Hello readers! So the AWsoME music alloted for this chapter is unfortunately not available on youtube. But the good news is you can get it for free on spotify. It's called : Salem's Secret by Peter Gaudy. Do check out this awsome piece of art!
Happy reading & Happy listening !
▪ ▪ E T H A N D A V I S ▪ ▪
E L L O R A
Papa is leaning against the rocking chair.
I didn't know it is possible for a person to loose so much weight within twenty four hours. He looks...weak. Extremely weak. Exhaustion is clear in his eyes. His head is tilted back and his eyes are closed.
Mum is sitting next to him with a bowl full of broth, probably feeding him.
I had seen him last night. Today I had extra classes in the morning and he was sound asleep when I left. I didn't know then that next time I would see him, he would be...different. I didn't know his condition would fall this sharp.
As I walk closer to him, Ethan at my feet, I couldn't stop the tears that are threatening to fall, causing my vision to blur.
The man who I had grown up thinking as the strongest man on Earth, is now so weak he cannot even hold a spoon steadily.
He is breathing very slowly, taking long pauses in between. Too long pauses. There is gurgling and rattling sounds coming from his throat....making it clear that he is having difficulty in breathing. The limited skin that is visible, his hands and feet, has turned bluish, a dusky colour.
Well, leukemia at its final stage does this to you.
All of this is gradual change. This was expected. Heck, I was even seeing him change every single day. The doctors had already informed us of papa's fate. We know what is awaiting us.
But right now, seeing his condition, it feels as if everything is starting over once again. For some weird reason, today the reality of papa's fate is hitting me hard as ever. A dangerous fear is slowly creeping up my nerves as for the first time, my mind is drifting of to a new world - a world without papa.
Nearing his chair, I rub my eyes of off the tears. Nobody is allowed to cry in papa's room. The doctors have said, seeing his loved ones crying over him might be stressful. And stress after all this, is the last thing we want.
Even in his week, semi-consciuos state he senses my presence as his eyelids opens slowly. With a lot of difficulty.
"Hey, lil' Queen " he says weakly, in a soft voice when his eyes finally rests on me.
Inspite of myself I cannot stop the smile that appears on its own at the nickname which he has been using since I first opened my eyes. He has refused to call me a Princess or any other name, because according to him I am born to rule - and queens does exactly that. Earliar when I was actually little, he had added lil', which although I am not little anymore, still persists.
"Why can't you just stop at Queen?" I sit infront of his knees on the floor, folding my knees backwards and resting my hands on his lap. My favorite place and position to sit in this entire world.
"Can't you see I have grown up? I am not little anymore papa!" I whine, when in reality I want to hug him tight so that he never escapes me and cry my eyes out.
The muscle at the side of his eyes twitch as his lips tugs at the side slowly forming a smile - weak, but smile nonetheless, radiating genuine happiness.
"You are only just nineteen lil'Queen. You'll be my lil' Queen even after you age an eternity." He says beaming, pronouncing each word very slowly, with difficulty.
"Right!" mum from beside him says, pretending to be annoyed. "A few seconds ago, you didn't have the energy to drink this broth. And now you have the energy to speak! That too so long a sentence! Justify this Samuel Davis!" Mum pretends to huff.
Yes, pretending.
Like I said, we are supposed to act normal infront of him. But on closer look, one would see mum's puffed red eyes, and dark circles showing sleepless nights spent crying. It is an extremely poor attempt in her part to show how normally annoyed she feels. Her eyes gives her away. Although papa doesn't notice.
"Huh!" Papa says. "You're comparing this stupid broth with my lil' queen! You're hideous!" Papa is a humorous man. But today even though he tries to make a joke, something is off about him. I can't really put my finger on what exactly. Although his tone is credibly humorous, his extremely blank and sad contrite tells otherwise.
Probably his health is the reason?
Suddenly his expression changes into that of despair and an abrupt lone tear escapes his eyes.
Shocked I start to ask him what is the matter. Then I meet mum's eyes. She shakes her head, telling me with her eyes to not speak.
Utterly confused I look back at papa.
Tear after tear escapes both his eyes now. He is crying. All I want now is to shoot the brains out of the person responsible for papa's sadness.
"I am sorry..." he says in weakly. His eyes holds a far off look, as he stares outside the window, at the inky black night sky.
"What is wrong papa?" I whisper, reaching out and keeping my hands on his.
He does not respond and keeps looking outside with that far off look filled with so much pain.
"I am so sorry....lil' Queen." he repeats, as his shoulders shake and his weak form breaks into a sob.
In a flash Ethan is gone from behind me. He lowers down beside papa's chair and holds his shoulders protectively - doing what I was craving to do all this while.
Ethan starts to say something, when once again mum shakes her head slowly at him.
Wide eyed, Ethan shuts his mouth. His jaw becomes taut as he clenches his teeth, for not being able to do anything to stop papa's sadness.
Exactly my point.
But why in the world is he apologising to me?
"Papa -"
Mum's glare interrupts me again. I bite my lower lip, restraining my tongue. I need a lot of self-restraint to not open my mouth and console him.
"I am " he takes a deep breath before continuing "so sorry." Another deep breath. "This is what you get fo-for " another breath "for immorality such as mine." he breaths, before breaking down into another sob.
Partly bewildered and partly angry with myself for not doing anything, I look at mum and then Ethan for help. Mum, has a hard look on her face, eyes fixed at the bowl of broth in her hand. And Ethan looks just as confused as me.
"What I - " Papa starts once again.
"Get to the point Samuel." mum interrupts him in an exhausted voice. Apparently tired of pretending to be completely at ease with papa's sorrow.
