How could this be? She had never known Tyler before. Why would Tyler call her “Mommy”? Could this memory be a fragment from the five years she couldn’t remember?
Impossible. Completely impossible. How could she be Tyler’s mother? And how could she have treated Tyler like that?
She didn’t even know how to smoke.
Thelma looked at the cigarette in her hand. It was unused. To prove to herself that she didn’t smoke, she picked up a lighter from the table, held the cigarette to her lips, and lit it.
She should cough. Surely she would cough.
But she didn’t. Instead, she smoked as if it were second nature—her fingers and throat moving as if they remembered.
Samantha walked in and immediately snatched the cigarette from her hand, yelling, “You’re smoking again?!”
Her sister said “again,” which meant Thelma must have smoked before.
Thelma stared at Samantha in a daze. For a moment, she felt as though she had stepped into an absurd world, so unfamiliar, so unreal.
If the fragment she had just remembered was real, then Samantha must know that Tyler was her child. But why had Samantha kept it a secret?
And… if Tyler really was her child, then she must have been married to his father.
His father… Sam Noah?
No, no, no. She couldn’t believe she had married Sam Noah.
What was even harder to understand was this: if she truly was Sam Noah’s wife and Tyler’s mother, why were they pretending to be strangers?
She recalled the tall figure she had seen last time in the hospital, talking with Samantha before she arrived. Sam Noah was indeed that tall. Could it have been him? If it was, then he must have known about her memory loss from the start.
Had he and Samantha conspired to deceive her?
Why?
Thelma held her head and shook it. She couldn’t bear to believe any of this was true. How could she possibly be Tyler’s mother? Before meeting Tyler, she hadn’t even seen Sam Noah. How could she have any connection to him?
Married to him? Giving birth to Tyler? She had no memory of it at all!
Samantha noticed her staring blankly and, worried that she had been too harsh, softened her tone. “I wasn’t scolding you. Smoking isn’t good for your health, is it?”
Thelma shook her head and said, “I just remembered something.”
Hearing this, Samantha looked alarmed. Nervously, she asked, “Remembered… what?”
Her sister seemed deeply afraid of what she might recall. Could it be that she had gone through something even worse than losing her voice?
Thelma’s mind was in turmoil, and she said nothing. She returned to her room and stayed there all night. The next morning, before Samantha woke up, she left the house.
She went to the Aerospace University Affiliated Kindergarten. She arrived early; the kindergarten wasn’t open yet. The street was quiet, and the cold winter morning chilled her to the bone.
She waited there for a long time.
One by one, people began arriving at the kindergarten. Finally, she saw that familiar car. Sam Noah and Tyler stepped out together.
Thelma walked toward them. Tyler noticed her first. His eyes lit up, and he excitedly greeted her, “Aunt Thelma, why are you here?”
He ran toward her, tilting his head up to look at her, his little face beaming with a smile, his big eyes sparkling like the brightest stars.
“Did you come to see me?” he asked in his soft, sweet voice.
Thelma didn’t respond. She knelt down, gently took his right hand, and asked, “Can I see your arm?”
The little boy was puzzled but didn’t hesitate for long before nodding.
