Hi, it's Karma again. Ampora left the room so I was alone with Kieran.
"Tell me about yourself! How's your life been?" I asked as I sat down in the office chair at the desk, and Kieran sat in the chair across the room.
"Get closer! I'm not that scary, am I?" I asked with a laugh.
"No, I'm just nervous and very surprised." He stuttered with a small laugh. He scooted the chair to the other side of the desk.
"Hah, I get that a lot." I replied.
"S-so, I'm Russian?" He asked.
"Yup!" I said.
"What hair color do you originally have?" I asked.
"Weirdly, your hair color. I guess my bio dad had the same." He told me.
"Oh really? How interesting." I said, "how did you grow up? Tell me about your family."
"I was adopted by a deaf family. That's why I talk with my hands a lot, I'm used to signing all the time. I know they meant well but, I felt so isolated. None of them are verbal except for a friend of ours. She's my age but she's deaf but had a lot is speech therapy. She talks really well! She does obviously talk a little weird, because we all do if we can't hear ourselves, but she can also read lips amazingly too. She understands that all I do is sign and doesn't get upset it I need to rest my hands after 24 hours of signing to my family." He laughed.
"Is your family nice?" I asked.
"Yes, absolutely. My siblings do make snarky remarks sometimes because I'm not blood related AND I'm hearing, but don't all siblings do that?" He replied with a chuckle.
"Definitely, I used to get in fist fights with my brother, well, OUR brother. Have you met Nabi yet?" I asked.
"Nope! Does he know yet?" He asked.
"Sadly no, but we can right now! It's about 7pm right now for him." I replied.
"He's in Germany right? I know my history on you. But I never knew you had a sister! Well, it's in your Wikipedia profile thingy, but her name or pictures were never shown!" He said.
"She wanted to be private. Didn't want every one knowing she's related to me, you know? But Nabi, he didn't care. His wife makes dolls already, and she's got a big following on YouTube because of it. So he already knew he was going to be in that type of life." I said.
"That is so cool. Will I meet him sometime this year?" He asked.
"He comes over in the spring! So yes!" I said to him. That's when my dad yelled at us to come out. We got out of the office and he looked terrified.
"What's up?" I asked.
"Your sister read the test wrong." My dad replied.
"Wait, what?? So are we not related!?" I questioned.
"No, you are related! FULLY related! I guess your mom never told me she was pregnant with my baby. Or maybe, she got assaulted after she left and didn't know who she was pregnant with, you know?" He told me.
"W-wait, so you're my dad?" Kieran asked.
"We will do another test, but maybe." He said. That's when Elle and Junji came home.
"So, kids, this is my sibling. Remember how we found out I had another one? This is him!" I said as I gestures toward Kieran.
"I-i thought you had a missing sister?" Elle asked.
"Uh, hi! I'm Kieran. I am the sister, I'm just a guy now, you know?" He said.
"Oh! I didn't realize! I'm sorry." Elle laughed.
"This is my daughter, Eleanor, and my son, Junji! We called them Elle and Jun though." I told him. That day, I wanted to go out with Kieran, alone. I got us into a good restaurant, and got us the best seat in the house. And complimentary Domaine Leroy Les Beaux Monts wine! Which is about almost $6,000. Over priced and I didn't like the taste, but whatever.
"This is, very, very expensive wine and I don't wanna waste it so I'm probably gonna drink it all." I laughed. He laughed as well.
"I'll drive you home." He told me.
"I want to know more about you! Tell me about yourself!" I asked him.
"Well, I live in Folsom, so it takes me an hour to get here. I have 3 cats and a bird, my parents have a dog, but since I still live with them, I guess he's mine too. I love sushi and salads. I've always loved alternative style and music, along with metal and some emo stuff. I've been fascinated with traveling and I'm an artist! I'm in school for animation." He explained.
"Other than the last part, you literally just explained, me!" I said.
"Really!?" He exclaimed.
"Yes! I have 3 cats, a bird, and a dog! But I do have a snake, but I'm giving it to my step-brother. Well, OUR step-brother!" I replied.
"And you like sushi!?" He asked.
"Yes! And salads! I was married to a Japanese man, our house is used to Japanese foods, and some normal. He was an amazing cook." I remarked.
"Wow. I wish I could've met him. He seemed amazing. I remember seeing him on your stories and lives, he was so funny and loving toward you. And every song he was in, I loved them. He had an amazing voice." He said.
"He really did." I replied.
"Is he buried? Or, uh, cremated?" He shyly asked.
"Both. He was completely cremated, and then we split his ashes in three ways. 1 for me, 1 for his parents, and the rest we buried. Since we happened to be, very, very wealthy, I may have gone overboard with his burial site. But, he knew he was going to die, so he planned his funeral, he did his will, he did design his burial site. Some of it. All he said is, he wants it to be a place where his loved ones and his future family can sit at and relax in the essence of beauty." I explained.
"What did you do!" He asked me.
"Would you like to see? I haven't been there since I got back from my trip... it's too hard for me, but I can find the strength." I offered.
"I'd love that." He replied. We got our food and we talked more and more. Once we were finished, and I was drunk off of wine, I gave him the directions to Jared's, uh, tomb basically.
"Goddamn, this place is heavily guarded." He told me.
"Yeahh, I gotta put in my finger print. Their graveyard workers are always on site so we don't exactly have to pay for someone to always be here to protect it." I explained. I got out and a worker took my print and opened the gate. We drove in and he parked.