All this while, papa had been talking to himself, unaware of the people surrounding him. As if in a trance. He hadn't responsed when I held his hand neither did he when Ethan touched him. And this is a solid proof of how often he is slipping from reality. Another effect of freaking third stage leukemia.
But mum's voice seems to have dragged him back to reality. His eyes again focus on me, and much to my content, he reciprocates my action by keeping hands on top of mine. My palms are now in between both of his.
"Will you forgive your old man lil' Queen?" he breathes with strained voice as his teary eyes looks at me.
"I can never, ever be angry with you papa." I say without missing a beat. "There's no question of forgiving you."
He starts to sob again. This time Ethan hugs him so that his head is leaned sideways against Ethan's chest. "Whatever it is papa, she said she doesn't mind. Please, please stop crying." Ethan says, rubbing his eyes of, of the tears.
This boy is doing and saying everything that I want to do and say right now.
Not knowing what else to do, I look up at papa, and nod my head.
Papa's face abruptly changes into anger. "If it hadn't been for this stupid cancer, I would never have even dreamt of giving you away!" he says raising his voice a bit. And immediately starts caughing.
I start to get up to get him water, but he tightens his hold on my hand and shakes his head, while gulping in huge amount of air. In the mean time mum has already received a glass of water, but he refuses her as well.
"Let me" he inhales air with his mouth before continuing, "...finish speaking with her first. Water can wait. "
"And so can I papa." I insist. "I'll listen to every word you have to say, only after you drink this."
Taking the glass from mum, I hold it infront of his mouth. And surprisingly, he does not resist this time.
After he finishes the whole glass and gets his breathing back to normal, as in normal for a leukemia patient, I keep the glass aside and hold his hand back, waiting for him to continue.
He stares at me for a whole minute.
Then abruptly he says, "Will you forgive me, even if I asked you to get married within a couple of months?"
Okay.
This was uncalled for.
But I have my answer ready.
"Of course." I say immediately.
All three pairs of eyes in the room, including papa's widens at my sheer calmness.
Well, of course I had already expected something this insane to be the cause for his despair. He is not a man to breakdown easily. It had to be something like this for him to cry. Its just that, I had never thought it would be this.
Plus, when I had said I would do anything, to reduce his pain, I wasn't bluffing.
A whole minute passes by and my family just stares at me with widened eyes.
Now, I feel the need to explain myself.
"Anything for you papa. Even if it means me marrying. I don't care as long as you are happy." I say looking directly at his eyes, trying to get my point across.
"I am proud of myself. " Papa says finally, extending a shaky hand and placing it on my head. "I am proud of myself for raising you good. " he says, now almost sobbing. "I wish, I had the freedom or opportunity to give you an option for such an important decision of your life. Believe me child, if I had either, I would have never dared to force this on you. But I am helpless. My time on this Earth has come to an end. And I deserve every part of it for what I have- "
"Enough Samuel." mum says in stern voice. How in such a situation she still can hold her ground is beyond me. It is in times like this that I feel my mother is the strongest woman on Earth.
"I will take on from here. Since it seems you're no longer interested in having this broth, I suggest you take rest now."she says getting up and keeping the bowl aside.
Then turning towards me she says, "Go outside. Wait in the living room until I get back. Ethan, you too."
Although I don't know what papa was about to say, I don't protest. Instead I say, "Rest well papa" I whisper to him as I get up. "Don't worry about me. Everything will be just fine. "
Well, how bad can things go?
* * *
As soon as we lock the door behind us, Ethan attacks me with questions.
"What was that about? You and marraige? What about your Uni-Intern-Phd-Scientist dream? No, wait. First of, who was the asshole in our front porch? And why the hell was he on top of you?"
My eyes widen. "He was not on top of me Ethan! He was just...holding me."
"Holding me is a decent way to put it. But who the hell was he?"
"Um, well he is my Professor from MC." I say reluctantly. I would have had to spill to him sooner or later anyway. Sooner is better I guess.
It was his time to widen his eyes. "Wait, what? Your professor? Why was your Professor on top of you?"
"He was not on top of me for God's sake! And as for your question, I have absolutely no idea. I know just as much as you do." I sigh exasperatedly dropping myself on the sofa like a rag doll.
"I am the one to always return home after curfew and get sacked. Not you! You are supposed to be the good child." he says hovering over me.
I look up at him smugly.
He is almost as tall as me. Why do boys grow so fast in teenage years? At fifteen I wasn't probably even half of what he is now.
"And yet, today" he continues, " you come way after curfew and mum says abosolutely nothing! That too with a man, who you claim now is your professor who was also on - "
"Say one more time he was on top of me, and I'm telling mum about Alexa. " I say irritated.
"I was just saying. " He says in a small voice before sitting beside me himeslf.
Well, plus points of having a fifteen year old brother. I knew bringing up the girl who he is secrectly dating, would keep him from eating my head atleast for some time. It always does.
"Fine fine! He was holding you. " He says with a scowl which for me is pleasantly satisfactory. "Care to elaborate why your Professor of all people was holding you?"
"Because you had decided to make your gracious presence at quite an unexpected moment and I was startled and jumped back on him!" I snap at him. "Now can we please continue this conversation some other time? My mind isn't working right now." I say leaning my head back and letting out an exasperated sigh.
Mum enters just then.
Taking a seat opposite us, she leans aside, placing her elbow on the table and her forhead on her hand. Then she looks up after a deep sigh.
"So Eli, you're getting married within next month. I have spoken to your would-be. He'll be visiting us on Thursday afternoon. "
> > > > >
What do ya fink?
Don't forget to show some love an affection towards the vote button at the bottom, just like Ethan showed so much love and affection for his father today ;)
Yours truly,
Ms. ObsessedWithSalem'sSecret