Magic Within the Waves

Chapter One - Memories

Chapter One

Memories

***

Melinda’s Story

At barely sixteen, I knew nothing about the kind of pain and sorrow you feel when someone you love dies. I had never owned an animal, so that meant never having to nurse it back to health if it grew ill or bury it if it died. I had never met any of my grandparents, so I never knew what it was like to mourn for them when they died. All my friends were still alive and I never had any siblings to worry about. Death was something I never fully understood, but I knew everyone had to die at some stage.

It was not something I had experienced or anticipated would break my family apart. Until the day, my Mum, the beautiful and enchanting Molly Brown, was diagnosed with congenital heart failure and given twelve months to live.

The day before she died, Mum called me to her hospital bedside and told me something that I would never forget. ‘Melinda, when I’m gone please don’t mourn for me. Instead, look for me amongst the nimble fairies, dancing around the feathery flowers of the bottlebrush – alongside the graceful mermaids, swimming through the crystal rivers of the cascading waterfalls – with the majestic unicorns, galloping wild and free through tall forests – with the star nymphs, luring out the first bright star of the night. For, my child, there I will be, hidden within the magic of this world. For, there I will be watching over you.’

Smiling weakly, she caressed my cheek with the back of her hand. ‘Remember my daughter, life without the fairytale notions of love, fantasies and magic is a very dull life indeed. So, love unconditionally, forgive quickly, laugh always … and smile. Above all, keep your mind wide open and believe.’

The following night, while I was at home unpacking Mum’s box of candleholders and placing a row of golden-haired nymphs and silver-maned unicorns upon the mantelpiece in the living room, a strange sensation overtook me. The air grew cold and thick. Tears pricked at my green eyes, stinging my cheeks.

I touched my fingertip to the side of my face, and I knew her weakening heart had given up its long agonizing fight – my Mum had finally departed this realm. ‘I’m going to miss you so much…’

The sight of the first bright star in the evening sky demanded my attention, bathed by the streaks of gold and silver light bleeding through the blackness. My heart trembled at the haunting sight. Desperately I wanted to curl up on the couch behind me, bury my face into the cushions and cry. But Mum’s words, ‘Don’t mourn for me’ forced me to hold back the tears. For her, I had to stay strong.

A light, loving and fulfilling, swirled across my suntanned skin, bouncing a ray of rainbows off my red hair. It was proof Mum was gone and I had in some way witnessed her go. She had kept her word and joined the star nymphs in the sky – dancing her way into the night in her magical hidden world.

‘I’ll be strong just like you asked, Mum. I will be. I promise.’

The second I turned from the window the phone rang, startling me. It had been so quiet that I almost choked on my aching heart. I knew it was Dad before I had even answered. ‘Dad is it Mum, is she ...’

‘Dear Bright Eyes, oh my dear Bright Eyes,’ he sniffed, his usually calm voice coarse from crying. ‘Mum is gone. She’s free of all the pain now.’

‘I know Dad, I know. I felt her go. I know I did.’

His whimper vibrated through the phone and washed through me. ‘I felt her go too. I know the feeling of her touch with all of my soul. A part of me can still feel her presence...’

His pain was evident in his words, forcing my threatening tears to splatter over the receiver. No matter how much I tried to fight it, they were going to prevail. I wanted to climb through the phone to be by my dad’s side. Just to be his rock to lean on – the support Mum would have wanted me to be.

‘Dad, you should know ... after a year of being here, I finally unpacked the last box in the entire house. Mum’s candleholders and her incense sticks are organised on the mantelpiece.’ I sniffed back the tears. ‘I think she would love to see the way I set them up – a tribute to her memory… The moonlight really brings them to life.’

‘I know Mum would love it. She would love anything you do for her. Just about as much as she loved you. You were her precious daughter, Mel. Never forget that.’

‘I know, Dad.’

He cleared his throat. ‘I’m leaving the hospital now. I won’t be too far away. I going to visit your Uncle John first. When I get home, we will light a white candle in her memory.’

‘Dad...’ Holding the phone against my ear, I peered out of the window again. The lone star had positioned itself in the centre of the window, brighter and more glorious than the quarter moon. ‘Don’t mourn for Mum, for she’s in the sky tonight… just like she said she would be. She’s burning brighter than all the stars put together. She’s so beautiful...’

Dad just about laughed. I could tell he was smiling through his sorrow. ‘Honestly my Bright Eyes, I wouldn’t expect anything less of her. She will be as bright in the next life as she was in this one … there’s no doubt.’

‘That’s just like Mum, noticed and loved by all.’

‘My darling, I should get off the phone now. I will be home once I finally escaped your Uncle John’s clutches.’ He blew me a kiss. ‘Love you, Bright Eyes.’

‘Love you too, Dad.’

I hung up the phone, only to be met with silence yet again. Was this going to be the norm without Mum around?

Breathing in a shaky breath, I stood in front of the marble mantelpiece. Mum had always decorated the mantelpiece at our old house. This time, now that she was gone, it was up to me.

I stared deeply at Mum’s candle holders, reminiscing over when and where she got them, and what spiritual or mythical meaning was attached to each one. The one with its own shrine – the one Mum adore above all – was a silver fairy candleholder. It was one Mum had brought from the local markets during a freezing winter almost foreign to Australia. The kind of winter where icicles would stick to your nose, and you would half expect to see a layer of snow blanketing the ground.

‘This is the only one I could find that even the tiniest bit resembles a real fairy,’ Mum had chuckled, holding the candleholder high so the low daylight danced through the clear glass wings.

‘Excuse me, but how’d you know what a real fairy looks like?’ asked the balding man behind the stall as he scratched a patch of grey in his scruffy brown moustache. His dark eyes studied her closely, eyeing her from her perfect red hair to her black leather boots. ‘Aren’t they just make-believe ... children’s stories and complete hogwash?’

