Next day Boss is wearing a dark grey sari. She has a bead around her neck, brown in color. The Traumafinder zooms up.

‘How are your voices doing?’

‘Talking to them.’

‘Good. Give yourself some time. Let’s start. Traumafinder’ 

Scenes move. It is by now clear to me that Boss can decipher each scene while I would get figments of my memory tantalized if I recognize a person or event. The next red signal arrives and as it slows down, I see the scene. 

I come home from school. My father is sitting on the sofa in the dining hall with his head down. He hasn’t gone to his office. My nani, maternal grandmother, has come to visit us. As I raise my head, I see ropes crisscrossing the room in a random pattern with cloth pieces hung on them. The clothes have been cut to pieces. I can make out some of my mother’s saree’s, my father’s shirt, my T-shirts and trousers; all have been cut and hung on the ropes. The whole room looks like a dhobi ghat except it is very dark. A flicker of sunlight is coming from the window which is almost covered by the shades. I feel heavy, very heavy inside as if a boulder has been kept on me. I ask my father what is happening. He does not say anything. A voice is coming from the bedroom.

‘This son of bitch will instruct me.’ She roars. ‘This harami who has no shame of his own. He who sleeps with his own sister. He who is a complete failure in life. He will tell me what to do. I will show this rat who he is.’ I open the door and go in.

‘What happened Maa? Why are you speaking like this?’ I ask her.

‘You keep quiet, you disease born. Eater of shit. Man of pain. He wants to eat and eat and eat, this bastard. A trouble for everyone. Always licking the ass of your own father. That son of a bitch good for nothing. Eat shit, you disease born. Die and let me live in peace.’

I walk out of the room. Shocked. Nanimaa is happy to see me. My Nanimaa is a soft-hearted woman with a thin figure and a sharp nose. But she has an air of melancholy around her today which I can sense. Her smile is not the usual radiant as it used to be. She asks me if I want food and I say yes. She gets me food on the dining table. I eat in pin drop silence listening to my mother abuse me and my father one after another with expletives, some of which I have never heard before.

‘Your mother was going through her schizophrenic episode. Is this the first time you can remember about it?’

‘Yes.’

‘How do you feel when you go back to this event in your life?’

‘Afraid. Anxious.’

‘That’s natural. We will see this happening again and again as you grow up. Let’s come to another important scene.’

She asks the Traumafinder to move ahead slowly. My parents quarrel often. I sit in my room and listen to them fight. My mother often listens to Harivansh Rai Bachchan’s Madhushala. Nanimaa has returned back to her place and my father cooks sometimes for us. I feel sympathy for my father. I feel angry on my mother. Boss doesn’t ask the scenes to stop even though there are red signals. Sometimes I would go hungry in the afternoon because my mother did not prepare food. Even though things look dysfunctional, they move on. Someday there would be fights, somedays would be peaceful. I am a good student and a good sportsman. I would study hard and play in my colony. My father would go to office and my mother would do the cooking, anyhow. Our house is not a clean house. The dining table is always full of things which have to be either stored or disposed off. We have to make space for our plates on the table. Our dining room is smelly. We would sometimes help our mother to arrange things in order, like putting the sofa covers properly. But these are nominal work. Nobody would dust or arrange the things lying inside them. Sometimes plates and saucers would stay where they are kept, on the table or on the floor, for days and days. The Traumafinder gets excessively slow. Boss frowns again. She is deep into the scene that is running on the screen.

I am anxious, worry written all over my face. My father is sitting on the sofa saying ‘what can I do’ repeatedly. My mother has locked the bedroom door. We can see smoke coming out of the space between the floor and the door. Something is burning inside with my mother in the room. We can hear her abusing us from the room with the expletives which by now we are in the habit of listening to. The Traumafinder turns bright red as I rise up from the floor. I knock on the bedroom door and she asks who it is. I say it is me in a loud voice. She opens the door.  I see the whole room covered with pictures of Hindu god and goddesses. She has put small diyas in front of all the pictures. The bed sheet is missing and the mattress has been folded and kept in the corner. Clothes have been cut and thrown all around the room. Steel plates and containers from the kitchen are strewn around the floor with things from the dressing table like lipsticks, combs, rubber bands kept in each of them. In one large container my mother is burning cow dung and the smoke has filled the room. I see her face. She has turned quiet on seeing me. All this makes me angry. I raise my hand and slap my mother hard. My father exclaims but he does not rise from his sofa. I am so filled with rage. The Boss asks the Traumafinder to stop. She looks at me.

“So, you hit your mother?”

“Yes. Never forgiven myself.”

“You feel guilty of it?”

“Yes, forever on my mind.”

“What are your emotions about it?”

“Afraid of my anger. Afraid of myself.”

“Why didn’t anybody take your mother to the doctor?”

“Taken to a psychiatrist.”

“Why do you think your mother had done what she was doing?”

“Delusions or hallucinations. Voices telling her to do that.”

“Yes, that’s possible. She may have been anxious. She was praying to the gods and goddesses to get her out of her misery.”

“Possible.”

“This action must have given you extreme guilt.”

“Yes. Took a vow never to hit a woman again.”

