“What friend?”
“A social worker of sorts.”
“This is not working out,” I cried with an exasperated sigh. “I need you to tell me the whole story.”
Dad looked at Mom and exhaled.
“Alright.” Mom’s face relaxed in resignation. “Get coffee. You’ll need it.”
I nodded and went to brew myself a cup. Sona called again. Busy. Will call later, I texted her and poured the coffee into a mug. The dark taste felt good on my tongue, familiar and soothing.
“Arvind was a new doctor,” Mom began, “when he learned that his friend offered medical services to vulnerable people. People who were destitute, kids who begged on the streets, sex workers. You know Arvind, he joined his friend immediately. Some of it required underground work. The criminals who ran the begging rings did not want unwell children to be treated. The sicker they looked, the more sympathy they could gain. Plus, talking to people meant exposing the abominable conditions the kids lived in because kids talk. Sex workers were controlled by brothel owners, although it was easier to convince them to help the women because healthier women meant they could service more clients. These young doctors did it for free and were discounted as idealist youth yearning for some soul-feeding work. Jayant, a young, passionate social worker, was their conduit. He took stock of who needed help and directed doctors toward them.”
“What does this have to do with me?” I interrupted with impatience.
She looked at Dad before continuing. “That’s one thread of the story. On the other side, Arvind and I were newly married and trying for a child. I was pregnant in the first year of our marriage but miscarried in the first trimester. Being married to a doctor, I was hopeful we would find the right treatment and try again, and we did. In another year and a half, I was pregnant again. We took all the precautions and consulted specialists. Nothing was evidently wrong, but my body expelled the pregnancy again. I was devastated. I wanted to try again immediately, but Arvind convinced me that my body and heart needed healing. Our families nudged us, but Arvind was adamant, and I trusted him.”
She held her palm out for him, and he put his hand in hers as she continued. “We waited and continued with hormonal treatments. When we tried again, the pregnancy held. The first trimester was very stressful for me, as you can imagine. You know we aren’t religious, but that year, I prayed for a miracle, and I got one. Sadly, it was short-lived. I delivered a stillborn baby at the beginning of the ninth month.”
Dad pulled his chair closer to hers and put his arm around her. I was tempted to rush over, but resentment got the better of me. Even after I saw a tear slip out of Mom’s eye, I crossed my arms and sat still. She wiped it with stunning agility and pulled herself upright.
“That was when Arvind got accepted to medical school in the U.S. Initially, he wanted to reject the offer, but we thought it could be the change we needed. Meanwhile, whispers ran amuck on how he should leave me and marry someone who would give him a son. This is what changed his mind. He didn’t want us to continue living in a toxic environment. Money was never an issue for our families, as you know. Your dadaji wholeheartedly supported our decision to move and offered to pay for his education. Around that time, as we prepared for our departure from India, Jayant approached us with an unusual proposition. He worked closely with Arvind and knew everything about us. He said that a young sex worker was expecting a child, and she wanted to give it a good, stable home.”
My heart raced. “My birth mother was a sex worker?”
“Yes,” Dad said. “A smart, savvy, intelligent girl.”
“Do you know her name?”
He nodded. “Sharda. She knew her child had no future if it grew up in the brothel. It would either be sold into sexual slavery or recruited into begging,” Dad continued. “She took Jayant aside the next time he went over to check on her and asked him to find a good option. She didn’t want her child to grow up in an orphanage either, like she had after she ran away from home to escape abuse.”
“But it was a different time,” Mom said. “Who would knowingly agree to take in a sex worker’s child? The stigma of the work, the stamp of illegitimacy…Jayant came to our home late one night and proposed a plan.”
“Adopting me?”
“Tell him,” Mom said, leaning back in her chair.
“Jayant said the girl wanted the brothel owner to be told the child died at birth. That way, they wouldn’t go looking for it. Like I said, she was a savvy child. She’d been on her own long enough to know the ways of the world.”
“What did you do?”
My parents exchanged an uncomfortable glance. “I didn’t ask how they did it, but that night, Jayant came home with a newborn and paperwork from the mother relinquishing her rights to us.”
My heart squeezed. “What happened to her?”
Another silent headshake from Dad. “Trying to reach out to her would have put her life and yours in jeopardy. That’s what we were led to believe. When she was pregnant, we sent her money and food through Jayant. We were outsiders, but they trusted him. So we did what we thought was best for everyone involved. It was what Sharda wanted too.”
“And it didn’t take much to convince me,” Mom said. “I was desperate for a child. We were leaving for the U.S. in a few months, and the girl was willingly giving us her baby. It was as if the stars had aligned. Everything coalesced to allow for your easy entry into our lives.”
I felt the world around me tilting. My gaze flitted around the familiar surroundings, my vision blurring over the espresso machine.
“When Jayant brought you home,” Mom continued, and I returned my eyes to her, “I was besotted. I fell in love with you the moment I held you in my arms. I was so overwhelmed, I couldn’t stop crying.”