For a moment, Mum just stared at him. Her bright green eyes almost froze him in place. Once she was satisfied with making him uncomfortable, she handed him a twenty-dollar note. ‘That’s exactly what I expect from a non-believer.’ Rolling her eyes at him, she turned to me, placing the candleholder in my gloved hands. ‘See this, Melinda? This is similar to the one I saw when I was little … when I got stuck in the hay bale on Mum and Dad’s farm. It has the exact same silver hair and pointy ears. But remember this… they are extremely fragile. Treat them with care and never touch their wings.’

‘It’s lucky you’re pretty, miss,’ laughed the man, his bulging belly wobbling beneath his dull shirt. ‘’Cause, no one in their right mind would believe such silly nonsense. Like I said before, it’s all children’s stories ... hogwash.’

Even though the man had insulted Mum, she just fluttered her thick eyelashes, flicked her hair over her shoulders and smiled. Her smile left him speechless like it did everyone. She had such an air of grace and beauty - her own kind of magic. She could win over any man, but she loved no other man the way she loved Dad.

Sighing, I re-joined the present and moved away from the mantelpiece with the same kind of warmth one of Mum’s hugs filled me with, flowing through me. I placed the empty box next to the pantry cupboard in the kitchen and sauntered around the house, closing all the curtains, and locking all the doors. There were strange sounds all around me now – whispers, creaking floorboards, and groaning walls. Without Dad here and Mum now in her magical world, I was alone, floating in a sea of emptiness.

Leaving the light on above the stove for Dad’s return, I headed down the hallway towards my room at the end, switching off the remaining lights. We lived in a quaint three-bedroom house so it didn’t take much for the whole place to grow dim. And Mum was a collector of all things fantasy. So, our walls were lined with paintings of dragons and wizards, fairies, and mermaids. It gave the house a darker, even mysterious sensation, no matter what time of the day.

I paused in the lounge room doorway and pictured Mum curled up on the couch with her pencil in one hand and her notebook in the other. The television was switched off, but more often than not it always was. Just like Mum, I found more enjoyment in reading the countless novels that overflowed our wooden bookcase beside it. I would sit beside her and read anything that took you into the kind of world you could only dream about.

Back in the kitchen, I ran my hands over the floor-to-ceiling shelves filled with cookbooks and dragon figurines. Mum was the family cook and just like everything she put her heart into, all her meals were special and came with unusual names. A shepherd’s pie had become the magician’s broth and a tuna mornay was now the mermaid’s basket.

Wandering around the dark rooms, I reminisced about the last family dinner, of roast chicken with Mum’s special three-herb seasoning, handpicked by the garden gnomes, when a loud thud and rattle came from the cupboard beside the fridge. Gasping, I flicked on the hallway light again. Tiny feet scuttled between my legs. Rats? Did we have rats? Swallowing the anxious lump in my throat, I tip-toed to the cupboard and kneeled before it. The rattle subsided the second I reached out and touched the cupboard handle.

‘Maybe it’s a fairy finally.’ A tiny hopeful smile crept across my face the way it would on Mum’s beautiful face when she told me a story about her mythical creature discoveries. ‘Maybe they are ready to show themselves to me...’

Holding my breath, I yanked open the door. Instead, I was disappointed to only find one of the pots had fallen and was dangling lopsided off its rack. There was no small creature sitting in there waiting for me to discover it and thankfully no signs of mouse droppings or a mouse hiding in the corner.

‘Grr!’ Shaking my head, I replaced the pot. ‘Get a hold of yourself, Melinda. You’re seventeen now, not eight. Mum’s stories are only stories that make her happy. Get a grip! There are no such things as nymphs, fairies and hobgoblins, unicorns and hopperscotches or even drop-bears, they’re just myths.’

From the age of ten, I had known, after my many years of never seeing one of Mum’s mythical creatures, that they were a beautiful way for her to bring life, excitement, mystery and magic into this world. A part of me wanted to believe even now, but all I could do was cling to her stories and books to find my own slice of magic, the magic she created.

Unable to handle the growing silence moving in around me, I snuck into my parents’ room and began the hunt for Mum’s fairytale books. It wasn’t long before I found them, stacked in the far corner of their built-in robe. Stuck to the top book, Where and How to Watch for Star Nymphs in the Night Sky, I found a letter written in my Mum’s cursive handwriting.

‘My dearest Melinda, the day you find this letter, will be the day I have left the human world. I will no longer be able to tell you how to hunt lawn gnomes and hobgoblins or where unicorns prance and fairies play. But I hope after all these years you have come to realise all mythical creatures only reveal themselves to a seeker who truly believes. These books, which you should remember as the books I read to you every night, are now yours. There’s information on every kind of creature in this world from the screaming banshee to the strange scallywagin and even those dangerous drop-bears. They live right under our noses, waiting for someone to find them. The sceptics who disagree with believers like me and claim we’re crazy are people who have lost all faith in magic. So my darling child, never forget how much magic there is from the roaming hills to the rolling waves, and how much magic you gave to my life. I love you, Melinda. Yours for always, Mum.’

Sniffling back tears, I folded the letter up and tucked it in my top. ‘I will never forget it, Mum, never! You were the magic, your love brought everything to life... I love you too.’

Not only had I lost my Mum, a person who loved me with her entire heart and soul, but I had lost the one person I could tell my deepest secrets to and know she would never judge... but I had lost my best friend. I wanted to cry and let all the pain inside breakthrough, but I couldn’t. All my emotions were pushed to the back of my mind making me numb. I was heartbroken, but for Mum’s sake, I couldn’t let the world see it.