The Boss smiled. “You learn the right things. But in the wrong way. Can I tell you something?”

“Yes.”

“Forgive yourself. You asked for forgiveness from your mother for what you did when you were sick?”

“How did you know?”

The Traumafinder moved to the scene where I am touching my mother’s feet and asking for her forgiveness.

“She forgave me.”

“Then get out of this guilt that you have inside you. This is closure for you. In a way it is not your fault. You should have been kept somewhere else for as long your mother’s condition improved. Letting small children see this is not a right thing. Let it go. But remember your vow. Women are discriminated and you may be the same kind of man who does this. You could turn into an abuser. We will see this later when we deal with The-light. You have to keep your vow intact. And never discriminate against any woman.”

I feel odd about this. She is right. It is not completely my fault. I am ten years old. If anyone would have counseled us about what was going with our mother, I would have understood. But in a place where people want to stay away from families like ours, who had time to counsel us!

‘Let’s come to the abusive voice you have. Do you think it is your mothers?’

‘Same tone, same flow, same expletives.’

‘Right. Now we have to work around this abusive voice of yours. The only way you can work with this voice is if you understand the issues with your mother. That she was going through a terrible problem in her life, had no one to look up to, had a child to feed, and a husband who had only expectations from her but no love. In the town where you lived, she must have been discriminated. Plus, she had unfulfilled wishes. That is the source of abuse in you. Unless you understand this, this voice will keep tormenting you.’

‘She was discriminated?’

“Your mother is a well-educated woman with a degree and a job which she wanted to do. She was instead married to an orthodox husband who valued his family more than her and expected her unflinching loyalty and dedication. She is better read than your father, yet had to serve him.  She was asked to be like other women who had easily blended into this role and had little educational or professional qualification to match her. And then there was a demanding child to take care of. She is dark skinned and suffers from schizophrenia. How much more do I need to explain?”

‘What can I do?’

‘Show love to this voice. The love that your mother needed from you. Understand this voice the way you should have understood your mother. Make it your friend like you would have made your mother. Don’t shrug it, don’t get angry on it as you do. Reason with it with care and kindness. You will see it will change or go away. You have to learn it.’

There have been no voices in me while I am going through all this. Everything inside is as quiet as a Buddhist monastery. When I realize what my mother had gone through, now that I am going through the same problem, my heart starts to melt. I have a good education, a job, a source of income. I have friends. I remember she had no one except us.

Tears well up in my eyes. It starts with a sob. And then it overtakes me. It has touched a deep pain. I start crying with my hand on my heart. I am wailing like a baby shouting Maa Maa. Boss stands up, sits on my sofa and hugs me. I keep my head on her shoulders and cry for a while as she pats my back.

‘Go home now. Today we had a long session.’ She says as I raise my head.

‘Yes.’ I muttered. ‘Thanks.’ I whisper.

‘It’s all right Kabir. We have some way to travel. I will see you tomorrow.’

‘Office work. Two days leave.’

‘Yeah, you told me. I will see you on Monday. Take care dear.’

I sleep in the hotel room for two hours in the evening. It is a sound sleep. When I wake up, I feel an urge to talk to my mother. I dial her.

‘How are you today maa?’

‘I am good beta. Good of you to call me. I was thinking about you.’

‘Thinking about you too. Eating and sleeping well?’

‘Yes, your father brings in a lot of fruits nowadays. I eat them.’ She giggles. ‘Sleep comes a little late. But I wake up late too. There is nothing much to do in the morning. Your father occupies the kitchen to prepare his breakfast. I keep sleeping.’

‘Nothing wrong in sleeping till late. I do it too.’

‘Yes. I am taking my medicines daily. I am feeling well. How are you doing, staying away from giving trouble?’

‘Yes. Good.’

‘Busy in your work?’

‘Yes.’

My family didn’t know that I have come to Kolkata. I did not want them to get anxious about it. I had decided to tell them once I get back to my city.

‘Take care Maa. Anything you need, tell me.’

‘Sure Beta. Who else will I say? You have been taking care of me for so long.’

‘Could have done more. Did you talk to anyone else, any relatives?’

For the next twenty minutes, my mother gives an account of all her conversations with our relatives and her Facebook friends. She still has a lot of suspicion of people but it was not like in my childhood. She has been taking medications now so things have improved. I listen attentively, speak little. I know she likes to speak.

After the phone call, I order dinner.

‘You eater of shit, you disease born. Always eating and troubling others. You are a trouble to everyone you man of pain.’

‘Calm down. I know what you have gone through. Let’s discuss why you are so angry.’

‘I am angry because you deserve it. You have been a trouble all your life.’

‘No, you are angry because of what you went through. I will help you out. It’s not my fault. I was a kid.’

‘You man of pain, how do you know this?’

‘I know it, I am sure of it.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘Yes, I am.’

‘Are you very sure?’

‘Yes.’

‘You are a man of pain, why should I listen to you?’

‘Because I have seen it all. I am the best person to understand all that you went through.’

 The voice gets quiet for a while. Then it talks to me again. I shower care and display my understanding. It becomes quiet while I take my dinner. I take my medication and go to sleep.