Chapter 19
“Maria! Maria!”
From the cigarette packs she’s selling on the sidewalk, Maria turned to look at who was calling her name from a distance. She saw their neighbor, that was also the mother of her daughter’s classmate in nursery school, running towards her. And, based on her expression, she looked in haste.
Maria felt a sudden cold run up her spine that caused loud thumps inside her chest. She quickly raised from the small wooden stool and met their neighbor halfway. “What is it, Mrs. Valdez?”
“The school teacher rushed your daughter to Jose Reyes Hospital. She just fell on the floor and complained that she can’t breathe—”
Maria didn’t let the woman finish her words, she ran to the street and blocked whatever tricycle was passing. She doesn’t care if she is almost hit by the vehicles. What’s on her mind is that she needed to go to the hospital where her daughter was.
“Please bring me to Jose Reyes Hospital!” Maria told the tricycle driver that stopped to give her a ride. “Please, be quick!”
When she arrived at the hospital, Sara’s teacher approached her and told her what happened to her daughter while inside the classroom. Maria couldn’t understand what the teacher was saying, she wanted to see her daughter now.
“Where’s my daughter?” she asked in a quivered voice. Her heart is pounding in mixed emotions that have started to fill her chest. “Where is Sara?”
“She’s in the emergency room,” Sara’s teacher said and squeezed her arm. “She’ll be okay. The doctors are checking her—”
“What happened to her?” she asked, tears starting to stream down her face. “What happened to my Sara?”
The teacher took moments to answer, and Maria can read the hesitation in her face. “She was just running around the room with her classmates, playing and laughing like the usual. But, then suddenly, Sara collapsed on the floor, holding her chest and crying while shouting that it hurts so much—”
Maria plopped on the emergency hall floor, her knees shaking that she can’t stand again. Her palms were sweating as her heart pounded harder. She stared in space and broke down into tears. Sara’s teacher knelt in front of her and spoke, but she couldn’t hear it anymore. Images of her daughter before she left her at school to work flashed before her eyes, making her cry harder.
She should not leave her at school. Maria wouldn’t take it if anything happens to her child, she wouldn’t forgive herself for the rest of her life. Sara was the only one left for her, if she lost her, she better be dead. Sara is the only beautiful thing that happened to her. From the moment that she heard her cry after giving birth, all her struggles and sufferings in life disappeared. And, she thought for a second that maybe, her prayers have been heard.
“Maria! What happened to Sara?”
Maria looked up and saw her friend, Wendy. She clutched on her sleeve and wept in tears. “I don’t know… the teacher said she fell on the floor and cried because her chest hurt…”
“What? Why? Where is she? Where’s the doctor—?”
The door opened in the emergency room, and a female doctor walked out. “Who’s the mother of the patient?”
Maria stood and dashed to the doctor. “I-I’m her mother… What happened to my daughter?”
The doctor looked at her sadly. “Ma’am, do you have a medical history of any heart problem?”
“H-heart problem?” Maria remembered what happened to her younger brother. “Wh-Why? How’s my daughter? Is she okay now? Can I see her?”
But, the doctor stopped her from entering the emergency room. “Ma’am, we need to know your medical history,” she said and gave her a look that conveyed painful emotions. “Because your daughter had a heart atFredk that almost fatal. We recommend she to undergo further examinations and ECG tests for diagnosis…”
Maria’s felt her world spin around when she heard that her daughter had a heart atFredk just a few minutes ago. Her sweet and bubbly three-year-old daughter suffered intense chest pain that almost lost her life. Her hands felt numb, and her knees felt weak, her chest tightened in pain as if her heart is being squeezed inside her chest.
“Maria…” Wendy held her shoulder. “Get a hold of yourself, Sara needs you.”
But, Maria couldn’t take the pain in her chest. She sat on the corner of the hallway and burst into tears again. She wept and shrieked until her throat hurts. She cried and prayed for help to whoever the people believed can hear their prayers.
“Isn’t it enough that I was abandoned and sold by my own mother?” Maria asked Wendy, her voice was shaking because of crying. “Isn’t it enough that I was raped and almost killed by the people that bought me from her?”
“Maria… Calm down, please…” Wendy hugged her tightly. “Sara will be fine—”
“Sara is the only one I have. Why your god can’t just give her to me? He has taken everything from me! He let my mother take my own freedom by selling me in exchange for money. He let me be abused and raped by men that I don’t know… Why can’t He just give Sara to me? Why? Am I not important to Him? Does your God have favoritisms? And, I’m not on His list?”
Wendy rubbed her back. “Maria, don’t say those words. Everything happened for a reason—”
“Then what’s His reason for letting this happen in my life? I just want to have a simple life with my daughter… is it too much to ask? I just want to live my life with her and forget the bad memories that happened in my past,” she murmured in between tears. “Tell me, Wendy. Is it too much to ask for?”
“It isn’t, Maria. That’s why I’m here, I’ll help you, I promised, Maria,” Wendy started to cry. “I will never leave you and Sara.”
Maria shut her eyes and cried. The pitch darkness welcomed her like death. “I doubt if your God listens to me, Wendy. I doubt that He even cared for me…”
***