"Is that a greenhouse?" He softly asked. I tested up.
"He loved many things. Writing, painting, gardening, even singing sometimes. He was a detective though. I'll tell you more on why he chose that when we are in there." I explained. I let him inside the greenhouse, and he was astonished.
"This is beautiful!" He said, "these flowers, they're beautiful. Is that a red spider Lily? Isn't that the flower of uh..."
"Death? Yeah. Weirdly his favorite. He demanded them. But he also liked dahlias, edelweiss, baby's breath, and many others." I said. I motioned for him to sit down on the bench inside.
"That statue. How much was that, holy shit. It's so beautiful too." He said.
"Fun fact, that's actually his twin brother. Jared didn't say anything about wanting a statue as his tombstone, but, I had to be extremely extra. I loved him more than anything, he deserves more than this, more than I could give him. If I could, I'd make a whole building dedicated to him. And since he's Japanese, we wanted to include that because he loved his culture deeply. That's why his tombstone is also in Japanese, that's why there's a tori gate you drive through in the entrance. That's why there's all of these Japanese decor and spiritual...things hanging around. His mom and grandma did that." I explained.
"His twin brother?" He asked.
"Yup! Identical twin brother. Identical in every way. They had the same hair length when he died, and his brother offered to model it since his proportions and his face was exactly like Jareds. But I did send photos of him to the sculptor so it'd be...more him." I said.
"Tell me more about you guys. I know you talked about it all the time, but I've been so busy passed few years, I always seemed to miss it." Kieran asked.
"Of course. We met when we were 8. I actually pushed his brother into a locker and I busted his head open!" I laughed. I continued to just talk and talk and talk about Jared. We sat here for 2 hours, and I spilled my whole life story to this person I met just today. He was invested though! And even when I asked him to talk more about himself, he reminded me that I brought him into a sacred space, a safe space for me, and that I deserve to talk about Jared in this place, of all places. I also told him a lot about our mom.
"She's dead?" He said, shocked.
"Oh god, you didn't know." I said.
"I-I didn't know. When I asked Ampora about her, all she said was that she was in Russia. What did she mean by that? Did she lie to me?" He asked.
"No, I'm sure she just...thought you already knew. She's buried in Russia, but died here." I said.
"Oh..." he replied.
"I'm sorry. I didn't want you to find out this way." I told him. He told me it's okay, but then we continued to talk.
"What in those? Is that a chest?" He asked.
"Its for letters. If people sit here and write something for him, or draw something for him, they put it in that box. You're aloud to open it and stuff, I'll show you something I wrote." I said. I pulled out a note, and I gave it to Kieran. He read it out loud.
"You're my first.
And I don't mean my first kiss,
Or my first relationship,
Or my first I love you.
You're the first person
who makes me feel like I'm enough
and the first one to show me
what I love you actually means." He recited.
"That...that's beautiful." He told me.
"I read that somewhere, so I'm not taking credit for that." I said.
"Oh." He laughed.
"Yeah, I'm not that poetic, ironic because I'm a song writer. But no words will do justice. Nothing will explain the love I had for him." I explained.
"Karma, you're quite the inspiration." He told me. We both paid respects to him before we left. We went back to my house, and I invited him to stay over.
"I have plenty of room!" I offered.
"Karma, I would, but i don't have any clothes with me and I also have work tomorrow." He told me. I gave him the longest hug ever, and I finally let him leave. I really just met my sibling!
That's when I got a text from Val!
"Hello! I know it's like, 8:30 there, but it's 7:30 AM here! How are you? Turns out, I'm going to college in a few weeks!!" He explained.
"Really! I can't wait! I really need some more friends." I texted back.
"You busy? Wanna call?" He asked. I accepted, and he began to FaceTime me.
"Well hey there, handsome!" He told me, I instantly blushed and moved my phone away from my face.
"What? Don't like compliments?" He laughed.
"What ever. Do you have a place you're going to stay at? Did you apply for a dorm?" I asked.
"I do have a dorm! What, did you want to have me live with you?" He smirked.
"Well, I have the space. I thought it'd be nice to ask." I replied.
"Thanks for the offer." He replied.
"Wanna have a scheduled meet up? I know some nice places in sac to hang out. Like, every Saturday? Or something?" I asked.
"I'll let you know when I get my schedule! Having a scheduled hang out day sounds good though. Not as stressful." He explained.
"I agree!" I replied.
"You also just want to get in my pants, don't you?" He said seriously.
"W-what?"
"I'm just kidding!" He laughed.
"You look so much happier. You don't have that hint of darkness in your eyes like you did." He told me.
"I found my missing sibling!" I announced.
"Wow!!! I'll go tell my mom! That's exciting!" He said. We began to talk about Kieran and the time I spent with him. Val is so sweet, seriously. He is like a free therapist.
"I kinda wanna kiss you when I see you again." He outrightly said.
"Damn! You've got nothing to hide!" I replied.
"Well, I like you! You know this!" He replied.
"Whatever. No you don't." I said.
"I really do, Karma. I mean it. I know your heart is still in unimaginable pain, and I don't want to rush things with you. Even if it takes you 10 years to fall in love again, I will wait. I'm seriously going crazy waiting for you to accept me." He laughed nervously. Him and I continued to talk for weeks, up until he came to Sacramento.