A Scandalous Secret. Jaishree Misra
we’re okay, Dad,’ Sonya said into the phone. ‘Mum stocked up yesterday, which must mean we have supplies to last us till Christmas.’
Richard laughed before hanging up but Sonya saw that her mother’s face was unsmiling. She had been sulking on and off like this for days. It really wasn’t like her to be so consistently down in the dumps. Realizing suddenly that it was uncharitable to describe Laura’s distress as ‘sulks’, Sonya walked across the kitchen, leaned over the open dishwasher and kissed her cheek loudly. ‘Cheer up, Mum,’ she said, ‘I’m not going for good, am I?’ To her horror, Laura’s eyes filled with tears and, before Sonya knew it, her mother had turned away, shoulders shaking as she suddenly broke down. ‘Oh, Mum,’ Sonya said, suddenly close to tears herself, ‘Don’t cry, please. You’ve got to understand why I’m doing this. Please?’
‘But I can’t, darling,’ Laura sobbed, tearing off a strip of kitchen paper to wipe her eyes. ‘It may be stupid of me but I just can’t understand why you would want to go on such a punishing quest. As it is, Dad and I would have been beside ourselves worrying about you being so far away. But somewhere like India! All that poverty and disease. And trying to find your natural mother? Why, Sonya? Have you lacked for anything at all in your life with us?’
‘Of course not, Mum!’ Sonya cried. ‘Why would you even ask that?’
‘Then why?’ her mother asked again, her tone anguished.
‘Mum, Mum,’ Sonya responded, dodging around the dishwasher to take her mother’s plump frame in her arms and squeeze her tightly. ‘It’s so hard to explain but this has nothing at all to do with Dad and you. It’s just something I need to do. For me. When Chelsea told me about her search, it made utter sense, you know. Even though what she found at the end of it was a squalid council flat and a smelly old couple. It was just something she needed to know – don’t you understand?’
‘I’m trying,’ Laura said, now looking mutinous through her tears. ‘Chelsea may have made light of it but the whole experience must have been terribly traumatic at the time. And so unnecessary, especially given what a lovely family she has. I met them at least twice back in your primary school days and, really, they couldn’t have been a nicer family. Anyway, how can this search for your birth mother be nothing to do with us? I feel as if we must have failed you in some way.’
‘Of course you haven’t!’ Sonya responded crossly. ‘But let me do this, please – Chelsea’s parents did. You hear all the time of people going off in search of themselves, don’t you? Well, it’s something like that, Mum. It’s been like a missing piece in a jigsaw puzzle. Or a gap in my teeth that’s annoyed and irritated me for years.’
‘But you always seemed so happy, so … so contented,’ Laura cut in, ‘And we’ve told you everything we possibly could, everything we knew, Sonya.’
‘That’s exactly the point, Mum. “Everything we knew” isn’t really very much. I read somewhere once that when children who’ve been adopted or are in foster care don’t know about their biological parents, it’s as if they’re carrying great big holes in their heads. And what do you think they do? They allow their imaginations to rush in and fill those holes with the most impossible fantasies. At least I haven’t done that. But I do need to know the truth now, Mum. And there’s no one who can tell me but her.’ By now, Sonya had released Laura and they stood looking at each other by the dishwasher, both their eyes full of angry tears.
After a pause, Laura bent to collect the dishes. ‘The truth can sometimes hurt terribly,’ she muttered softly. ‘And that’s what we’re scared of. Dad and I simply couldn’t bear to see you get rejected a second time over, darling. And by the same woman. I mean, you were such a darling little baby. Only someone truly cold and heartless could have picked you up and given you away. And then walked away from you without once turning back to enquire after your welfare.’
Sonya looked down at the floor tiles. Then she picked up the tea towel and wiped the casserole dish, before kneeling to put it in its usual place. After a few minutes, she looked up at her mother and said softly, ‘I know, Mum. I know you and Dad have only ever wanted to shield me from painful stuff. And you always have. But I’m eighteen now. About to leave for uni. You won’t be able to protect me from everything, y’know.’
‘Well, you can’t blame me for trying. I might not be your biological mother but I doubt anyone will love you as much as I do,’ Laura replied defiantly.
Deciding to lighten the mood, Sonya turned her expression impish. ‘Perhaps I should smuggle you into Balliol and have you set up home under my bed? With a little hob and a little kettle so you can be ready with one of your famous cuppas at a moment’s notice? Bet you’d like that, wouldn’tcha?’ Sonya got to her feet and stuck her forefinger into Laura’s soft belly, trying to make her laugh.
‘Go on, you,’ Laura said gruffly, pushing Sonya’s hand away, but Sonya could see her mother was now smiling, albeit reluctantly. She sighed under her breath, glad that the present crisis had blown over. Growing up with a rather over-emotional mother, Sonya had grown adept at spotting a tantrum brewing from miles away and she knew it wouldn’t be long before another bout of maternal tears emerged from somewhere. And who knew what her impending chat with Tim would do to Mum and to her? One bout of tears in a day was more than any girl ought to deal with, for Chrissake. Perhaps she ought to disappear into her room and do something really innocuous like read a book! Oh yeah, or do her packing … Dumping Tim could wait for another day or two, really.
Chapter Seven
On the evening after her dinner party, Neha mustered the energy to visit her parents. She had not seen much of them in the past week, busy as she had been, calling and reminding all her guests of their party invitations and getting the house and garden spruced up. Besides, she needed to tell her parents she was leaving for Ananda the following day. Neha hoped her mother would not ask to come along, seeing what short notice it was and how little she had enjoyed it on the one occasion Neha had taken her along. This time she really did need some space to sort out the mess in her head.
As the car pulled into the porch of her parents’ small and neat Kailash Colony home – the house in which Neha had grown up – her mother’s trim figure emerged from indoors, followed as usual by the family’s two boxer dogs whose stubby tails started wriggling furiously at the sight of Neha’s car. Neha made her habitual fuss over the dogs, both of whom adored her, before she briefly hugged her mother.
‘You look tired. Too much partygoing, huh?’ her mother said.
Neha shot her a glance to assess whether she was being sarcastic or disapproving but her mother’s handsome face was impassive. ‘Where’s Papa?’
‘Gone to the golf club,’ came her reply. ‘But he said I was to hold on to you till he got back.’
‘Oh, I can’t if he’s going to get too late, Mama. Sharat’s leaving for Lucknow and I should see him off. And I have to send some things his mother’s asked for too.’
‘She’s always asking for “some things”, isn’t she?’ Mrs Chaturvedi said drily. There was no mistaking the sarcasm now. Neha’s mother and mother-in-law had never seen eye-to-eye, a situation caused partially by the disparity in their social standing. Neha’s mother had always considered herself far more sophisticated than Sharat’s, despite the fact that the latter had a great deal more money and lived in a Lucknow mansion that was five times the size of her home. Luckily such tensions had never affected Neha’s own relationship with Sharat’s parents which, except for the odd hiccup, had remained close and warm. ‘What is it that she wants this time?’ her mother pressed.
‘Oh, just a couple of sets of jewellery that she left with Tribhovandas for polishing last time she was here,’ Neha replied.
‘Hmmm,’ her mother said with a distant expression on her face, and Neha knew she was now thinking of all the jewellery that Sharat’s mother still hadn’t passed on to her. It was her mother’s oft-expressed belief that Sharat’s mother