The Guy With The Diary

Chapter 7

NIKLAS

Though I had left my country for the longest time, it felt just like yesterday. Walking the brick-floored path that led to the gate, I still felt like that little boy who was terrified of everything. Especially himself.

The green iron-wrought gate looked a little different. Clearly, it had gotten repainted over the years, I presumed, but that wasn't just it. Perhaps it was another gate altogether. Who knows.

“Home sweet home, right?”

I turned to see who was speaking and it was no one but Cole. Cole was one of my nineteen siblings. The closest one to me, perhaps because he was only seven years older than me. The next youngest was like twenty-five years older than Cole.

“Can’t say I'm not happy to see the house,” I said, meeting him halfway and getting into his embrace. “And to see all of you, of course.”

Cole bit his lower lip, sucking it in as he let out the word, “yeah”.

“Why did you sound that way?”

“What way?”

“You know very well what I'm talking about.”

He shrugged his left shoulder, his lips curling into a smile. “I don't know what you're talking about.”

He seemed a little different. A bit distant. Even over the phone when we spoke in recent weeks, I noticed a major change in the way he spoke to me.

Let me let it slide, I thought to myself. It was probably nothing.

I walked with Cole, watching how the sunlight hit on the flowers, as we approached the house.

The house was still the way it was. It was breathtaking— if you looked at it in a photograph. In reality, it looked boring, lonely and sad. Truly, there was no better way to describe the house. The way it was painted, the exterior furniture design and sculptures of the statues served also as a fountain— a very peculiar one. It was just a very sad sight.

I couldn't tell if it was just me attaching the plethora of sad memories I had in the house, or not. What I did know was that I couldn't wait to leave the house. Even before I got into the house.

“Where is Mother?” I inquired, dropping the little bag that was slung over my left shoulder, and then sitting beside Cole on the porch.

“She never leaves her room,” Cole said. “Ever since we lost. . . .”

He kept mute and didn't say anything else. For a moment, I could swear that I saw his hands tremble though they were dug deep into his pockets.

“Since you lost what?”

Cole patted my knee and then gave it a squeeze. “I think it's time you met Mother.”

I smiled and stood immediately. “You are right and… uh, let me guess. Father is somewhere wasting his money on women and he calls only when he needs help.”

I expected Cole to respond to the joke—like what it was. It was because that was what we always joked about, even on the phone. Mocking Father was the one way we were always assured to get a good laugh. We couldn't go wrong there. But he wasn't laughing this time, now, was he? He had a smile plastered on his face, but I could see that it was out of anxiety. Or he was simply being polite. I couldn't tell which.

“You‘re alright?” I voiced, squaring my stare at him. “I know it's been a hot minute since we saw each other, but you know can tell me anything. Anything at all.”

“There is nothing to tell you,” he scoffed and a bigger smile came on his face, only that this time it was even more forced. “At least not from me, Nik.”

“You seem anxious or something. What's wrong, Cole?”

Still having the forced smile on his face, he said, “It's nothing, brother. You are overthinking this just like you do everything. I'm good… really, I am.”

“Maybe you're fine, but you seem nervous and it's very unlike you.”

“My darling boy,” Yilena shouted out to me. “I have missed you and all the stupid things you say and worry about.”

Yilena was simply being Yilena. It was almost alarming how much I missed her voice.

Yilena was the house ‘manager’. She looked thirty or so, but she was about six times that age, give or take. Yilena wasn't part of the Dalima family. At least, not officially, but she had stayed with the family so long that everyone saw her as one.

Poking my cheeks in jest of how ‘ skinny' I was, she said, “You barely call anyone, you little twat.”

“I have been busy. Besides, the whole point of me leaving was to get this life behind me.”

Yilena spat the chewing gum she had in her mouth to the ground. “Good luck doing that.”

I didn't let her get to me. It was Yilena after all. She always knew how to push everyone's buttons and going back and forth with her was never worth the stress. My relationship with Yilena was always hard to define. I couldn't tell if I liked it or not. What I did know was she was a good person. On some days, at least.

Mother was sitting before the mirror at her dressing table. Her room hadn't changed so much apart from the little poster of a teary eye that hung above the bed. Everything else was just like it was when I left four years ago.

