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“Let’s take a walk,” Kell proposed quietly while they were in London for an errand, his eyes sparkling with genuine affection.
“Where to?”
“Anywhere,” he said. “Wherever our legs will take us.”
Lila’s pulse quickened, and she couldn’t say no. She didn’t want to say no. In Kell’s vocabulary, he meant that he wished to spend more time with her in this world where no one could reach them, and this was exactly what she wanted too.
They roamed aimlessly. Ate food from street vendors and looked at shops with interesting displays. And the weather was on their side until it started pouring out of nowhere late in the afternoon.
She didn’t plan on walking by this street, but her feet led there after they took a wrong turn, as they searched for a shelter or a place to mark to go back to the other London.
She had to tell him this was the wrong way, and that it was better if they went somewhere else. There was nothing in that neighborhood but slums, and there weren’t gaps between buildings to use to hide. They would have to go somewhere else.
But she said nothing, and eventually, they jumped back into her past just as the wind picked up.
As she took each step, the loud beats of her heart warned her. It would only take a word, but it died on her lips.
She rather felt like a moth attracted to a flame. The closer she got to the light, the closer she was likely to catch fire and turn to dust. Unlike a measly insect, she knew when to draw back and avoid getting hurt. She would not let the fire burn her.
It was a stupid idea. One that would get her into trouble, and that she would probably regret. But it was a temptation. She was curious. She wanted to get closer to the blaze.
She squeezed Kell’s hand and stopped in front of a two story building that had seen better days.
“Why did you stop?”
“Just because,” she said, her hand already on the door. The chipped dark paint scraped her fingers. “We can wait here until the rain ceases to fall.”
He frowned as she had expected, but she still pushed the door open, dragging him through the threshold. The smell of decay hit her nostrils and she twisted her mouth.
It felt as though they had just traveled to another world. Or was it another time?
Lila called on her fire. She itched to glimpse how time had changed the house, and wanted to take stock of how different it was from the past.
The place didn’t come alive with the flame. Instead, it looked even more dead than it was in the dark. Cobwebs covered the walls along with mold, and she saw a mouse and beetles running away from the light.
That godforsaken place was so rotten to the core that the only living things inhabiting it were some of the dirtiest beings on earth. Somehow, it was fitting.
“I don’t think it’s a good idea,” Kell said, speaking for the first time after they entered, seeing that Lila was moving around the house. “Trespassing is illegal.”
“It’s not if no one lives here,” she answered, trying not to get his reluctance to convince her to leave. “No one cares if we look around.”
Kell sighed, resigned. “I wonder what is special about this old house. I thought we would be just waiting for the rain to end.”
“Who knows,” she shrugged, lighting her face with the fire. “Maybe I’m looking for ghosts.”
“I only see vermin,” he commented just as more beetles came out of a broken jar sitting on a lonely chair in the kitchen. “And broken furniture. It’s been a while since someone lived here.”
About ten years, she thought. Maybe more.
There was no place like home.
That room once used to have a table and three chairs and a small counter with cupboards above it. Only part of the cabinets was left, one door slightly hanging, ready to fall off any minute. Perhaps she should struck it with magic, stare at the wood smashing once it hit the floor. Destroy the remnants of a past long gone for good. Perhaps they would disappear into oblivion.
Don’t damage the property, he would remind her, ever so respectful and gentle even with broken and sharp things. He used such care with her as well.
If only he knew that she used to be familiar with that very thing. That the very lonely chair in the center of the room helped her so many times when she needed to reach the cabinet and pried it open with her little hands to see if there was something to eat that day.
She could claim ownership to this skeleton of a house if she wanted. It was no one’s and everyone’s property at the same time. It might be free, but it came with heart-wrenching taxes. It wasn’t something worth taking.
The dark wood of the narrow stairs loomed before them once they left the kitchen, and Lila took her steps tentatively.
She felt Kell behind her, the sole of his boots the only noise in the house. “Saints,” he cursed, and she knew he had reached the step with the dent in the wood.
“Watch out,” she warned, not sure if to him or to herself.
