Suddenly, Mom let out a cry of pain on the therapy table.
Her brows furrowed tightly, as though she was enduring unbearable torment.
I wanted to hug her, but my spirit slipped through her once again. I had forgotten once more that I was only a spirit now. I couldn’t hold her anymore.
I didn’t know how long it lasted before the procedure finally ended.
Mom slowly woke up, her eyes dazed and unfocused.
Beside her, Frederick and Timothy visibly tensed, their nervousness written all over their faces.
Frederick cautiously called her name. “Margaret?”
She blinked in confusion and answered softly, “Frederick? What happened to me? Why am I in a hospital?”
Frederick quickly made up a lie to cover the truth.
In the following days, Frederick and Timothy carefully tested her, asking if she remembered anything about
Whenever they brought me up, Mom’s eyes filled only with blankness.
She had finally forgotten me and all the pain of the past!
I was happy for her… but also deeply lost.
Death wasn’t the true end. Forgetting was.
This time, Mom had completely forgotten about me.
After a few days of recuperation in the hospital, her mental state improved visibly.
Still worried, Frederick and Timothy took her traveling through several cities before moving her from New York to Detroit.
It was the middle of winter in Detroit.
It snowed heavily on the day they moved.
Frederick and Mom were not familiar with Detroit’s climate
When she was shivering with cold, Mom took out a scarf from her suitcase. It was the one I had knitted for her when I was 18.
Mom wrapped the scarf around herself in a daze. It warmed her body, but left her heart aching for reasons she could-
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12.03
Chapter 10
n’t explain.
11
2月
The clothes and scarves in my mom’s wardrobe were all branded, but she had no memory of this scarf, which was hand–knitted with rough stitches.
She became desperate to know who the scarf belonged to. Both Frederick and I, who was floating in the air, panicked.
My mother had finally forgotten the pain of the past and was living a happy and fulfilling life. I would rather she for- get me for the rest of her life than remember these painful memories.
But she had always been stubborn and would never give up until she got the answer she wanted.
Modified electroconvulsive therapy had erased her painful memories, including me, but if she were pushed hard enough, she could still remember them.
While Frederick and I struggled in silence, Timothy had a sudden idea and told a white lie. “Mom, this pink scarf was made by a little girl who loved you very much. She passed away a long time ago.”
In his story, he stripped away everything dark about my origin, leaving only an image of me as a kind, loving, pitiful girl in Mom’s heart.
Hearing it, Mom wept in Frederick’s arms and lingered in sadness for days.
A year passed. The snow in Detroit melted, and bit by bit Mom recovered from the grief of my death.
One quiet night, she held Frederick’s hand gently. “Honey, let’s have a daughter.”
The following winter, Mom gave birth to a beautiful baby girl.
Because it snowed heavily that day, she named my little sister Noelle too.
She resembled me when I was small, big bright eyes, round cheeks, and always smiling at Mom and Frederick.
The day she learned to speak, she chirped “Mom” from Frederick’s arms.
Mom shook a baby bottle in her hand, her lips curved into a radiant smile of happiness.
Seeing my mother happy, I was happy too.
I gave her one last, reluctant look.
Finally, I let go of my last attachment, and my spirit dissolved into the wind.
For the rest of your life, may you live in joy, Mom.
If I ever had the chance, I would still want to be your daughter.
The end.
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