Of Quilts and Time

I remember sleeping in my new bedroom, now no longer the playroom for my sister and me. The space once adorned with pink barbies and colorful legos was now filled with cream wooden furniture, each piece decorated with carved flowers and vines.

My bedsheets were pretty too: a white quilt with soft pink seashells and sage seaweed, and most importantly, I was excited to no longer share a room with my sister. 

I was pandering at the cusp of getting older, now eleven years old, and was granted the new room to myself. I could put my clothes in the used to be toy closet and put my notebooks and pencils on my very own desk, but the one tradition I swore to protect was storytime with my mom. 

Each night, when 9:00 PM rolled around, I would brush my teeth and find my mom. Forcibly dragging her by the arm, I would lead her into my room, where she would take a seat beside me on the quilt. Grabbing the red leather journal and whatever pencil remained on my nightstand, I would ask her to tell me a story.

Never using books or fables she knew, she would come up with an original Rachna story each night. There was once a story about the pillows on my bed and another about the bowl of fruits in the kitchen downstairs, and with each story I’d attempt to write the tale in my journal as well as she told it to me. Unfortunately, not all nights were story nights with my mother, some days she would be tired or just not be in the mood.

Though, even on those nights, I would ask her to stay with me and I would talk about all the things in the world and all the thoughts in my mind: tellings about my playdates, comments about my teachers, or even the rehearsals for the school play I was in.

So one night, underneath the quilt, in a darkness more hushed, I thought about her once being a little girl like me, which led me to think of my grandma, her mom. Thinking about it some more, I realized that there was once a time where she would probably get tucked in by her mom too.

Intrigued, I started to ask her questions about her mom. I asked about what it was like, her mom being in India, and my mom being in America. She told me that they call each other often. She told me that she would see her in the summer. 

I don’t know why, but I began to feel afraid. I had seen grandma every summer during our family trips to India: the graying hair, the slower walk, the lull in her speech. I never enjoyed those trips to India, but at the moment, all I could feel was guilt for disliking the eight hour connecting flights and the early morning drives to the airport. More than just guilt though, I felt terrible at the idea of my mom also becoming so different. 

The idea of change felt terrifying.

I had never seriously thought much about what it would be like or how it would impact me, but perhaps that sole night my worries might have accumulated to the point of asking. And so, with watery eyes, I asked her if she would always be there with me. 

I hadn’t said it directly, but what I knew I was really asking was if she would ever die on me.

Of course, she avoided the question; I think good parents tend to do that. She spoke of maybe going far away sometimes, but she never spoke of death. 

Though even without its mention, my mind was filled with loss. I remember my thick curls touching my eyes as I shifted deeper in the sheets, because what would life be like without storytimes and nightly sessions of talking with my mom? In what world, would my routine with her at 9:00 PM not be in my life? 

I felt safe in the quilt, its plush fabric and the bumps at each of the seams, but it felt suddenly fleeting, like in just hours, the weight of the world would bear on my shoulders.

It already felt like it did.

After that, I think for a while I got scared about the temporary end of life, when things might end, or how I wasn’t spending every second of time on things that were limited and timely. I would grow attached to the random parts of my home like the ugly yellow walls or the brown comforter I used in the winter. I would get visibly upset at the notion of any change at all.

But now, I’m older and in college, and I don’t call my mom at all. My morbid fear of aging and death grew into an exhausting anger of why that time with her hadn’t always been as kind to me during those storytime nights. 

Moving into a new space, my small first-year dorm, my mom’s phone calls became a rampant means of avoiding, and what used to be the one thing I enjoyed the most with her fell into a pit of obligation. 

Time—the very thing that once ruled me with fear—shifted into a weapon I wielded against my mother. Why hadn’t she used it more kindly? Why hadn’t she kept me safe from everything that happened, from the quiet way time seemed to slip past us?

I don’t know why letting go feels impossible, why grudges come easier than forgiveness, or why I’ve spent nineteen years learning to cling to resentment. 

I no longer go out of my way to say goodnight to my mother or wrap her in a hug. Instead, I pour my frustration into words, listing what she did and didn’t do. I tell myself that someday, when I’m ready or when she is, we can mend this quiet distance and revert back to when my love for her was simple and effortless. But time persists, even when I don’t.