California

By late afternoon, Hélène was relaxed enough to continue her emotional journey through Madeleine's life. How many times the story brought her close to tears, could not be counted. The guilt which accompanied each memory was held in check. To the mother's sad heart, Madeleine was a fun loving girl, talented, multifaceted and lost to both her parents in life, but not in memory.

As the narrative of her final days played out, Hélène asked Philippe to turn around and return home. The driving helped to restore some of her equilibrium. A brief glimpse of the water mammals reminded her that her daughter's spirit was also free. The dolphins, in their own way helped her to gather resources for the ending of the story. It had been many years since Hélène told the full story of Madeleine's final days.

They entered the house quietly, moving by mutual consent to the back. The view of the ocean from the gardens of Philippe's home seemed a fitting place to relate the details. The air, the water and the flowers somehow seemed to balance the horror of relating the details of the fire which eventually consumed the young girl's life.

'After I found out what Guy had done to my daughter, I was lost. On the day she finally spoke to me, it was because he begged her to have sex with him. For years before that he had already been touching her inappropriately. I didn't know. Madeleine never said a word. When she adopted the persona of the masked man, I wondered what prompted that change but I thought it was nothing more than her theatrics. As I think back now Philippe, I realize that she was probably so hurt by his betrayal. When she refused Guy's final advance, he got angry. The coward had the nerve to tell her it was ok because he was not her real father. That information was enough of a shock for her young mind and body never mind the careless seduction he used to manipulate her.

At first, she did not ask me about you. She only told me what happened between her and Guy. I immediately sent her to my mother. To my shame, I was not clear to her, about believing her. I did not ever think she was lying to me. Guy could be cruel but I never said "Madeleine I believe you". I just gave in to her demand to be taken away. I knew she would be safe with her grandmother. My parents adored her but they told her things and didn't understand how much it hurt my relationship with my daughter. Even if my mother didn't love you, she loved your child, Philippe.'

He nodded in grateful thanks remembering the subtle conflict between them. Hélène's mother was a tyrant who dominated her family. Philippe was certain that she understood his attraction to men and tried to steer her daughter away from pursing a relationship which would only end in disaster. Unfortunately, Madeleine Sr. pushed her daughter toward an unhealthy liaison with an abusive pedophile. Philippe wasn't sure what he would do with regard to Guy. His initial response had been to track him down but he realized that his responsibility was to Hélène, to hear her story and help bear her grief. Later he would tackle his feelings towards the sleazy husband. He turned his attention back to Hélène who was speaking slowly and in French.

'Madeleine spent quite a few months with my mother. I was paralyzed with fear and anger, two emotions I could not reconcile. I wanted to leave but the other children loved their father. He made every effort to be good to them, knowing that I would have a hard time if I separated from him. I could not support them on my own. I spoke to Madeleine every day but she refused to come home unless Guy left. When it became clear to her that he was not leaving, she came to see me early one morning. I was unprepared for what she told me.'

Hélène looked up, as if seeking permission to continue. Philippe nodded. He did not try to stop her or halt the tears which began to flow. He suspected that some of what she was about to say, had never been told.

'Madeleine was fifteen by then. She told me that Guy said was not her father. My daughter asked me point blank, what kind of woman I had been, who could love one man and marry another. She wanted to know why I took her away from you. She was sure you would have loved her without conditions. I could not deny anything because it was the truth. I know you would have been a good father. She said she was never coming back to live in the house as long as Guy was there'.

"You have made your choice Maman. Just tell me who and where my father is. Someday I will go to him and have a real family again."

'I felt the pain of her words to the very core of my heart. What could I say? I really didn't know where you were. I told her your name and recited our last conversation. You were on your way to New York. I think that's what you told me Philippe.'

Hélène waited for a confirming nod before taking a breath and continuing her narrative.

'Madeleine gave me a curious smile. I didn't know what lay behind her eyes. The mask she adopted for her performances had now become a part of her face. I could not read her. She said goodbye and hugged me for the first time in weeks. I thought maybe she had forgiven me and was planning to return home to visit more often. I felt a glimmer of hope. But, unknown to me, she was planning to leave all along.

