Gifts of the Living Phoenix

Chapter 11

One Mystery Revealed

Faith didn’t have to be told twice.  She skirted out of the room after getting a glimpse of her mother next to someone she didn’t recognize.  Faith wanted to look for Hope but decided that she would talk to her later.  She walked out the door and saw three familiar faces coming towards her front door. 

            “Hey Faith, we wanted to be here for you,” Everett said quietly.

Faith hadn’t cried the whole time, but she took one look at the faces of her closest friends and the tears started rolling down her face.  Big tears she hadn’t even realized she had been holding in until Everett grabbed her tightly and whispered his condolences telling her he would be here for her no matter what.  Faith couldn’t stop crying even if she wanted to now…

-------

“I didn’t see you after your aunt arrived, Faith,” my mother stated.

“Yes, well, she gave me permission to leave,” Faith said a little more defensively than she meant to sound.

“I was just wondering,” my mother said, “no need to get defensive.”

“I didn’t want you to think that I was shirking my duties,” Faith said much more gloomily than she felt in days.

“Honey, no one would ever think that of you, least of all me,” my mother said calmly.

“I just couldn’t stand being in the room any longer.  It was suffocating, watching people mull around waiting for something to happen, except the something has already happened,” Faith exclaimed exasperated. 

“I know that this wasn’t the easiest thing, but hell, no one likes funerals,” my mother’s voice trailed off.

Too often I knew what the trailing of her voice meant.  She was soon lost in her world and her own private thoughts.  Thoughts that she seldom, if ever, shared with me.  I learned not to take it personally, realized at some point that she couldn’t help herself.  But sometimes I wondered where she went when she had that far away look on her face.  It didn’t happen as often these days, a lot more when I was younger.  I knew that she was thinking about something, or someone. I just didn’t know who or what.

“Sorry, I was lost in thought about all the things I still needed to do,” my mother explained.

“It’s ok mother, I of all people, understand,” Faith said a little more compassionately this time.

My mother smiled at me and gave me a knowing look.  She touched my cheek in reflection before gaining her composure and getting back to business.  My mother is probably one of the biggest clean freaks I know.  It’s too bad that I’m not as diligent as her, but I know that organizing and sorting out her life right now was the one of the most important things on her to do lists. 

“Would you mind helping me out with the storage boxes in the storage room today?” My mother asked.  

“Course not, but I’m not alphabetizing anything, or sorting diddily by numeric order,” Faith retorted.

“I would ask Hope but she is really out of sorts right now.  I knew both of you guys were daddy’s girls, but I had no idea to what degree until I saw Hope.”

“Fair enough.  I just need to get through some boxes and throw some things out up there.”

 A few hours later found Faith and her mother sorting through boxes of old letters and books.  Most of the boxes had been covered in dust while a few looked as though they had been recently opened.  There were slight smudges where small fingers had disrupted the very thin layer of dust on some of the box tops. 

“Been up here lately, mother?” Faith inquired.

“The other day actually, I was looking for something,” my mother explained.

“Did you find what you were looking for?” Faith asked, not really expecting an answer.

“No, I didn’t.  But it’s ok.  It’s not important,” my mother replied.

“If you tell me what it is, I’ll look for it,” Faith offered.

“That’s ok honey. I’m sure it’ll turn up at some point,” my mother said simply.

It was unreal the amount of clutter one family, much less one person is able to accumulate over the years.  Faith looked through box after box realizing how much paperwork and letters her parents had kept.  Were these going to be painful memories for her mother she wondered?  They sat in silence, going through the papers without making much progress at all.

Finally, her mother got up and stretched her legs.  “I’m going to get something to drink, want anything?”

“Water please,” Faith blurted.

“Water it is.  River, lake, still, magical fizz?” my mother joked.

“Pfft, whatever mother, water,” Faith said as she rolled her eyes.

“Coming right up!” my mother said a little too cheerfully.

Faith’s eyes scanned over the rest of the boxes in the attic.  Lots of boxes, but the two biggest boxes were the ones that her mother was interested in going through.  The first box took them nearly two hours to go through, but that meant the second wasn’t too far from being completed.  Faith thought that she might find Melody when she was finished.  Maybe they could talk about what she was feeling right now about Everett.  More and more these days, he seemed to be at the forefront of his mind.  This from just one puny little kiss which they hadn’t been able to explore.  At this point, anything seemed better than what she was doing. 

The second big box contained basically more of the same letters and cards from the past.  All received while living in their house.  Shifting through the letters and cards Faith noticed one very clean envelope.  It did not appear to have any return or mailing address on it.  In fact, it was just blank.  Not thinking much about it, Faith went to throw it out, but decided to check inside just in case it was something important. 

How odd though that this piece of paper looked like very old stationary.  As she started to open up the folded letter, Faith got the sense that it was a letter her mother had written.  The clean cursive was easy to read and at first she mistook it for a page from her journal.   As she started reading it, she realized it sounded like a goodbye letter.  She read what appeared to be a goodbye letter from her mother to someone she called C:

My Dearest C,

I think I have long since lost the flair for fine writing.  But I really needed to share my thoughts with you.  I woke up in the middle of the night thinking that I might never be able to tell you how much you mean to me, that I might wake up to find that all of what we had shared was just a dream… Actually, it’s quite funny how easy the thoughts come to you when you’re lying in bed at night and can’t sleep.  You have nothing else to think about because at night, you’re all alone with just your thoughts…and how odd… that just as I feel the urgent need to transfer those very thoughts and feelings to paper, those ideas… which were so concrete one minute ago seemed to just dissipate into thin air. 

