Author's Note: I tried a different approach to my writing this time. I tried chronicling the life of Ruby more than just focus on one death or one showing of mortality. Because the truth is, death and mortality occurs throughout our entire lives, not just in one moment. This is my entry into the Village Square Forum contest- this month's theme being: Death/Mortality. Being the angsty author that I am, this was rather simple to come up with the basic idea and make it as traumatic as I could. Working out the entire story and writing it actually took me several days. Oh well- I feel like I have a shot. Good luck to all other contestants too!
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Life was difficult. Life was confusing. Life was agonizing and unfair and unjust and awful and anything else you might want to throw in there. It didn't truly matter what you called it, for it was everything and nothing. Angel and Demon. Heaven and Hell. Order and Chaos.
There are certain things in life that should never be forced upon a human being. Burdens never meant for mortals to carry. But I guess the gods messed up pretty badly for me. If there even were any gods. Because if there was one thing I was sure of was that no god or goddess or guardian angel had ever bothered with me.
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From the beginning, my life was rough. Living on the streets of the city, begging others for spare coins and rations. But of course they never would look at us, let alone help us. I got my first job when I was six years old. Six years old and I was already exposed to the hardships in life.
My father was an alcoholic and compulsive gambler. Any money any of us had ever earned was wasted on a beer and a good time. Love was nothing but a myth to him.
My mother...she had left us early on. She died in childbirth with my youngest sibling, my brother Thai, who died shortly afterwards. She had loved all of us dearly, but love wasn't enough to save her.
Then was my sister, Kin. She was the spitting image of my mother and had her personality to boot. But she was taken. I remember the day clearly. I was eighteen and we had finally been able to afford a cramped apartment that was selling for dirt cheap. It was her fourteenth birthday and as she blew out the final candle, these men barged into the room. They took her. Grabbed her and dragged her away to a group home for girls with unreliable parents. I pleaded for them to let her stay but they refused, knocked me to the floor and spat upon me. Told me I was a weak sister who would never see her sister again. Kin's words still sting in my ears as they dragged her out- "Mommy! Help me!"
I ran after her. I ran for miles and miles, searching every street and alleyway to find any trace of her. But I never found anything. No clue. No hint as to her existence.
That night was the same night I met Tim. I had collapsed on the sidewalk, burying my hands in my face and sobbing. He put his firm hand on my shoulder and wiped away my tears. Told me it would be all right. Hugged me tight and soothed me until dawn broke over the skyline. I had found someone to love me unconditionally.
---
It wasn't long before we were married. We loved each other dearly and that was all that mattered to us. We both were broken and we had found someone who helped glue the pieces back together again.
It was a simple wedding with only the necessities. A pastor Tim had met during his worldly travels agreed to wed us and I wore a rather plain white dress and Tim a bland tuxedo. But no one seemed to care. After all, there was barely fifty people there, a majority of them being people Tim knew.
My sister never showed. I had tracked down her address online and sent her multiple invitations. Yet she never came. She never saw one of the most memorable moments in my life. And I wept, for now, I had no maid of honor.
---
I was pregnant. Tim rejoiced, but I was uneasy. Was it from my husband or...him? When I had woken up and had barely enough strength to make it out of bed, he knew something was wrong. When Dr. Hardy announced my pregnancy, I knew something was wrong. When the doctor questioned who the father was, we all knew something was wrong.
I had never spoken about it before. I tried with all of my might to block the memory out of my mind. But it would occasionally resurface and rear its ugly head once again.
Shortly after Tim and I were married, we had settled down in the tranquil town of Forget-Me-Not Valley. But I still had my job in the city. One day, as I was commuting to work, a man grabbed me from behind and brought me into an alleyway. ...The rest was understood without needing to say a single word.
My husband embraced me as I cried and told me he didn't care whether or not the boy was his son or not, he would love it like his own. When I asked for forgiveness, he nodded without a word. I knew he was hurt but he was too loving to ever say it.
---
Pregnancy frightened me. I could deal with morning sickness and the cramps and the sudden exhaustion. It was the actual birth I was worried about. My mother had died in childbirth- was I any less susceptible? No, for we were all mortal and we could all die just as easily as anyone else.
The birth itself was difficult. My labor was unusually painful and inexplicably long, as the doctor told me. But I prevailed through the storm. And at the end, I held my darling baby boy in my arms. Tim and I named him Thai after my deceased brother. We hoped his fate would be better than my brother's. Boy were we wrong.
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Time seems to fly when you raise a child. The days speed by and before you know it, you find yourself face to face with a child that can walk and talk as easily as you can.
Innocence is their essence, purity coursing through their veins. A radiant aura seemed to glow from all around children, especially at his age. Thai was six years old, yet our lifestyles at that time in our lives were near polar opposites. I was a homeless bum with hopeless parents and a family I was forced to support on my own. He had not a care in the world, freely traversing the valley and playing with whoever had some spare time.
Tim and I did not earn enough money from our jobs to send Thai to any sort of school, public or private. Not to mention, if we did have him attend school, he would need to go to the city due to the fact that the town had no school of its own. So I quit my job (they were going to fire me eventually anyways, right?) and home schooled my son.
Thai was always a quick learner. He learned to talk in half the time that most children had, and walking seemed second nature to him. His studies were no different. We often finished early and would play in our tiny outside garden.
I would chase him around the yard and he would laugh that melodic giggle of his. It was so sweet and lovely, it sounded as if music were played each time a chuckle graced his lips. Oh how I loved that laugh. Too bad it disappeared so quickly.
"I love you, Mommy..."
---
I had heard from pretty much every parent I'd ever met that the teenage stage was the worst. To be honest, I laughed at them. My Thai rebellious? Ha! What a ruse. ...I wish rebellious was the worst of what he was.
