Memories from the Past

Chapter One

Trigger warning: mention of depression

Here lies Isabella Marie Swan

September 13th 1987 – September 16th 2027

"Death lies on her like an untimely frost
Upon the sweetest flower of all the field."
(Romeo and Juliet, Act IV, Scene V, Line 33)

I stood as I looked at the gravestone. My mother's gravestone. I knew what I was supposed to feel. I had to feel grief, I had to mourn. Yet I didn't. I was relieved, happy. She was finally free, she could finally rest.
"Are you ready to go, kiddo?" my grandfather asked, his voice still shaking with pain. I nodded my head, finally removing my stare from the gravestone and towards the brown orbs that belonged to my grandfather. The brown was surrounded by red as his eyes were puffy from crying.
"Yes, let's go. Shall we go to the diner?" I asked, hoping some food would lift our spirits. Grandpa simply nodded his head as he wrapped his arm around my shoulders, pulling me close to his side. His hand was wrinkled yet laid firmly on them, almost afraid I would vanish as well.

"You know you aren't allowed to drink, Xandria." Grandpa said as I took a sip of my white wine. I chuckled.
"I turn 21 next month gramps. Besides, I am allowed to drink in Scotland" I said as I took another sip. Grandpa rolled his eyes.
"Yet you are in the United states right now. But I guess I can let this one drink slide for today." He said as he took a sip of his beer. His hair was almost completely white, with some gray streaks woven through it. His face had been wrinkled and a kind yet stern look resided on it. And finally, a moustache in the same colour as his hair accompanied his features. I chuckled sadly at his remark.
"Thank you, grandpa. And thank you for letting me stay here." I said as I played around with my glass.
"Anytime panda." He said, using the nickname he gave me when I was a little chub. Grandma had once dressed me up in a complete panda jumpsuit as a toddler (yes, including with a hat that had little ears on it) and since then the nickname had stuck. The memory of it made me smile as I still had the little jumpsuit back at home.

Grandpa drove us back to his house, the ride back to it was quiet, as had our time at the diner has been. Neither of us felt like talking, not knowing what to discuss without returning to the topic that was my mother. My now dead mother.
Once inside I helped grandpa get comfortable on the couch with another beer in his hand watching the football match that evening, yet his eyes where hallow. He merely stared at the screen. I kissed his cheek and made my way upstairs, towards mum's old room. I jumped on the bed, plunging my face in the pillow as the tears finally came.
Truth be told, she never really was much of a mother to me, sure she tried to be there for me but she had a crippling depression that she never could break out from. I had never seen her smile, well truly smile for that. There were only ghosts of what might once had been a genuine smile around her lips, but it never reached her eyes.
I sad up and sniffed as I wiped my eyes. I had to remember that she was in a beter place now, and that she was happy. I sighed as I got up to make my way towards the bathroom, only to trip over a loose floor board. I yelped softly as I caught myself on the door handle, my other hand smacking against the wall beside it hard.
"Everything okay up there, Panda bear?" Grandpa yelled from downstairs.
"Yeah I am fine gramps, just lost my balance. No worries!" I yelled back as I turned around and examined the loose floorboard, only to discover it had a hidden compartment underneath. I knelt down to examine the compartment closer and found a small box hidden in it. I gently grabbed it and sat down on the bed.
The box itself was a velvet blue with a simple clasp to keep the lit closed. I flicked the claps and carefully raised the lit, only to find multiple photographs of my mother and a necklace with some sort of crest on it. The crest was made of a lion, with a hand above it and three clovers in a banner underneath the lion. It was beautiful.
I felt the tears burning yet again as I grabbed the pictures and started to look through them. It was my mother in her senior year of High School. She had pictures with all of her friends, they were in the parking lot, in classes or they were hanging out. But the last picture intrigued me the most.
It was my mother on her 18th birthday, and she was standing next to a boy who seemed to be her age, only there was something odd about him. My eyes traced over his pale white features: the hard square of his jaw, the softer curve of his full lips—twisted in a smile, the straight line of his nose, the top of his forehead—partially obscured by the tangle of rain-darkened bronze hair. He seemed almost unnatural. But the thing that shocked me the most was my mother's smile. It was genuine. Real. It even reached her eyes.
I close my eyes and try to control the tears that are threatening to fall once again. I imagined she might have smiled this way the moment before she jumped off that cliff. I imagine she might have thought about this man. Maybe he was once her true love, before she met my father. Maybe he passed away, and is that the reason why no longer could smile after both he and my father passed away. I could not imagine what it would be like to lose someone you love twice. Even if it might have been years apart.
I finally opened my eyes and allowed for one last tear to slip away. I had to believe she was happy now. That she was with my father and her first love again. That she is smiling now like she did in the picture I was holding close to my chest.
I just had to believe that.