The Trash's Guide to Rewriting a Parallel World

VI

Alberu stood silent as he stared at his mother's coffin. No one was there to mourn for her. Not even his so-called father.

He stared at her coffin slowly sliding down the earth.

It is a simple thing, embracing one another.

There was a moment of beckoning, asking, and giving in unison. What went wrong?

No words were spoken.

To clasp more than a hand, to reach around, yet yield, to feel at once a heartbeat at chest and spine, and know you are still alive.

"Mom. Mom... why did you leave? "

And when the moment passes—the brief and simple intimacy of the everyday—he steps apart, releases the touch, but still the warmth remains—every cold.

"Mom... Mom... won't you please... open your eyes once more?"

Nothing has changed, but what is? And what has always been is deepened, and you know:

What is broken can be fixed; what is injured can be healed.

But what is his canon?

"Mom... Mom..."

The lingering pains of wounds never healing will be, or not be, in their time.

The scars created will hold within them the memory of a simple thing: embracing one another, giving and asking, holding on and letting go—that moment together when each responded to the wordless beckoning of another's heart.

"I miss you..."

Unforgivable...

Unforgivable...

The presence of the man who threw a white rose on her mother's grave suddenly disturbed his silent thoughts.

He gazed at the man, Lief Cicero, wearing his stoic facade.

"Condolences, Your Highness."

"What? " he asked. His voice was somber, demanding an answer from the man before him.

The man did not look at him but instead asked, "What is it, Your Highness? "

There was a long silence between them. Alberu simply stared at him, cold rage visible in his eyes.

"What must I do to obtain power? " he asked.

The power was ever so omnipotent that no one would stand in his way.

Power is so revered that no one will hurt what's most dear to him.

Lief finally gazed at him, a gaze filled with the coldness of a murderer.

"What can you give me?"

"Anything," he replied. Alberu stared at the man in front of him. He didn't bother keeping up with his facade.

It's as if he's making a deal with the devil.

That was when he felt like prey. The fear and morbid bloodthirst crept into his being.

Lief Cicero cracked a vicious smile.

"I like the way you look right now, Alberu Crossman."

The man in front of him stared at his crumbling heart and soul.

"So beautiful that it makes me want to see more of this despair."

Alberu remained silent. His gaze never left the man's face. His Royal Instructor, who came like a comet and who never thought a single damn thing, smiled at him in reverie.