I’ll try and be as honest about my feelings as possible.  I already find myself lurking on the edge of rambling, talking about nothing much of consequence.  As I write this letter, I already know that I will no longer hear from you.  So in some ways I’m not sure why I’m writing this at all….Perhaps I just need this said.  Need to know that I tried to tell you and let you know what I was feeling. 

We knew this day would come,  we knew it couldn’t last.  And while the idea of not hearing from you stirred strong feelings of regret and sadness, I am grateful that I didn’t have to say goodbye.  Saying goodbye would have been so final…that perhaps this was the best way for us to part.  

I don’t know if I could have easily just let you go if I was given the option.  I don’t know if I could have stayed away and done what was in your best interest.  I got selfish.  I wanted you all to myself.  I know this now.  I don’t know why I didn’t tell you earlier, why I could never get the courage up to tell you what you truly meant to me.  Perhaps if I had uttered the words, everything would have become so much more real, and as selfish as I was, I don’t know if ultimately I could have hurt Colton in the way that I did. 

We both told each other, that we never thought we would find solace in one another.  I never thought that I would find someone like you, someone who could complete me… complete my thoughts.  I find even now, as I’m trying to share the feelings deep inside me that I just can’t seem to find the right words.  The feelings are there, they are walled up inside me, just like the tears welling up in my eyes, unable to push over the rim of my eyes and down my cheeks.  That is what my feelings feel like sometimes.

You remember the night I told you about the one love of my life, the man I met when I was very young?   I never told you the rest of it because his rejection of me felt so raw and painful even then.  I fell head over heels in love with this man who made the pit of my stomach ache.  When I thought about talking to him, my heart would flutter.  Butterflies I thought to myself.  We had a short, but heart stirring relationship…but in the end it didn’t work out, and in the very end he broke my heart.  I had never had my heart broken before.  I never felt such searing pain as I did back then.  And I swore to myself that I would avoid being hurt at all costs.  Unfortunately, what I didn’t realize with my resolve is that when you keep yourself from the pain and hurt, you also keep yourself from loving.  You don’t even realize it, but after a while, you end up putting walls around you as a barrier so that no one can touch or hurt that part of your heart.   I had long since given up on the dream that there was a person out there who could be a kindred spirit, someone who I would have a deep affinity for.  The romantic notion that I could find and create an attachment above the superficial was then and is still now something that I feel will always elude me.  However, there will always be a longing for a connection to someone that would have me desiring for more than I have now.  Thank you for rekindling the hope that never was. 

Thank you for being there when I needed someone to hear me…without any judgments or reservations.  And for that I will always be grateful.  I hope you will be happy, and find the happiness you are so deserving of.  I will always cherish our time together and hold it deep in my heart.  Lastly, I’m sorry for stopping the words that you wanted to share and thus turning your words of love into a joke.  I was wrong but also scared to hear those words from you and so I never allowed you to say it… but I need to say it now to you…I love you...

I always have…and always will….

Miala

Faith felt stunned and embarrassed as she read the letter.  It wasn’t dated so she had no idea how old it was, but she got the sinking feeling that it was old, pre-father, or at least that’s what she hoped.  His name was mentioned in the letter.  Hands slightly shaking, she struggled to put the letter back into the envelope.  It was none of her business, was it?  I mean, this might have been before her father and it might have been someone she regretted.  But the envelope looked too clean, too new, not even a little yellowed with age.  

Why was she shaking?  Why was she overreacting?  This was probably a simple mistake.  Nothing more than a simple misunderstanding.  But how was she going to bring it up to her mother?  How did she go about asking about her past love life?   Wait… is this why the prophecy was true after all?  If she wasn’t the daughter of the second born son, she was the daughter of the first born son. Oh my god, did that mean… wait, who was her father exactly?!?

Faith wasn’t sure why the idea of her mother loving another elf other than her father bothered her so much.  What was the nagging feeling that tugged at her heart when she looked at her mother?  Was this the reason? Was this man the reason?  More questions she thought.  All she had were questions and no answers.  When it came to her mother, she always had more questions than answers.

Faith’s thoughts were interrupted by the sound of her mother walking up the wooden steps.

“One glass of ice cold water for the hardworking lady,” her mother smiled.

“Thank you mother, “Faith replied quietly.

“You’re welcome hon…” her mother said.  Her mother’s voice didn’t trail off because she was thinking of something else.  Faith realized she was still holding the envelope in her hand and her mother had noticed her holding it.

Faith quickly put the envelope back in the box and smiled at her mother.

“I’m gonna get some air for a minute, ok mother?” Faith said a little too quickly.

“Sure honey. You know where to find me,” was all my mother said back.

Faith walked out of the musty room down to the fresh cool air that immediately gave relief to the closed in feeling that she was experiencing.  So many questions ran through her mind that she didn’t know where to begin or what to ask first.  Did it even matter if mother loved another? 

Again, she thought to herself, why did it matter so much?  Something really troubled her about this whole situation but she couldn’t figure it out.