Page 26 of Stolen Moments

“What if I don’t want to make connections? What if I want to take a year off before medical school? Travel? Figure out what I actually want?”

My mother’s expression hardens. “Priya, we’re not having this conversation again. You’re not taking a gap year. You’re not ‘finding yourself.’ You are going to medical school next fall as planned.”

“Maybe I don’t want that plan anymore.” I’m trying very hard to keep my voice calm, steady, but I’m not sure if that’s working.

“Then what do you want?”

“I don’t know! That’s the point. I’ve never been allowed to want anything other than what you want for me.” And there is the rise in my voiceI was scared of.

“We want you to have a successful career. Financial stability. Respect in your field.”

“You want me to be you, and I’m not you, Mom. I’m me. And I’m exhausted from pretending that this is what I want.”

“This is about that boy, isn’t it? The hockey player.”

What? I look at her in shock.

“How do you know about him?”

“Professor Morrison mentioned concerns about your behavior. I did some research. Jackson Rivera. Art major who plays hockey. I had someone look into him, watch you both. Completely inappropriate for someone of your caliber.”

“How dare you have someone follow me, watching me, that…” I stop before I say something I will regret. “He’s not inappropriate. He’s brilliant and talented and he sees me for who I actually am instead of who you want me to be.”

How dare she look into him, how dare she throw him in my face.

“He’s a distraction and you’ve let that distraction jeopardize everything you’ve worked for.”

“Maybe I want to be distracted! Maybe I want a life that includes more than medical school and residency and living up to impossible standards!”

“Then you’re not the daughter I raised.” God, I never thought my mother would have said those words to me.

“Maybe I’m not,” I say quietly. “Maybe I never was.”

I walk out of the house, out of the symposium, out of the life my mother has planned for me.

And for the first time, I feel free.

Chapter 10

Priya

I fly back to Thornhill three days early, on a red-eye.

I haven’t slept. Haven’t stopped thinking about Jackson, about the choice I made, about the future I want versus the future that’s expected.

I go straight to his studio. He’s there, painting angry strokes of red and black across a massive canvas. He doesn’t notice me at first, too absorbed in his work.

“Jackson,” I say quietly.

He spins around, surprise and hope and hurt flashing across his face. “Priya.”

“Can we talk?”

“I don’t know. Can we? Or are you going to tell me again how this is too complicated?”

I deserve that. “I was wrong.”

He sets down his paintbrush. “About what?”