Albatross

by Ross Turner

  “Right…” He continued, pretty much just thinking aloud. “So, what happened that pushed you so far apart?”

  “It wasn’t her fault…” Jen whispered, her voice lost almost entirely to the wind.

  “Did you do something?” Deacon asked her.

  His question was not accusing; he just needed to know.

  “I couldn’t…” Jen croaked, tears welling up again. “I wanted to…”

  “Wanted to what?” Deacon pressed gently.

  “I wanted to help!” Jen exclaimed, shuddering and shaking suddenly as grief overwhelmed her. “I couldn’t!” She cried. “I should have…I could have…”

  Deacon pulled her close and quieted her, resting his palm against her cheek tenderly.

  “I’m sorry…I’m sorry…I’m sorry…” Jen apologised, repeating it over and over and over again, whiling her breath away as she spoke.

  Deacon couldn’t tell if she was apologising to him, or whether it was for something else entirely, and he got the impression, actually, that it was a little of both.

  “Shh…” He calmed her. “It’s okay…” He did his best to reassure her.

  “I should have told you…” Jen confessed, looking up at him through the dim light.

  He leaned forward to kiss her, wiping the streaming tears from her cheeks and pressing his warm lips to hers.

  “It’s okay…” He assured her again. “Whatever it is, it’ll be okay. I still love you…”

  Jen looked on at Deacon, overwhelmed by his kindness, and he looked back expectantly, though clearly, and understandably so, nervously.

  Opening her mouth to speak again, Jen croaked a little and struggled to talk, partly because of the state she was in, and partly because she just couldn’t find the right words.

  It was as if the very thing she needed to tell him, she was still trying to convince herself was true.

  She didn’t want to believe it either.

  Deacon sighed.

  Sometimes his perception was just as much a curse as it was a gift, especially when something eluded him.

  He rested his hand gently on Jen’s cheek again, and looked into her eyes with his all-seeing gaze.

  His trust in her was obvious, and it seemed to give Jen courage.

  Once again, it was now or never.

  She took another breath, still drawn entirely by his gaze, and took the leap.

  “Deacon…” Jen whispered into the night, for a second time shattering the silence of the darkness all around them with her words.

  “I’m here…” He breathed back at her through the blackness, and Jen nodded slowly, holding back a scream that she had kept hidden within for a very long time.

  “Clare’s dead.”

  Revelations

  Unsurprisingly, that night, Jen’s dreams were not peaceful. They were wild and treacherous and yet again plagued by a haunted past. The dark of the night once more took her on a long, sinister trip down Memoria Lane, stirring the darkest thoughts and emotions from deep within her.

  The blackness loomed upon her menacingly and, compared the other dreams she’d had of late, this one felt much more like a memory, like a reality even, than just simply a subconscious fiction.

  The lane stretched out limitlessly in both directions, shrouding all that Jen could see in darkness, and everything remained hidden from her.

  A hint of devious, low hanging fog that she hadn’t noticed before brushed coldly against Jen’s face, wet to the touch.

  There was no wind that she could feel, yet all about her the trees swayed and bowed this way and that, bending their wills obediently. Their huge looming trunks concealed much of the light from the streetlamps, dotted haphazardly along the lane, and beyond them the bushes and shrubs were shrouded in almost total blackness.

  Jen knew that at one end of the lane lay the shop where Clare worked.

  She rounded the corner that once again appeared from nowhere, and continued towards it, presuming that somewhere along the way she would bump into her older sister.

  Checking her watch, Jen knew that Clare had already finished, for it was long past the hour, and the shop would be closed at this time. Surely she would be on her way by now.

  But, as she peered into the distance through the dim light and the thickening fog, Jen could see no sign of Clare.

  Suddenly a noise off to the side of the road startled her. It was a sound that she recognised all too well, but it still caught her off guard, and fear of the unknown began racing through her veins.

  This time though, she didn’t call immediately for help, and took a few tentative steps towards the treeline, squinting to try to make out any shapes in the darkness.

  She wasn’t far from a streetlamp, but ironically, if anything, that only hindered her view, for it cast yet more shadows onto the greenery beneath the trees.

  Creeping forward, keeping as silent as she could, Jen edged closer and closer, stepping from the tarmacked road and onto the soft verge beyond, squatting down low and peering through the trees.

  The cry sounded again, this time much closer, and much louder, and much more desperate.

  And above all else, it sounded like Clare calling her name.

  Jen’s lungs drove into action.

  “Help!” She cried. “Is anybody there!?”

  But no one came to her aid.

  Then, just as she recalled from her last dream, a figure appeared from the shadows, separating itself from the blackness and the shadows as if it belonged to them.

  This might have been a dream, but it was no fairy tale fiction, and Jen knew it.

  No matter how much she might not have wanted it to be, this was a memory, and she had absolutely no choice in the matter.

  With that knowledge, as she crouched, transfixed for barely a few seconds by the shadowy figure before her, Jen was gripped by fear.

  All of a sudden the figure darted away between the trees, skirting round Jen and exploding from the treeline and out onto the road, sprinting off into the distance at full pelt.