"Shut up, Dad!" he screamed, his muddy brown eyes flaring with a fierce determination. His hands were clenched into fists and he was steadily getting closer to his father with every word. "What do you know?"
What did Tim know? That was not the right question to ask him. Tim knew much more than anyone else. He had faced so many hardships and tribulations in his life, so many cuts and bruises, Thai had no right to ask such a ridiculous question.
"What do I know? You have no idea what your Mother and I," I cringed, "have gone through to give you a nice home with good food and warm clothes! Have you ever thought to stop and think about something like that? Ask yourself, when was the last time you thanked us for all the things we've given up to support you?" It was one of the rare moments when my spouse raised his voice, and that meant there was bound to be trouble.
Thai shot me a glare and I winced and mouthed 'sorry' to him but he shook his head and scoffed. "Yes, Daddy, thank you so much for moving us to this hick town where I am tutored by my uneducated mother and play with all of my friends- oh wait! There aren't any kids here for me to be friends with!" He retorted bitterly, his voice raising to a shout as well.
Tim fumed, his face beet red with anger. Now Tim was one of the most peaceful men I'd ever met in my entire life. He wouldn't dare to hurt a fly unless it was hurting me. But that was the problem. Right now, Thai was hurting me and Tim knew it.
I watched as he raised his hand and smacked my son across the face. He fell to the floor and lay there, sprawled across the carpet, clutching his aching skin. Tears welled up in the corner of his eyes as he stared back at his father. Running out of the room he screamed back at us,
"I wish I were dead!"
I sank to the floor and wept. That was one of the biggest mistakes we, as a family, could have ever made and we knew it as soon as it had happened. I saw the regret glittering in my husband's eyes as he held me. We both knew we could never take that back and God only knew what doing that held in store.
"I hate you, Mom..."
---
Times had been tough back then. The Inner Inn, a lodge Tim and I had set up in the village, was not doing as well as we thought it would. We only had one resident- a redhead traveler by the name of Nami. Money was tight and the tension was thick.
I knew that this was inevitable. That's why I was surprised, but not shocked that it had finally happened. For deep down, I knew he would act on his emotions sooner or later.
When I came home from delivering some food to a family in Mineral Town and the house was quiet, I figured Thai was studying or reading. When I knocked on his door and he didn't answer, I figured he was asleep. When I opened the door and found him dead on his floor, I figured I had failed him.
It's a gruesome sight to behold, your own son slaughtered right in front of you. I still don't wish to speak of it. The entire thing was still a bit of a blur to me. I think I screamed, or maybe I just collapsed on the floor and bawled until I had dried myself of tears. And maybe it had been minutes. Or hours. Or days. But when Tim found the two of us lying side by side, a knife sticking out of his son's chest, he gasped and fell to the floor.
He pounded on the floor, screeching "Why?! Why?! WHY?! Why have you forsaken me, Harvest Goddess?!" He pressed his face into his palms and cried like I had. We laid in solemn silence for what felt like years. We couldn't move for an even longer period. It felt as if we were paralyzed throughout our entire bodies.
It wasn't until the moon shone through the window and we heard Nami returning from her night at the bar that we mustered up enough energy to pick ourselves off of the floor. Tim rushed downstairs to call the police, though we both knew he was long gone. I searched for a clue. A hint. A note as to why this had happened, even though deep down I knew exactly why.
It wasn't until the police had come and several doctors had come to attempt to save him and give us their condolences that I noticed a ripped piece of parchment attached to his mirror. On it were words scrawled in deep red ink (at least that's what I hoped it was):
"Why didn't you protect me, Mommy?"
---
It's been quite a long time since then. I don't cry anymore. At least, not as easily as I once had. I hadn't quite moved on, per se, but I'd gotten better. The Inn was flourishing quite a bit, as villagers from Mineral Town would come and visit daily and stay here. But Tim and I didn't truly care too much for money anymore.
Today would've been his twentieth birthday. Winter 19th- a day when the land was frozen and blanketed in heavy, cold snow. I stared into the mirror that had held the secrets of his suicide as if, somehow, someway, he would be able to see me looking for him in the reflection.
"Happy birthday, honey." I whispered, my voice barely audible even to myself. I set a bouquet of white roses down onto the dresser beneath the mirror and gazed absentmindedly into the glass. "Mommy is so, so sorry, Thai..."
"Hi, Mom." I gasped. That voice, that enchanting singsong melody could only belong to him. And then, at last, I saw his reflection in the mirror. His raven black hair, his hypnotizing brown eyes and his forlorn expression.
I let a single tear escape from my eyes and I felt his arms surround me in an embrace. I choked on silent sobs and he gripped me tighter. "I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry."
I knew who this illusion truly was. The boy I once thought was Thai had transformed into my new son, Rock. It had merely been a trick of the mind, a flicker of the light, a longing of the heart. I had yearned for it to be him and out of that longing, my heart had deceived me.
I once was broken. A fragment of a once-beautiful porcelain doll that had shattered. I once thought I was invincible. When Tim and Thai and I were together, like one big happy family, I thought that nothing and no one could ever touch me.
But now I know how fragile the heart truly is. You can polish it to make it shine, make it seem as if it were the most valuable of jewels, but with a mere slip of the hand, a glitch in the process, you can lose everything you worked so hard to obtain in one fell swoop. Mortals were never meant to lead perfect lives- if we were, there would be no gods or goddesses. But I think it's time to accept God back into my life, even if just to try it. For you, Thai.
I have to move on. I have to, I have to, I have to. If not, I'll never go anywhere with my life. I regret not being able to tell you this while you were still with us, Thai, but it's better late than never...
Mommy loves you, Thai. And I'm sorry I couldn't protect you.