This really doesn't make sense. The Dad I know would never have come in between Mum's parents and her.
Isn't love supposed to be that cloying sentiment that makes you want to let go, rather than clinging on?
The journal lies on the mahogany table, as a bent finger of mine is pressed between my teeth. A faint orange light from my bedside lamps emanate my room while my feet stumble in between the shadows.
Why am I finding so many lies in my beliefs?
Change the word. Make it... faith!
I need answers before that, I'm afraid...
It has almost been an hour since I've come back from the Rosens and Uncle Gary. The weather started changing only after I left the hospital, and now it is an entirely different shade of blue.
I rub my hands on opposite arms, before closing the windows of my room with a click. Footsteps pace around my room and I realise that they're actually my own.
I've talked to Mary and Richard, but Meredith...
I can't actually summon her or anything.
Rubbing my temples, I blink several times at the journal. My bedroom clock ticks away, as I wonder why Henry had to resort to those methods to catch my attention at the library.
Something yellow flashes from near my table, making me grip on to the metal of my bed.
Am I hallucinating too...
Just as I advance towards the picture frame resting on the table, the journal starts fluttering till it reaches the very last page.
"Back to the old methods?" I avert my attention from the frame and rest my palms on my hips as I glare at the journal; its yellowed pages create a sharp contrast against the maroonish table.
Henry's handwriting is there.
"It was the only way I could grasp your attention at that moment.
Also, it was a form of warning."
I roll my eyes and drop my head to the side at the journal, even though I know Henry can't see. When I focus back on the pages, new words have appeared:
"I can also see you, Lindsey. Must I now reprimand you on the etiquettes of body language?"
I put my hands up and shrug.
"The matters of your generation never cease to astound me.
"At least, your posture is quite better as compared to others of your age."
"All right..."
He really is my Great-Great Uncle, isn't he.
"Give her a break, Henry."
This time the handwriting isn't Henry's. The letters are of an average shape, as compared to Henry's small ones.
My eyebrows rise to my forehead, creating several ripples in it.
"Kathy, that's you. Right?"
"Yep. I didn't say anything before, so that I wouldn't blow my cover. Now you know, so I'm interrupting and making Henry sigh at my side."
"This is exactly why I only let you do more practical things.
"I presume you have already spoken to your maternal grandparents."
A brow of mine rises at the his sudden change and the sentence's certainty. He really seems to be be sure of my going there.
"Yep, and it went swimmingly."
Notes of Mary's lament find their way into my ears, and I shove them away before they can make me cloy my insides again.
"What do you wish to do next?"
The same brow still remains arched. "You ask as if I have a choice."
"There is almost always a choice, Lindsey; we humans sometimes cannot find it.
"What lies ahead is not at all wonderful."
"That's an understatement, really."
One hand that lies on my hip falls as I reiterate,
"Look you two, this is our family we're talking about. Or what's left of it, anyway."
The clock rumbles beside me, just as my arms wrap around my chest and my arched brow relaxes; though, my gaze remains transfixed on the new words scribbling themselves.
"Very well. Though, you still need to know why the gender of one child and birth order changed."
An eye of mine screws itself half shut as I add,
"You said you didn't know at the manor."
"I did not know then, and I am grateful for that.
"This information is better with only you knowing of it."
My chest exhales a deep breath, just as I catch sight of the same yellow object I saw before. It disappears after a few seconds.
"All throughout history, female birth has never been grey.
"It is either black or white;
It is either considered as a damnation or blessing.
"I think that is the reason of the variation."
"What does that have to do with it?"
I wave a hand, while cringing a bit at the 'damnation or blessing' part.
"Everything.
"In 1890, there were two brothers and one sister. The sister died, while one brother became immortal for the moment.
Isabelle's death damned and sealed the fate of the future Knightleys.
"Ever since then, no other woman was born into the Knightleys after Clarence, Matthew's daughter. Even Clarence's birth was possible because she was born before the curse.
"Our family has been plagued by the untimely deaths ever since, Lindsey.
Primrose, Fitzwilliam's wife and Matthew's daughter-in-law, died of childbirth.
Christopher and Amelia, your grandparents, also died before their time, along with your parents, Charles and Jennifer.
"As for the birth order, things complicate from there.
"First, the boy is born and two blessings follow suit: meaning that 'glee has returned' or 'past mistakes have been rectified.'
Yours and Kathleen's births were a blessing for the Knightleys, but a damnation for Meredith.
"Here, I only theorise:
Meredith wanted both you and Kathleen to die at the night of the accident, but 'fate' came in and Kathleen became a ghost and you are still alive and healthy."
A knock on the door interrupts our conversation, and Ms Bragge's voice passes through the wooden frame,
"It's time for supper, love."
I look down at the journal and it's still open.
"I'll be in the dining room in a few minutes!"
"All right, but who are you talking to?" worry coats her voice as it slides into my room.
"Ah- I'm revising home work out loud!"
Under the dim light of an orange lamp.
I imagine her nodding at my answer behind the door, and then her footsteps become fainter and fainter with the moments. The same yellow flashes again in the frame.
"You keep glancing at the frame. Do you see something?"
I blink at Henry's words, and turns towards the frame with Mum, Dad, Kathleen, Dylan and younger me smiling back. My constricted chest eases itself.
"Nothing."
"You see something yellow, do you not?
Two extra blondes, perhaps."
"How do you..."
