“Mom… Are you alright? Lena, get more water please,” Emily panicked, watching her mother cough like she was choking terribly. Lena rushed to the kitchen with the empty jug.
Mrs Jones tried to stop her but neither of the two was having any of it and the cough wouldn’t stop either. She had already drained the third glass of water when she finally stopped coughing.
“Mother… What’s wrong?” Emily never thought she would panic so much in her life. It’s just that she had never seen her mom be sick or fall sick before. Her mom has always been like this strong superwoman to her.
So now that she suddenly coughed… It is the signs of sickness right? So naturally, she’d panic.
“I’m fine… See… I’m fine,” Mrs Jones tried to dispel their worries as she looked up at them with a smile. Lena breathed deeply in relief but Emily still looked worried.
She drew a chair close to her mother and asked quietly, “Mother… Are you sure you are alright?”
“Stop worrying too much… I’m fine. Finish your dinner. Don’t waste food. It isn’t easy to get money,” she tried to change the subject.
Emily realized what she was trying to do so she didn’t insist anymore but she just couldn’t eat her food happily again. She kept on thinking about why her mother had reacted like that… That too when she mentioned the name of the new company that accepted her.
She didn’t even hear anything that Lena was telling them. Mrs Jones sighed when she glanced at Emily and saw her picking her food.
She is well aware of what her daughter must be thinking cause this daughter of hers has always been sensitive to things from an early age, unlike Lena… Just look at her. She’s like the opposite of Emily, just keeps on chattering and chattering.
She sighed and looked at Emily again… ‘How do I tell you why? Why… that place is unsafe for you?’
A few minutes later when all the plates on the table were already empty, Emily and Lena packed them up and headed to the kitchen cheerfully making Mrs Jones think that perhaps Emily has forgotten about the incident.
But as soon as they left, before Mrs Jones even had time to stand up from the dining chair she was sitting on, Emily had already come back.
“Mom… Can I ask you something?” She asked quietly, looking a little bit upset. Mrs Jones reached out to hold her hands gently, suddenly having a feeling that whatever she wanted to say would be related to her reaction earlier.
“I’m listening,” She replied slowly, reaching out to stroke Emily’s shiny ebony black hair.
“Mom… Don’t you like the job I got? Oh, wait! I never told you it’s in the finance department so it must be the company… Don’t you like the company? Cause I checked your forehead earlier and you didn’t seem to have a temperature,” Emily explained.
Mrs Jones smiled again and told her, “You’ve always been sensitive just like…” Her eyes grew wet with tears and she looked at Emily like she wanted to cry.
“Just like him… Just like papa,” Emily finished her unsaid words and Mrs Jones sniffled tearfully trying so hard not to cry. She wiped the corner of her eyes.
“I don’t have a problem with your job and certainly… not with the company,” Emily noticed how reluctant she seemed to say the last part and she was convinced once more that there was something her mother is not telling her… Not telling them (her and Lena.)
“It only reminded me of someone,” She assured Emily, noticing how unconvinced the latter still looked.
“Is it someone from your past?” She nodded to indicate ‘Yes’ to Emily’s question. Emily’s eyes widened. Her mother has never spoken about the past to the extent that anything about her father became a forbidden matter.
She doesn’t remember much or let’s say anything about him though so it made it easier to not ask about him.
“Emily… Let the past remain where it should be… The present is all we should focus on now,” She answered. Emily was silent for a while before nodding.
Mrs Jones put on a bright face and cheered, “Congratulation baby! It’s your first job after college. I hope you’ll do marvellously well at it.”
Emily blushed and admitted, “Mom… I haven’t gotten the job yet.”
Mrs Jones was stunned, “Huh? What?”
Emily nodded slowly and looked at her fingers nervously, an old habit of hers that she has never been able to get rid of.
“Yes… I haven’t gotten the job. At least not yet. I passed the first round with my application. Now, I have to go to the office on Thursday to defend my application of course and probably for the job interview. After that, I am hoping I will get the job,” Emily mumbled.
Mrs Jones nodded but this piece of news didn’t diminish the smile on her face. She still cheered Emily and encouraged her, “Don’t worry… Just wait. You will get the job. Who would be a fool not to accept my daughter?”
“Mom,” Emily gave her mom a meaningful gaze. “What?”
“Don’t use any tricks to help me get in. I want to do this on my own,” Emily paused but her mother understood her statement perfectly well.
She laughed heartily making Emily surprised. “You really think highly of your mother. I do have connections but not as much as influencing… Derrick’s decision,” She told Emily who noticed how her mother had once again been reluctant to pronounce Derrick.
‘Mom… What are you hiding from me?’ she thought but kept a smile on her face regardless.
Lena appeared in the dining room with a bitter expression. “Mom, you are here chatting happily with Emily that she has forgotten what she is supposed to be doing in the kitchen. She left me all alone to take care of the dishes!” She immediately complained when she walked in.
“She prepared dinner all by herself and she didn’t complain. You only have to wash dishes yet you won’t let us have peace. Why can’t you be like her?,” Her mother rebuked her.
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