Mother turned, stared at me, and looked away. She looked sad, and dare I say, older. Of course, that wasn't in the least possible, but I guessed she was stressed out or something.

After what seemed like an hour to me, due to the awkwardness of the moment, she found her tongue. “You came after all.”

“Well, not because I wanted to but I'm guessing you don't care.”

“You were always good at guessing,” she uttered, almost in whispers— clearly for emphasis, which by the way, hit home.

“I will be leaving in the morning, Mother.”

She shrugged and tilted her head as she spoke. “You can leave in ten minutes if you want.”

“For someone who couldn't wait to see me, you don't appear excited at all.”

“That’s because I'm not. Never was, never will be”

What? I mean, Mom was always a very difficult character. At times she would embody the character of a doting mother, and sometimes, even as a kid, I felt she didn't want me around her. She was a meanie— at times— but I didn't expect her to treat me this way.

“You look great,” I said, forcing myself to smile at her.

“I don't care what you think,” Mother voiced, looking at me from head to toe with zero emotion on her face. “Sit,” she let out, pointing at an armless chair beside me.

I didn't react in any way. Now I felt all the emotions I refused to address years ago. Those emotions were the major reasons I left home for good.

“Suit yourself,” she said. “You have been lied to all your life. You know nothing and it was your father's decision to keep you in the dark. So much for the love he claimed to have for you all”

The first thing she told me was that Father took his own life. He gave no warning and showed no sign or anything. He just gave up on life. Now you might think this wasn't surprising for man who had lived almost seven decades. But I knew better.

Mother's voice was calm and clear, but it was her words that tore my heart to bits. After she had spoken, I tried to convince myself that she was only telling lies. She couldn't possibly be serious. I couldn't have been living a goddamn lie my whole life, now, could I?

But then those questions were answered once I gave Mother a good look. Her eyes were cold and still. She didn't avoid looking into my eyes even though I was tearing up, sniffling and shaking as though every joint in my damn body was about to break off.

How was I supposed to live with the fact that I wasn't born a vampire as I thought my whole f*cking life? From what I learned from Mother, no one was born a vampire. All vampires were once humans turned by other vampires who were turned by others… and it went on like that.

Yeah, I just learnt about all that now!

Now I saw why everyone acted weird when I talked about my parents.

I had always known that vampires could change humans, but I never knew I wasn't born a vampire. That just like every f*cking vampire that has ever walked this cursed Earth, I was once human. Mother said my father found me as a baby and changed me. Just like he did my siblings.

Mother stood and punched me in the face, point blank, sending me straight to the floor. “I took care of you filthy diseases he called his children just so he could be happy.”

She went on to say that Father was always a “softie” and had given orphaned kids the two greatest gifts he had— immortality and his endearing love.

Mother continued. “All for what? So that he could end his f*cking life and leave me in this lonely world all alone. The motherf*cker promised me that he would love me forever just a few centuries ago. Now he has killed himself.”

She fell to the floor and kept yelling “he has left me”. I stood and was about to leave when she tossed an envelope to me.

“He wanted you to have that.”

I picked it up and didn't even look back as I left the house and began sobbing in the garden.

“I knew it would break you,” Cole said, wrapping an arm around me. “He made sure no one told you….”

“You knew? Even you, Cole!”

“There was nothing I could do…”

“How about telling me?”

“Niklas, he didn't want you to know because there was no one he loved more than you. He didn't mind anyone else knowing.”

“When you love people, you tell them the truth. Not lie to them their whole motherf*cking life!”

I didn't know what to do or feel. My whole life was a lie and now it was as though I had no life at all.

In the little brown envelope, he gave me was a necklace Father valued more than his life— his words, not mine. It was made of wool and not worth anything apart from the fact that Father loved it so much.

“I have nobody,” I said, weeping into my bare hands. “The others don't care.”

“I care,” Cole said.

“Mother doesn't care.”

Cole held my face so that our eyes were at the same level. “She is not our mother. She's father's wife— there's a difference.”

“I’m all alone,” I cried out.

Pulling me into his embrace, he said, “You have me. You will always have me.”