  He was dressed all in black, from his boots to his jacket, and he glanced back only once as he raced away, catching Jen’s eye as he did so by the light of the nearest streetlamp.

  Her breath caught in her throat at the sight.

  It was him.

  The man who had broken into Keepers Cottage and tried to kill Deacon to get to her.

  His hair was a little shorter, a little less unkempt and dishevelled, but it was most definitely him.

  Jen didn’t have time to think on that however, as the faint cry sounded once more from beyond the treeline, and this time, following her own shout for help, there was a much more discernible word amongst the sound.

  “Jenny…”

  The voice was weak and desperate, clinging to faint hope, but it was one that Jen knew all too well.

  Without thinking, stumbling blindly forwards, Jen hit her head on low branches three times before she pulled her phone from her pocket and fumbled to turn on the torch.

  Finally she found it, and immediately the light shone just over the bush directly before her, and beyond it the sight than Jen beheld turned her stomach.

  “NO!!” She screamed, diving immediately down through the shrubbery and to the side of the figure that lay on the cold, damp ground.

  In an instant she felt her hands and knees turn sticky and warm, as she knelt on the ground by torchlight.

  “No…” Jen’s voice weakened, overwhelmed. “No no no no…”

  “Jenny…” Clare breathed, weakening more and more by the second, coughing up blood and spluttering as she spoke, choking and gargling.

  The word seemed more like a reflex than a cry for help, and Jen looked on helplessly.

  Her sister’s trousers and underwear were pulled down to her ankles. Her jacket and blouse were ripped open and soaked in blood, showing her pale, exposed skin beneath, sticky and black and oozing from a gash in her stomach.

  Lying beside her head was a large rock, s
mothered too in thick, black gunk. Blood poured from a battered hole in Clare’s skull, seeping through her hair until it was completely drenched in it.

  “Clare…” Jen words caught in her throat.

  She tried to call for help, but she could not speak: paralysed by fear and shock.

  But then Clare spluttered and gargled again, choking up vast amounts of blood as she tried to talk.

  Jen found her tongue.

  “HELP!!” She shrieked deafeningly. “SOMEONE HELP!!” Even as she screamed she dialled for an ambulance and bellowed almost incoherently down the phone at the operator.

  Descending into the deepest depths of the blackness, there was simply nothing else Jen could do.

  She tried to stop the bleeding, but Clare’s head was gaping, and there was so much blood pumping out of her stomach that Jen couldn’t even see the wound.

  She just held her older sister’s hand as blood poured over them both, covering them in all that was left of Clare’s life.

  Drowning and gasping, it wasn’t long before Clare succumbed, but every second was agony for them both, and Jen wailed and screeched and shrieked.

  She couldn’t live without Clare.

  She didn’t know how.

  But from that moment on, regardless of whether she wanted it or not, there was a great cavernous void inside of Jen that could never again be filled.

  Startling awake, Jen screamed, shaking and bawling in agony and grief.

  Deacon was there of course, but for now at least, there was only so much he could do.

  So far, time hadn’t been the greatest of healers.

  But, as it stood, that was all that they had.

  That’s all anybody ever has.

  Some people go their entire lives thinking that void can never be filled.

  Perhaps they are right.

  Perhaps they are wrong.

  Either way, often they put all of their trust in the miraculous healing power of time.

  But sometimes, even that isn’t enough.

  Not when there’s a festering thought consuming you.

  Just like family though, that great void can mean lots of different things. And what we do with it, what we make of it, can perhaps lead us places that we have never even dreamed of.

  Not all of us have the strength to follow such a difficult path.

  But, for those who do, and for those who are fortunate enough to have someone to support them along the way, here's to a new life.

  Letting Go

  Morning did not come quickly, and the darkness tormented Jen cruelly.

  She rose early, more so to avoid sleep than out of any real necessity. In his concern, naturally, Deacon accompanied her, and his all-seeing gaze followed her as she swept slowly around the kitchen in a routine so solemn and ingrained that she didn’t even need to think about it.

  Occasionally Jen glanced across at Deacon sat at the kitchen table, and he smiled at her affectionately. She returned his smile as best she could, but she found it particularly difficult that morning.

  Every time, Jen couldn’t help but let her gaze drift across to the opposite side of the table, where Clare sat. Watching her younger sister, her eyes were filled with sadness and regret, as they so often had been these past twelve months.

  “You okay?” Deacon asked softly, seeing Jen glance across to the empty seat opposite him for the fifth time.

  “Yeah…” Jen lied, unconvincingly, as she laid out four plates upon the worktop for breakfast.

  Deacon raised his eyebrows slightly, but didn’t say a word. After a moment of silence, realising all of a sudden what she’d done, Jen sighed deeply and sorrowfully, and placed one plate back into the cupboard, closing the door silently.

  Jen panned bacon and eggs together, sliced tomatoes and grilled them, toasted bread until it was crisp and buttered it smoothly, all with a well-practiced hand. But her mind was not on food, and she wasn’t hungry in the slightest.

  Finally, giving up, she groaned and placed down everything she was holding, leaning her elbows down onto the worktop and dropping her head into her hands.

