– Maria, what you did was disgusting to your sister. You're well aware that she loves Markus Morgan. But you were flirting with him.

– I was just having a bit of fun. I didn't think Mariszka would cry about it," I say in an indifferent tone.

I don't have an ounce of regret in my soul.

– I know you've never felt sisterly love for each other. And that saddens me. But I am not asking you to love her. I'm asking you to respect her feelings. Her love. – Mum's voice suddenly trembles and tears appear in her eyes.

It makes me uncomfortable. It scares me.

– Mum… – I touch her shoulder, but she doesn't react to my gesture.

– You can't understand how she suffers. Unrequited love is the worst thing that can happen to us," she says with feeling.

I don't say anything. I'm struggling with two feelings: pride and love for my mother.

– Forgive me," I finally say quietly.

– It's not me you should apologise to, but your sister.

– It's beyond me.

– She's your sister!

– Mum, please! – I exclaim insistently and turn my back to her. – I promise I won't flirt with him again. That's enough, but don't make me apologise to her! Because that's never going to happen!

– Why are you so soulless? Why am I such a bad mother that I have failed to teach my daughters to love each other? – In a voice full of longing, Mum says.

This sentence makes me turn round to her.

A tear rolls down Mum's cheek. She wipes away this moisture with the palm of her hand, covered with a black silk glove.

I see her tears for the first time in my life.

It's unbearable.

Mum's crying.

A terrible shame eats at me.

I take Mum's palm in mine and press it to my lips.

I don't know how to comfort her. But I won't vow to seek Mariszka's forgiveness. Ever.

***

That memory came to me with the second stupor I had on the plane.

It's weird. I'd never thought about the past before. And the memory was a nightmare. A nightmare, a brutal truth that caught up with me after all these years.

My body, my soul, my brain was filled with the same horrifyingly intense feeling of shame that I had felt that night over a century ago. I grabbed the smartphone lying on the bedside table and typed a message to my mum: "I'm sorry for everything. You're the best mum in the world. It's not your fault your daughter is the worst daughter in the world."

One touch, and that message would fly to my mother like a dove of peace, like the belated repentance of her ungrateful daughter.

But my pride prevented me from making the gesture. So I erased the message, threw the smartphone in my lap, and leaned back in the first-class seat of the plane that carried me on its iron wings home to Toronto.

"'Wasn't it you who cursed me, Mariszka? I am now in your position! But unlike you, only I will know of my misfortune. I won't let anyone do to me what I did to you! – I thought with irritation. – I can't be alone with myself… I can't wait to land in Toronto already.

I hate long journeys and frequent changes of planes. But getting from Gdansk to Toronto is a whole system. Gdansk to Berlin to Reykjavik to Montreal to Toronto. Twenty-nine hours. Just dropped out of my life. Twenty-nine hours of thinking and wasted time. Nothing useful. Just wasted hours.

When the plane finally landed in Toronto, it turned out that my suitcase with my camera and all my stuff was stuck in Reykjavik and wouldn't arrive for another twenty hours. In response to this information, I just shrugged my shoulders helplessly. But I'm an avid traveller, so all my suitcases have special tags with my name and contact details, and the airport staff have promised to deliver my suitcase directly to my flat as soon as it arrives at the airport.