There was a small landing before the solitary room upstairs, its door tightly shut. Lila lingered until Kell was beside her.
“Is it locked?”
Yes, should’ve been the right answer. And also, we should go.
But Lila’s shoulders barely shook in hesitation. Her fingers faltered on the discolored handle before she wrenched the door open with more might than she intended to.
She didn’t know what to expect, but she didn’t think she would find anything. The declining light of the storm outside invaded some of the bare space, making the room seem bigger than it was.
Not that there was much occupying the room in the past. A small closet by the door. A bed with threadbare blankets under the window in the middle. In front of it, a chest filled with clothes and books and toys, all heirlooms from her previous life.
She often curled up on the rocking chair that sat on the right side of the bed, because it wasn’t big enough to fit them all. And from there she watched the most beloved person of her past with the only eye she had left.
She saw her smile and told her stories. In her child naivety she was aware that they couldn’t afford to live like before but she was happy all the same, because at least she had her mother.
She recalled with helplessness when she saw her abruptly change.
One day her pink cheeks lost their color. Her eyes transformed into hollow pits of black. The brown of her hair turned a shade of grey.
She lost her spark, but she never lost her smile. She always had one for her daughter, even during her last moments. It was branded into Lila’s memories and sometimes, it cut deeper than a knife.
She wondered what would have happened to her if her mother hadn’t died.
“There is nothing here,” Kell said.
“No,” she sighed. “There is nothing.”
“I think we should go.”
“Yeah,” she nodded slightly.
He was the first to leave the room, and she thanked him for it. She needed a moment alone. Kell might not see anything in this place, but Lila saw everything she had lost.
She wondered if her mother’s ghost was hanging around the room, haunting it, angry at life for giving up on her when she still had so much to do, when she still had a child to look after.
Lila clenched her fists to stop the tears threatening to spill. She couldn’t break down here. She had to leave before Kell would look for her and wonder why she was stuck in a room full of emptiness.
She allowed one last glance at everything, even though she hadn’t forgotten about it ever since she’d left. She motioned to leave but her foot stomped on something.
A loose floorboard.
She offered the floor a sarcastic smile. She thought she knew all the secret spots in this house, but she was wrong. She knelt on the dusty wood and removed the plank, assuming she would find nothing. And instead, there were a couple of sheets of paper tied by a red ribbon.
Letters?
Whatever it was, now it belonged to her.
Lila came downstairs wearing the hint of a smile. She found Kell waiting by the door, his arms crossed on his chest. The rain had turned into a downpour, which meant they couldn’t leave yet.
“You look,” he frowned, trying to find the word. “Eager.”
“Do I?” she wondered rhetorically. “I’m eager to leave this city.”
“Then let’s go back,” he said. “I saw a dead end where we can leave quietly.”
“We could use the house.”
The words were out before she could force them away like a bug flying in front of her face.
It tempted her to leave a mark, claim this place as her own like a conqueror over an enemy castle.
She wanted to show the house and the ghosts inside of it that she had made it. She wasn’t the same person who used to survive there. She was thriving. She was powerful. She could destroy this building with a single snap of her fingers.
Watch me. See what I can do? You should be proud of how far I came all by myself.
Kell pursed his lips. “I’m not sure,” he began. “We probably shouldn’t.”
“But?”
“It’s raining too hard,” he gazed outside. “We could wait, but who knows when it will end?”
Lila tilted her head to the side. “Then you have your answer.”
More than a week after finding the sheets of paper under the floorboard, Lila still hadn’t removed the ribbon to see what was written inside.
For all she knew, they could be blank.
For all she knew, someone with a penchant for writing had lived there after she left. Maybe a young girl who was tragically aware that she could never publish her book because god forbid women did anything that wasn’t marrying and having children.
Let’s say the girl had secretly started writing a novel or poetry. Maybe she also appreciated Blake’s poems and wanted to emulate him, and become one of the first women to be published with their real name. Maybe her father hadn’t liked that so she hid her creations.
Maybe.
