A mother’s work is never truly over, Maya knew this as soon as her daughter was born. For what felt like the hundredth time, she sat beside her child’s bed, carefully mending the quilt. She could never have predicted, when she first bought it from a yard sale, that it would become her daughter’s most treasured possession.
To call it a quilt was a stretch, as it was little more than a hodgepodge of oddly shaped fabric scraps sewn together, layer by layer, until it was thick enough to cradle her daughter’s small body as she drifted off to sleep. The person who had pieced this together must have spent countless hours turning discarded remnants into something beautiful and functional. Maya felt it was her responsibility to repair the inevitable rips, not just as a tribute to the unknown creator but as a way of showing her deep love for the little girl who held it dear.
“I love how cool it feels when I first climb into bed,” her daughter said one night as she wrapped herself in the quilt. “But soon, it gets warm, and then I’m all cozy. Where did you get it?”
The answer was simple but too dull to share with her wide-eyed child, so Maya added a little fantasy. “It was brought over on the Mayflower by the Pilgrims,” she said, delighting her daughter. “It’s made from fabric scraps from all over Europe, and it was the very first blanket used by the first Americans.”
It was a small fib, but it sparked a cherished tradition. As the quilt began to show signs of wear and tear, and as her daughter faced her own moments of sorrow, Maya would sit beside her, mending it with care and continuing the “true” story of how it had come to her daughter.
“During the Civil War, your quilt was captured by General Grant,” Maya told her one evening, weaving another chapter into the story. “It helped keep him warm during cold nights on the battlefield. When the war ended, it was returned to its rightful owner.”
“Grant?” her daughter asked, wide-eyed.
“Yes, Grant,” Maya said with a smile. “Then it was passed down, and Abraham Lincoln used it while he was president.”
“You mean my blanket was with Abraham Lincoln?”
“Of course,” Maya replied, winking. “But not just because of Lincoln. It was President Theodore Roosevelt who kept it in the White House.”
“Who took my blanket to the White House, then?” her daughter pressed.
“That’s a story for later,” Maya said, kissing her daughter’s forehead. “Now, get some rest, and we’ll pick up the story next time.”
Maya, unfortunately, found herself telling that story more often than she would have liked. Her daughter suffered from intense migraines. At first, the doctors thought they were just ordinary headaches, but the reality was much more difficult. Too many nights, her daughter would curl up in pain, smiling through clenched teeth. The headaches were unbearable, and the only thing that helped was the cold washcloth Maya placed on her forehead, her soothing voice, and the familiar tale of the quilt as her daughter drifted into sleep.
Many nights, Maya would sit in the quiet room, piecing together the fabric of the quilt as her daughter slept, wishing there were some way she could repair the pain her daughter endured. The only sound in the room was the soft hum of Maya’s voice. It was a song she had sung since she was her daughter’s age an accidental melody that had become something more. It was a tune just for her daughter, one that would exist only for that moment, replaced by another the next time.