(2) Mother's Cries

Story: of a helpless mother
Location:-Bhimavaram, town located in the West Godavari District, Andhra Pradesh,India.
Narrated by:- Author

A middle aged woman went to the market to buy some vegetables. Her cute little daughter was along with her. It started raining heavily in this city where she was hardly a month old, and the  traffic made a mess all around. It was difficult to find any transportation back home. They struggled for an hour and still could not find anything. Lastly the woman saw a taxi at some distance from where they were standing. She waved her hand, called aloud and did other efforts to draw driver’s attention onto them, but it did not work. Then she decided to walk down that distance and hire the vehicle. She urged her daughter to start walking, but the child was so tired that she denied to walk a single step. Mother tried to convince her but failed. Then she asked her daughter to stand and wait in the same place for 5 minutes and told her that she will be back with that taxi so that they could go home. Child was ok with waiting there. The woman asked her not to move even a bit from where she was and having said that ,she started walking fast towards the taxi, turning back every two seconds to check if her daughter was ok. Mother was too scared of leaving her alone but they hardly had any choice. When she reached there, she checked with the driver if he was ok with taking them where they wanted. The driver agreed and permitted her to get in. She pointed him to drive in the direction where her daughter was and saying thus she sat in the vehicle.

                To her shock and agony, driver drove straight into the direction opposite to what he was instructed. Woman yelled at him in anger and asked him to correct his direction. Instead, he accelerated the taxi and with some unknown and devilish intention, did not pay any heed to her and kept driving fast. Woman got scared of many things together. She was not able to concentrate on the roads he was rushing through, was worried about her daughter  and could not even imagine what was going to happen to her.  Gathering all the force of the mind and body, she flung opened the taxi door and jumped out of it. She got hurt all over but was least worried about herself. She gathered herself and started running in all the directions she thought could lead her back to her daughter. She kept falling, running on the roads she could not recognize. She was asking every other person to guide her back to the vegetable market where she had left her daughter. People were very less helpful in this new city. She was tumbling down on every step, sobbing and shouting for help. She appeared like a mad woman crazily roaming around.

                All bad thoughts appeared to her mind, she started cursing herself for her decision of leaving the child alone. She was praying every second to God to help her daughter and keep her safe. After many efforts she reached the place she had left her daughter, but was taken by shock when she could not find her child there. She started crying and called her daughter’s name repeatedly loud enough to make others cry. She fell on the ground and hit her head on the road several times in regret of what she had done. But her love could not allow her to give up. She stood up, went to the nearest police station, filed a missing complaint and then started again the search for her child on her own. She roamed around all the nearby vicinities but could not find anything. Then she saw a group of  young college students doing some charity work. She walked upto them and asked for their help to find her daughter. They agreed and 5 of them set ahead with her on their bikes to help her. After wandering around the city for about two- three hours, it clicked to one of them that the child could have become the victim of the gang which was very prevalent in the city in children kidnapping. They tried their luck by driving straight into the area of those goons, known to one of the girls in that group. They reached there and found no strict security  and hence breached the boundaries and went inside the old factory which was being used as the workplace by that gang. They all started searching for her daughter. They came across many young children who had been physically abused and were being prepared for some gruesome operation. That woman was petrified at the sight and only prayed for her child’s safety. Her tears and cries were endless, until she saw a glimpse of the dress her daughter was wearing on that day. She ran towards the iron stand where her daughter was lying asleep. She broke out in cries at the sight of her daughter. She held her in arms, hugged her tight , kissed her several times and started calling her name to wake her up. She did it many times but there was no movement in child’s body. She shook her, moved her face, pour water into her face, but all went in vain. The woman was aghast to see this, she begged her daughter endlessly to speak up , open her eyes and come back to her.

                Few minutes passed away, and then the child who was wrapped in mother’s arm, opened her eyes, smiled at her mother and said….”its a circle mamma, please don’t cry , I will come back”. And then she slept forever.