My dad patted her hand. “I had to force you out of her arms to get her to sleep that night. I think I had to sedate her. Then I sat with you in my arms all night. We hired a wet nurse to feed you, someone we trusted.”
“Then you moved here?” I asked.
Mom nodded. “Three months later, we boarded the flight to our new life with you. It was a flight to freedom in every sense—away from the prying eyes of the society we knew, toward a new beginning with the child life had gifted us.” She broke down into tears, and Dad put an arm around her. This time, I got up and knelt beside her. “Mom.”
“I’m alright,” she said, wiping her face with her palms and sitting upright again.
“But why didn’t you tell me all this sooner?” I went back to my seat, facing them. “I’ve been old enough to understand, to come to terms with it. You could’ve told me anytime from teenage to now, but you chose to feed me lies!”
“We never lied to you, Mihir,” Dad said firmly as Mom nodded.
“My life has been a lie, Dad! My entire existence is founded on a lie. Don’t you both see it?” I’d given up trying to modulate the agitation in my voice.
“Arvind wanted to tell you, but I asked him not to,” Mom said, avoiding my gaze.
“Why, Mom?”
“You heard it. I’d lost three children. I wasn’t ready to lose you. What if you decided you didn’t love us anymore? What if you wanted to sever ties with us? The prospect of losing another child was just too onerous for me. What if you went looking for your birth mother, found her, and decided you loved her more than you loved me? I wasn’t ready to lose your love. I’m still not ready.” I thought she would burst into tears, but she sat tall and still.
“But you’re still mourning the loss of your real child, aren’t you? The one you lost in the ninth month?”
She gave a startled look and turned to Dad for reassurance.
I rubbed a weary hand over my brow. “I saw it while driving you back from your anniversary party. Was it around the time you lost him?”
“Her,” Dad said softly. “It was a girl.”
Mom slumped in her chair.
“And the tears every time you listen to Sufi songs?” I added on an epiphany. “Those are for her, your real child.”
“Stop calling her that,” Mom said pointedly. “You’re our real child. She’s a memory. Yes, I love her, but I didn’t get a chance to show her my love. I got that chance with you. You’re my real child, even if you’re bitter about it. This is what I feared, Mihir. I didn’t want to tell you because I was afraid of losing your love and trust.”
“You’ve already lost it, Mom,” I said with intended cruelty, and she burst into tears.
Dad put his arm around her again and avoided looking at me. I knew he was angry with me for bringing her such pain.
“I’m not sure of anything anymore,” I said with my head in my hands. “I’m not sure you aren’t ashamed of me. I’m not sure you didn’t hide it because you didn’t want to tell the world my birth mother was a sex worker. I’m not even sure you love me.”
That jolted Mom’s head up. “What?” she cried through her tears.
“I thought you never disciplined or hit me because you were good, enlightened parents. What if it was only out of pity for me?”
“What are you saying?” She wiped her tears away and took on the avatar of a fierce goddess. A deep, intimidating frown appeared on her face, and her body straightened into warrior mode.
“Everyone I knew growing up got hit at least once. Why did you not hit me, punish me? Was it because I wasn’t yours to hit? I wasn’t yours to exercise that right over? Or was it because you didn’t want to hurt a poor, abandoned child? You always gave me what I wanted, whatever I asked for. Was it because you felt sorry for me? Was it pity, Mom? Was it sympathy, not love?”
Warrior Mom jumped from her chair and advanced toward me. Dad and I stood on instinct.
“You,” she said, pushing a finger in my chest as I took a step back, “were not an abandoned child. Your mother entrusted you to us. You are our son. If you were abandoned, you would have died in a gutter by the streets the day you were born.”
“Sneha…” Dad interrupted.
She silenced him with an angry look, then turned to me and continued, “As far as hitting you is concerned, we didn’t hit you because we don’t believe in exercising tyrannical control over children like they’re chattel. You are our child, our love. But if that’s what it will take to convince you of our love, then here…” She delivered a firm slap across my jaw so hard that my head swiveled from the impact. My hand moved to my cheek.
“Sneha!” Dad gaped, horror-stricken, but remained glued to his place.
She appeared to be a frail, aging woman but packed quite the punch. I was certain that without the beard, I would have sported her palm print on my cheek for hours.
Her chest heaved as she tried to repress her tears and her hurt. “There are two ways children come into being in this world—in the womb and in the heart. If a mother and child are lucky, it’s both. I wasn’t fortunate enough to carry you in my womb, but you came into being in my heart.” She stabbed a finger at her chest. “If you think you can negate that with your cruelty, you are wrong. You can never take that away from me or yourself. You will just have to live with it, even if you don’t like it. Now, get out,” she commanded, looking into my eyes. “You can doubt our intentions for hiding the truth from you. You can mistrust our insecurities, but you do not get to doubt our love for you. Not for a second.”
Dad took a step closer and gently touched her arm.
“Leave,” she roared like an angry lioness.
I took two steps back before turning around and walking away. I heard my mother’s violent sobs as I closed the front door behind me. It sounded like someone had cut open her chest and wrenched out a piece of her heart.
I knew the feeling well.