Lila realized that everyday after they had been in that house, she had crafted an excuse to procrastinate from looking at those sheets of paper. And each excuse had heightened her curiosity even more.
Then why was she taking her sweet time?
She bit her lip, feeling the stolen papers in the pocket of her coat, grazing her like either a knife or a kiss against her ribs.
She clenched her fist and rose from the bench in the galley where the crew had gathered to eat dinner. She could feel Kell’s eyes on her as she walked out to her quarters, but she didn’t turn. She didn’t want him to go after her at least until she had dealt with those sheets.
She closed the door of the captain’s room and heaved a sigh. The natural reaction would be running. Not read what those papers were about. Throw them into the deep blue sea, even, to avoid temptation and hurt.
But she didn’t want to run anymore. She wanted to – her hands shook.
She took the parchment out of her coat and removed the red ribbon holding the papers together, and noticed the initials scribbled on it, charcoal ink washed out by time. She had hidden the treasure so swiftly that she hadn’t seen them.
“Fuck,” she muttered under her breath.
She needed to sit. She went to the narrow bed, and sat on the quilt as if she was about to read a novel and she couldn’t wait to see where the story was going. But this time, the story was her own.
There were numbers on each sheet. Sixteen. Twenty-six. Thirty-six. With her heart in her throat, she opened the one with the lowest number and started to read.
D.B. 16
Dear daughter, if you are reading this letter, it means I have probably left this world. I wrote a letter for you to read when you turn 16, 26 and 36. Do not read them at the same time! Please. Open the letters in order. I am hiding these because I don’t want your father to find them and throw them away. I could tell you these things to your face, as you’re sitting in the chair by my bed sleeping, but I am afraid I can’t. I don’t want to give you this burden. I have given you many burdens because of my questionable choices. I wonder if my bad choices are catching up with me, and they are the reason I am sick. I want you to be happy, and for as long as I am alive, I will try to make you happy. But when I am gone, I hope you can create your happiness. Do whatever you want. Become whoever you wish to. When you marry, find someone who is completely different from your father. If you don’t find anyone , then it is better you don’t marry at all . Do not make the same mistakes I did. People can be… manipulative, and I hope you can find someone who will love you and accept you for who you are and respect you, always . You are such a bright girl. So smart. I am sure you will find your way.
Forever yours, mom
The tears blurred her vision and she had to take a moment to recollect herself before reading the letter with the number twenty-six, the age she had casually turned a few months earlier.
D.B. 26
Dear daughter, you should be twenty six when you open this letter. I hope the last ten years have treated you well, and you have flourished into the person I knew you would become. I am sure you are beautiful and witty. Perhaps you are married by now, and have children of your own. I am disheartened that I am not there to meet your husband and your kids, but know that I am praying for you from above and I am looking after you. I wish I could see you. I am curious! I hope that your husband is a good person and he treats you well and respects you. My dear. It is time I get something off my chest. I don’t want to turn this letter tragic, but I didn’t want to disclose this in the letter for your younger self. If you didn’t keep your promise and read all the letters before their time, you probably already know. Remember when you lost your eye? What an idiotic question. How could you forget? Your father called it a curse, and I couldn’t explain it myself and I thought of it as such. He dealt with it without letting me know and when I found out, I got mad on your behalf, but there was nothing to do anymore. I just wish it wasn’t an illness that deprived you of the chance of living shortly after I have departed. I wish your twenty-six year old self is reading this letter and is having the time of her life. Give your husband my regards.
Forever yours, mom
She almost didn’t hear the door of her cabin open. She hastily tucked the letters in her coat and sniffled, trying to appear unbothered despite her state.
“Hey,” she whispered, her voice raspy.
“They started singing,” Kell explained. “I don’t like to do that.”
“Yeah, I know.”
He sat on the bed, observing her, as if he was trying to say something but he couldn’t find the right words. One of his hands cupped the side of her face, and he rubbed his finger under her eye.
He got closer and enveloped her in a hug, trailing his hands on her back. She drowned in his arms and let him comfort her until they both fell asleep.
Sometimes home was a place. Sometimes home was a person.