บท 1: Second Chance

'Hhhmmm….agghhh..my head hurts.....what hap..pened?'

'uncle's car...yes his car....he hit me! no....aunt! cousin! grandparents...change..'

"NO!", I shouted as I sit up.

"Nai, baby what is wrong. Do you still feel pain?" I heard a voice beside me, a voice which I miss so much. A voice that chases all my fears away, Mama.

"Mama", I cried while looking at her standing beside my bed. How can she be here. She was dead, she left me alone.

'She's gone!'

'No! I'm dreaming', I shouted in my head while holding it in my hands. I was confuse and distraught.

"My baby, what is wrong... you have a fever Nai... It's ok I'm here baby.. cough cough ..", so console me softly while coughing.

'No! your not, you left me!' I shouted in my mind while crying hysterically.

"Baby its fine, I'm here.. I'm here", she pat my back while assuring me.

"Mama!!!.hckhckhck..Mama!!!", I continue to cry embracing her with everything I have. I'm afraid, so afraid.

I miss her so much. So much that it hurts.

"Shhh..Its Ok my love.. I'm here.. now now, sleep your still weak.. cough cough.. Mama would be here when you wake up, OK?", this was the last words I heard then everything turned black.

As I regain my conciousness, I tried to remember what happened.

'Did I dreamed of Mama again? NO! Its to real to be a dream!'

Then I notice the room I was staying, I thought;

'This is not my room in my aunts house. No! This is the room my mother and I shared before she died.' I continued to look around, ' Yes!, this is my childhood room.'

Its a small room with a single window beside the bed. A cabinet across and a door opposite of the window.

'Yes, this is our room. I did not dreamed of mama. She's here. She's alive!'

"Nai, your awake? Are you fine now?" Ask mama with her soft voice.

I looked ar her, 'Yes my mama.. she's here with me!'

'She always look at me with those kind eyes full of love.'

"I'm fine mama", I answered her as I control myself not to cry in front of her.

"That's good then Nai, cough! cough!.. I will make you a porridge ok. Your favorite!" She told me as she open the door and walk out still coughing.

'I really did come back, but how? Its to impossible..' I then saw the calendar its July 1995.

'I really did came back!'

'I'm 4 years old again.* I remembered I had a fever after we came back from the church. The pastor even gave me a trinket. Said its a lucky trinket and instructed me to always wear it in my left wrist, and I always did, it was the last memento my mother left that aunt did not sell cause its worth nothing. Now that I think about it, how can a Christian pastor believe in a lucky trinket?'

I tried holding my left arm, 'where is the trinket? Ha?!'. I looked around the bed.

'Where is it? I never took it off. Even while bathing.' That's how mama saw when she came back.

"Nai, what is it?" She asked as she came in the room bringing a bowl of porridge.

"Mama the trinket? Did you see it?"

"Oh... not really. Maybe you left it in the church Nai. Now come eat its still hot!" She hand me the steaming porridge while smiling at me.

As I eat the porridge, I thought;

'Impossible, that never left my hand. Never!'

'....Maybe this is what the pastor meant, I came back because of the trinket. It was really a lucky trinket! It brought me back to when mama was still alive. It gave me a second chance to live my life without regret.' I thought while smiling, I then looked at mama busy arranging the messy room.

'She's here with me now. Mama, the world gave me a second chance. I will cherish it. I will not be a coward anymore. I will fight for everything. I need to. For the both of us!'

* Korean Age, you are considered 1 year old at your birth.