There's a saying in Thai I heard once as a child:
> "The trees remember what the living forget."
I didn't understand it then.
Not fully.
But now, with that symbol burning beneath my skin and my name slipping from memory like a dream fading on waking—I finally do.
Because the trees never forgot who I was.
They were just waiting for me to remember why I shouldn't have come back.
---
The banyan tree stood at the southern edge of the village.
It was older than the houses.
Older than the shrine.
Older than the village itself.
Its roots bulged from the soil like the backs of sleeping spirits. Its branches tangled so thick above that the ground beneath was always cloaked in a green twilight.
My mother used to speak of it like a person.
> "She waits there."
> "Under the banyan."
> "Always weeping. Always watching."
> "Never let her call you by name."
---
No one came with me.
No one even watched me leave.
The village was still… strangely quiet.
Even the monk hadn't moved from the temple.
He just sat there, head bowed, like he was listening to something no one else could hear.
Something whispering.
Something waiting.
---
The path to the tree was overgrown.
Vines like veins.
Leaves sharp as razors.
But the moment I passed the first root, the air shifted.
Colder.
Denser.
Like a different world entirely.
I didn't know what I was expecting—an altar? A grave? A statue, maybe?
What I found was a woman.
---
She sat at the base of the tree.
Her back to me.
Hair black and wet, clinging to her shoulders.
Wearing a white funeral dress soaked to the bone.
Even though there hadn't been a drop of rain that day.
And she was crying.
Not loudly.
Not theatrically.
Just… slow.
Endless tears falling into the roots, feeding them.
Like sap.
Like ink.
---
> "Excuse me…" I said, stepping forward. "Do you need help?"
She stilled.
Slowly, her head turned.
But her face—wasn't there.
No eyes. No nose. No mouth.
Just smooth skin.
As if her features had been erased.
But somehow… I still heard her speak.
---
> "Anya."
> "You came back."
> "Even after she warned you."
---
I froze.
> "Who are you?"
> "How do you know my name?"
---
> "Because it isn't yours."
> "It was borrowed."
> "Like the light inside you."
> "You shine with what belonged to someone else."
---
> "My mother—"
> "She told me never to come here."
> "Why?"
---
The woman didn't answer.
Instead, she lifted one hand—long, pale fingers stained black at the tips—and pointed toward the base of the tree.
There, tangled in the roots, I saw photographs.
Dozens.
Faded and weather-worn.
Each one showed a girl. Different ages. Different faces.
But every photo had one thing in common:
The eyes had been scratched out.
---
And there—tucked beneath a thicker root—was one photo newer than the rest.
Mine.
From the year I turned ten.
Wearing the necklace my mother gave me.
Smiling.
Unaware.
---
I pulled it free. My fingers trembled.
The back had something scrawled on it in red ink.
> "She took the soul. She buried the girl. The name was the cost."
---
I turned to the woman.
> "You're saying… my mother did this?"
> "She took someone's soul?"
> "That doesn't make sense. She was kind. She—"
---
> "Kindness does not erase debt," the faceless woman said.
> "She was desperate."
> "She made a trade."
---
> "For what?"
> "A child."
---
And then I remembered.
The night I overheard my mother weeping in her sleep when I was a child.
The way she'd sometimes stare at me like she didn't recognize me.
The way she never let me near temples.
The way she avoided photographs.
She wasn't protecting me from the village.
She was protecting the village from me.
---
I knelt beside the woman.
> "Who are you?"
> "Why are you weeping?"
---
She tilted her head.
And for the first time, her face… cracked.
Not open.
But like glass beneath pressure.
Lines webbed across the smooth skin.
And I saw something beneath the cracks.
A mouth.
A voice trying to return.
---
> "I'm the girl who was never born," she whispered.
> "The one whose soul was promised."
> "But your mother broke the seal."
> "And now the god is awake again."
> "He wants what he was promised."
---
> "Me?"
---
> "No."
> "He doesn't want you."
> "He wants the name you carry."
> "Because that's what binds the soul."
> "Without a name, your soul is just a light waiting to be eaten."
---
Suddenly, the banyan tree groaned.
The earth shifted beneath me.
And I saw, between the roots, a hole begin to form.
A tunnel.
No… a throat.
Wide.
Dark.
Breathing.
---
The woman vanished.
Like mist.
Leaving only her tears behind.
And a trail of red string leading back toward the village.
---
I ran.
---
When I burst through the trees, the sun had already begun to set.
And waiting at the edge of the field was Uncle Prem—white-faced, trembling.
> "Where did you go?" he asked.
> "We've been calling for you—no one could remember your name."
> "Even me."
> "You were just… gone."
---
And then he looked down.
> "What's that in your hand?"
---
I hadn't noticed.
I was still clutching something from under the tree.
A scrap of silk.
Inside it, wrapped carefully, was a baby's name scroll.
One used in a binding ceremony.
Only three words written on it:
> Kamala.
Anya.
Borrowed.