"That is because I always saw yours and Dylan's blonde rather than brown in your childhoods, Lindsey.
"Tap twice on the frame glass, and you will see my meaning."
I keep staring at the journal, while my hand creeps its way to the frame on its own. I expect the glass to be cold against my thumb, but it's of moderate temperature.
My straight lips cast downward, as two springly fingers tap on the frame.
Mine and Dylan's hair, in the picture, turns from brown to blonde for a few seconds before vanishing completely.
"I've seen my baby pictures. Mine nor Dylan's hair's never changed colour. Then how did you see my hair that way?"
"That perplexed even me for quite some time. I only knew of yours and Dylan's hair being browm, by it being compared to your father's and grandfather's, respectively"
"Then when I became a ghost, I saw the same."
"After the accident, your sister and I saw yours and Dylan's hair darkening with the years till it turned to its original colour."
I press three fingers to my hair roots and bring forth a brown strand.
"What's going on here..."
"Do you know what sort of traits does the colour yellow exhibits?"
My fingers remain on the strand and a brow perks on my forehead.
"It means happiness, loyalty, innocence, clarity and caution even."
Oh look: five things again.
"But how is yellow a bad thing?" I interrupt my own thoughts
Imagining Henry giving me a nod, new words wander into the page:
"Exactly: Even the brightest flower may wilt with time."
"Lindsey!"
I look at the door and feel my grip loosening from the table.
"I think you ought to go now, but I must ask a question:
"Are you sure you want to come?
"You have only crossed half of the river. The other half may be marred with storms, silence and a toll price."
My eyes shut tight, such that only darkness appears in front of me; my heart acts as though it wants to crack my chest.
Should I or shouldn't I?
The grandfather clock strikes five times, as I answer Ms Bragge:
"Yes, I'm coming in a minute."
I whisper back at the journal,
"Why is there a toll price, anyway? We never paid any price to see all your memories."
"It's because these memories that you're going to see are neither Henry's nor mine. Loopholes may be convenient, but they come with a price."
A grunt follows suits, as my palms slap against my hips.
"The only possession I actually care for are Mum's ballet shoes. What can one do with them?"
"I don't know, but we all need to know your choice, Lindsey."
Mum's ballet shoes or saving everybody's lives. Including hers.
But they're what I've got left of her...
My usually straight shoulders hunch, while the clock beats again.
She would've wanted what was good for everyone...
The tip of my chin raises upwards while a new determination courses through my veins.
"I want to do it, and that's final."
"You ambition often reminds me of Isabelle. And it often frightens me, Lindsey."
I sigh, quoting the family motto,
"Ambition and Loyalty above all."
"Very well; remember your choices.
"Your sister and I shall endeavor to assist you in whatever way we can, no matter what.
"Also, your 'trigger' is 'Wake Up'."
"My trigger?"
"Your trigger is how I got you out of Meredith's manipulated dreams. Everyone has their own.
"Yours just happens to be the first phrase that your brother used to say to you every morning."
You act as though you don't even remember...
Meredith words find their way into my mind as Henry mentions something that I really can't remember now.
"Henry, was there ever anything between you and Meredith?" I say before my brain can even fathom what I've asked.
He takes a few minutes and his writing seems somewhat slower this time.
"There was and was not.
"Certain memories have been locked away, Lindsey; and they shall only unveiled by themselves."
I expect something else to come, but it doesn't. Heaving a sigh, my feet carry me out of the room.
For only one has to toll through East of Eden to reach the gardens of heaven.
I don't wanna live forever,
Because all this bad grammar is making me cringe
SURPRISE UPDATE, PEOPLE!
Why does everything related to Lindsey Striling's music have to be so pretty? I mean- I can keep staring at her videos' cinematography ALL DAY.
But then, I'm reminded of my finals.
The music above is 'Take Flight' by Lindsey Stirling(God, I sound like Phelba now). The video was just too fantastic for me to give just an audio link instead.
And my finals are also why this update is before Thursday(that is the exact starting date for me).
With that being said, TGD won't be updated next week. :'(
I do have chapters written; but they need a major editing operation, before I can actually post them.
A half-hearted update is worse than anything.
BUT UPDATES WILL BE BACK AFTER 7 JUNE!!!
All right, enough of that depressing stuff, let me share a fun bts fact with y'all today.
This chapter was originally going to be called 'Topaz in the Storm' and Henry's quote to be 'A topaz in the storm may darken with time.'
But then I thought that that didn't make sense, since my characters talk about flowers, not gemstones.
*notes that down for another story however*
Also, I once idea to make Lindsey's childhood hair blonde and then make her hair colour change when she enters puberty(yes, that actually happens. It is only a matter of pigment changes). But then I thought: Why should I go all science-y when I've got magic?
And:
"This is Henry."
"Kathleen."
Lindsey's thoughts.
P. S. Y'all might get a character-author convo when Meredith's chapters end.
It'll be with an entirely different character, this time. ;D
For compensation, the song below summarises the next chapter:
Sweet Ophelia- Zella Day
(P. P. S. If you find the vid confusing, then put in mind Ophelia from Shakespare's Hamlet. It makes way more sense then).
Now, onto this week's question:
How does this 'toll price' make you feel?
Let me what you think through the comments or drop down a vote(the latter is literally like a virtual pat in the back).
Warning: Do not beLIEve everything I say. *whistles*
Have a fantastic week!
Love,
MS Zame