  “I can’t do this anymore…” She sighed, and in an instant Deacon was there beside her.

  “You can do it.” He tried to reassure her. “It’ll be alright…”

  But Jen just shook her head in denial.

  Though, saying that, she had been in denial for quite some time now.

  And even Deacon struggled to believe his own words, now that he knew the truth, and he glanced around the kitchen as if he expected there to be somebody else there with them.

  Clare was still sat at the table, and she looked on at him with an expression painted across her face that was a mixture of so many different emotions it was all but unreadable.

  Jen wrenched her head from her hands and looked across at her.

  Her older sister’s expression changed and she smiled, her eyes comforting and understanding.

  Finally making her decision, Jen’s mind was all of a sudden set.

  “Deacon…” She started, and he looked back to her yearningly.

  “Yes?” He asked.

  “I have to show you something…” She told him, and as she did so she glanced across once again at Clare.

  Her sister’s face dropped dramatically, as if Jen had just delivered the killing blow herself. Guilt ripped through Jen’s veins at the sight, but, in the end, she held firm, knowing at long last what she had to do.

  “Okay.” Deacon agreed, not knowing what it was that Jen wanted to show him, but getting the impression it would be of monumental importance.

  Without another word, hearing the sound of faint footsteps above them, Jen began plating up their breakfast.

  Clare rose slowly and rather ominously from her seat, passing Deacon as she walked over to Jen.

  He felt a shiver run up and down his spine at her gaze, but, of course, he had no idea what caused it.

  “You can’t…” Clare whispered urgently to her younger sister. “You know you don’t want to…”

  Jen nodded, knowing of course that Clare was right.

  But this time, at long last, she could see reality more clearly. She knew now that, sadly, she had no other choice.

  This was just what she had to do.

  Clare nodded, in the end understanding as well, but tears stood heavily in her eyes, and she longed to hold her sister, to put her arm around her and tell her everything was going to be alright.

  But, just as had been the case for almost a year now, she knew she couldn’t.

  And perhaps simply that knowledge, more profound than the hundreds of other reasons, was why Jen had to finally let her go.

  The morning was crisp and cold.

  Fallen leaves whipped up off the ground in great flurries, swarming around the two of them as Jen and Deacon, hand in hand, paced down the narrow lanes.

  Where Jen was leading him exactly, Deacon didn’t know, but he felt not the need to ask.

  All the while, keeping a steady, level pace with the young couple, Clare remained.

  Jen wore a thick hoody to keep the chill wind at bay, and Deacon wore his rugged jacket, for indeed the air was harsh.

  As usual, Clare felt not the cold, and wore a plain, red dress that thrashed about her bare, flawless legs wildly.

  Turning down a rough track then, one which Deacon had never before followed, Jen led him further and further past the treeline. The ground here was rocky and bumpy, and had clearly not been repaved for quite a few years.

  Trees leaned in to grab them as they walked by, reaching over and down towards them yearningly. But when Clare swept by, all but unnoticed, they ignored her presence entirely, just as most did nowadays.

  A tall set of black iron gates emerged ahead of them from between the trees, looming high and menacing in their path. Set deep into the ground beside them was a large, brick cenotaph, and upon it was bolted a bronzed plaque, worn and faded by the torturous passage of time.

  Cemetery Drive<
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  All of a sudden Deacon understood.

  Jen glanced up at him with a wry smile upon her face, knowing there was no turning back now.

  He stepped up to the huge gate and pulled the rusty iron bolt across that kept it closed against the wind. With an eerie creak he pulled one of them ajar so that Jen could slip through, and once she had, he followed, closing and bolting it behind them, leaving Clare stood outside gazing after them.

  Jen steered Deacon through the oceanic maze of headstones.

  Some were small and quite faded, with only very short inscriptions engraved upon them. Whilst others, enormous and towering, had giant sarcophagus bases and huge crosses that drove up towards the sky regally.

  Finally, as they swam through the sea of graves, Jen brought them to a stop, and they began to slowly tread water.

  Before them lay a single, grey headstone, relatively new compared to many of the others around it, and only just beginning to show the wear and tear of time.

  Upon it was engraved but a few lines, the text plain and black and unmarked.

  Clare Williams

  23rd of March, 1996 - 10th of October 2014

  Taken from us too soon

  Forever in our hearts

  And there, stood upon the grave, though not for all to see, was Clare, gazing at her younger sister once more with heavy eyes, but an indescribably heavier heart.

  “I’m sorry, Jen…” Deacon breathed, not knowing what else to say.

  She didn’t reply.

  Instead, she just wrapped her arms tightly around him and he embraced her back, sharing his warmth with her on that bitter day.

  Jen shuddered as she took a deep breath, gazing with her head rested upon Deacon’s chest at Clare. Her older sister, beautiful in her plain red dress, hands clasped together in front of her, stood upon her own grave as if all of this was just as bad dream.

  But the look in Clare’s eyes confirmed brutally for Jen, for the last time, that this was no nightmare.

  It was far too real to imagine such a thing.

  “I don’t know if I can take this…” Jen whispered, talking to Clare just as much as she was talking to Deacon.