Mom's Missing...

"Mom you need to leave my apartment, my babies MaMa and her Mother is moving in. Their trailer is infested with roaches and due to the recent cold weather, their pipes busted."

As soon as Mrs. Collins received five hundred dollars from her mother selling the van she left her daughter, she left her twenty-five-year-old son's apartment and has not been seen since.

Mrs. Collins was forty-nine when she was last seen and she had moved to Ville Platte, Louisiana. However, no one has seen or heard from her since that move. She has six sons and a daughter who have been searching for her for over two years now.

One day her youngest son Yusuf was at the library picking up a book for one of his nieces. By chance, he happened to come across a book cover with his picture on it. The picture was taken at least five years prior. He started to read the book and realized that it was not a coincidence. The book was written by his mother and it was formatted like a letter to him. Out of curiosity he went up to the librarian and ask him to check their catalog for more books written by Mrs. Collins.

Just as he suspected there were seven books each one had a sibling's name as the Title. Yusuf checked out all seven books and went home to notify his siblings. Within two days they all met at a Barnes and Noble book store which happened to have their mother's books on the shelves for sale. Each child had read all seven books by the time the day had ended. They decided to research the publishing company only to find that it was owned by their mother, and was located in Colorado.

So the next day they all took a train to Denver Colorado from New Orleans Louisiana. From the train station, they caught a cab to the main office of their mother's publishing company. They were hoping to be able to see her. It just so happened that only a secretary was at the office, who told the children that she had never met their mother and that she was the only employee currently working there. A year ago I was instructed to give a package to Mrs. Collins's children should they ever show up, if you will all have a seat on the chairs in the lobby I will go and get the package. The secretary returned with a small package and handed it to Mrs. Collins's only daughter who was the oldest of all the children.

Aliyah opened the package and it was just a little black book. "If you are reading this my babies then you know by now that for the past five years Mommy has been busy writing and publishing books for each one of you. The books were written to help guide you in your adult life. I noticed over the years that each one of you struggled in different areas. Or taught me something unexpectedly by comments you made to me over many years. Well, that was the fuel that drove me to create a publishing company of my very own and write over seven books. The remaining books are not in my name I ghostwritten those books. The proceeds for each book I wrote for my children are separated into accounts in each one of your names. Now I need to warn you that not all the books sold the same amount of books. Some books stay sold out, meaning the company sells that particular book faster than they can keep printing it. However, a few of the books have been harder to sell and have not made very much profit. For this reason, your bank accounts will not have the same amount of funds in them. You can always sell the book yourself and of course, the proceeds are all yours. Now the actual publishing company does not belong to any of my children. It belongs to my husband, so do my other books. Only the book that is written to you with your name as the title belongs to you.

On the train ride back, none of the children spoke. Everyone was still in shock because they thought they would finally be able to see their mom. The disappointment was written all over each one of their faces.

Aliyah could not stop thinking about how her book was written about how weak she believed her mother was, and after this experience, she had misunderstood her mother for years. She was not a weak woman at all, wanting to never be alone does not necessarily make you weak. It is just a preference and there are so many different ways to look at a situation. Having a different perspective than someone else is not a bad thing, it is normal.

Ibrahim was thinking about how his book was written all about forgiveness. He never had problems forgiving others, but when it came to himself he never considered the damage not forgiving himself had caused him. His Mom's book made him realize that he deserved to be forgiven by himself just as much as, if not more than those he had forgiven.

Alijah was upset because his book was about how bad people seem to always get everything they want. While those who struggle all their life to do what is right seem to have the hardest time financially, and emotionally. Pondering over it seems to bring back so many bad memories of how his brothers would treat him. Being the sixth child always did make him feel invisible. He missed his Mom, and would rather have had a hug than the book.

Yusuf felt the same way as Alijah even though he was excited about his book. It happened to be one of the books that sold the most copies. In Yusuf's book, his mother talks about how much she loved him, and how he taught her that loving a person was a conscious decision. You make conscious decisions to either love or dislike someone or something. Then as with any decision you follow through with an action. Mom loved hugs and running her fingers through her youngest hair. That was because it was the largest afro she had ever seen.

Abid was not happy to even have a book written to him, so the topic of his book just made his anger increase. His mother had written to him in regards to a statement he made about her being unable to provide him with stability, and that she never asked his permission to make so many children. He said he never wanted to be a big brother, that was why he treated them so badly. In his book, his mother explains how she had hoped that all of her children would be close. No matter where they moved to in this big world. To her, always having a friend that they could talk to that understood them because they had experienced the same things in life and had much of the same interests was very important. Abid was one of the children who was the most ungrateful and misunderstood. However, Mrs. Collins loved all her children despite everything they put her through. She just wished they understood that and would love each other.

When all the children finally got the chance to see just how much money their bank account had in it they felt happy and sad at the same time. Happy because all their financial problems could be solved, yet they knew they had treated their mother wrong. Especially the oldest son Ali, whose book was all about the power of prayer. He was the main reason his mother was missing and had felt like she was no longer wanted or loved by her children. Even though he told his mother that he did not pray any more because he honestly believed that his prayers would never be answered. He decided to pray today and tell God Almighty thank you for the financial security now. Also he asked God Almighty to bless his mother wherever she might be, and protect her. All the children decided to keep in better touch and from that day on they treated each other with love and respect in honor of their mother.