I Got Over My Past

“You goofed up your presentation in class today.” My roommate/best friend said as I entered.

“I was trying to forget it. Thank you.”

“Do you want to talk about it?” She was trying to help

“Let’s go to the movie. I already got us the tickets.”

“I wish I was like you. I have to delve in and cry about everything that goes wrong. On the other hand you just forget, like it never happened” She said, as we got into the cab.

“Forget and move on.”

But I couldn’t move on from the way she admired my ability to forget things. After she slept that night I took out a report card. It was my second grade report card, signed by Ankita & Shikhar Sinha as parents. I had managed to keep it safe and hidden with me. It was the only thing; I had of Mamma-Papa. I wasn’t as much forgetful as I pretended to be. Suppressed memories started to rise again.

It was my first day of 3rd grade and I was so desperate to tell my mom all about my new seat partner, our new class teacher, books, new time table but I never got a chance. I came home running and saw my parents in handcuffs. I was horrified, there was police. Police, I was so scared of that I finished my glass of milk every morning so that police doesn’t come to get me. There was another couple who looked at me with some strange look, I was unable to decipher.

After that I remember court, some abrupt questions. Somehow, my home wasn’t safe for me anymore and I couldn’t stay with my parents. My parents said, they had adopted me in mutual understanding with my biological parents because they didn’t want another girl child. The other couple claimed I was abducted. Apparently, they were neighbours and on good terms, before I was born.

Some medical tests confirmed that, new couple were my biological parents and there was no paperwork to prove my adoption. No one asked me, who I wanted to stay with. They considered me to be too young to make that decision. I can still hear Mamma crying.

After that, all my report cards were signed by Sonali & Suresh Mehta. But, I have known only one mamma and papa till then. I couldn’t give those names to someone else so, I started calling them Mom & Dad. New revelation was that I had an elder sister, who died in an accident a year ago.

Mom & Dad treated me really nice and it was impossible to believe that they would give up their kid just because, it was a girl. Mamma & Papa were always great and I don’t think, they were capable of abduction.

I never met Mamma-Papa again but I thought about them every day. After a while, I was scared of the truth as it would have proved someone to be a liar, which I wasn’t sure I could handle. I learnt the art of suppressing the painful memories and unanswered question, which now my friends admire. They think get over things very easily. None of them knows, suppressing your feelings and getting over aren’t the same.