After she walked out the door, there were many times during the course of that day when she had seemed so emotionally distant to me. My heart was in a turmoil about what I should do. At some point, I think I made up my mind to leave Guy. Later that day, with the plan not even concrete in my mind and, on an impulse, I called my mother to check on her. Maman told me Madeleine was not there.'

"Hélène, she packed her bag this morning and said she was returning home. She told me that she misses her siblings".

'Mon Dieu! My heart began to race immediately. It didn't take me long to figure out that Madeleine had already left to find you. She lied to me and my mother to give herself time to get away. I was in a state. I called the police but they refused to help me. It was too early they said. She couldn't be designated as missing until 24 hours. Guy was nervous also and did not support me. I even suspected him of kidnapping her and doing harm to her because he was obviously trying to cover up for himself.'

Hélène sat in a chair and started rocking her body. Philippe longed to hold her but refrained from getting closer. He could see the emotional zone into which Hélène retreated while relating the story. Her body and actions told him so much more than the words. He knew she would reach out to him if needed.

'Hours stretched into days and days to weeks. It was clear that she had crossed the border. It was not so hard to do in those days but I think she needed to have an adult with her. Someone was responsible for transporting her, but I will never know who.

As the weeks became months, I started to lose all hope. I didn't know anything about the American side. We never watched the news from there but when the police came to see me, I was shocked to know that there had been a few hostels along the route 89, which took in kids, mostly runaways who were heading south. They had few rules and regulations. Most were just old farmhouses turned into cheap money making ventures. Most of them were deemed to be unsafe.

Many of the kids were smokers and drug abusers. Apparently, someone accidentally started a fire. There was no alarm and no sprinklers. The structure quickly burned to the ground trapping the kids inside. Madeleine had been there. The bodies which had been trapped on the upper floor were huddled together in death and unrecognizable. Her few things were found among the ashes.

You saw the necklace among her things. It had been my only gift from you. When she was leaving me that morning, I asked her to wait. I went to my room and took the necklace from my jewelry box. 'La voici' I said. 'This is all I have of your father. Keep it and wear it. Perhaps it will help you to feel close to him. If she didn't have it, I would never have known where she was. My only consolation was the knowledge that least her death was a release from her turmoil and for me a relief from the constant worry but as you can imagine, I have been haunted for years by the vision of her in the fire.'

Philippe said nothing for awhile. They had talked before. Some of the story was not a surprise. In the quiet following her revelations, Philippe tried to recall the moment when he gave the necklace as a gift. They were in their third year of university. It was Hélène's twenty-first birthday. A group of them had gone to their favourite club. They were not performing but Hélène went on stage with the local band and sang her heart out, thrilling everyone. Philippe had not planned to give her a gift. They were all 'poor' students with little money to spare so friendship was the gift they shared with each other. The necklace had belonged to his mother. In a moment of weakness, he removed it from his neck and wrapped it around her own, partly because she was lovely and partly because her singing moved him to another dimension of delight. He did not know at the time that Hélène was more thrilled by the chaste kiss which accompanied the necklace. She couldn't tell him how long she had waited for him to declare some feeling for her. As if she could divine his thoughts, Hélène looked up at that moment.

'Did you ever really love me Philippe?'

'I have loved you more than any other woman except my mother. I still love you but never in the way that can make you happy. I would have been a better husband to you than Guy. I would have been a better father to our daughter but I could never have been completely happy and you would not have been either.'

'I see that now. I know too that I would have been heartbroken if you did not return my love. With Guy, I didn't care. Your love for Vladimir astounds me and yet I see that you are happy.' Hélène looked away for a moment. 'Our daughter is dead. We have nothing more to share. What now Philippe?'

'We want to introduce you to the family Hélène. I hope you will always feel like you are a part of us. Then, I wish you to meet my protégé who sings so badly, but writes beautiful music. Let us be together for a few more weeks. When I went into the box, her childish heart stories and the few trinkets drew me to her. But, in the necklace, there is an energy. When I touch it, it says to me "don't let her go. Find me, please find me". This makes no sense but if there is more to the story, things even you don't know, let's give ourselves a chance to discover it together.'

Philippe went on to talk about the plan for a simple dinner party with Vladimir's son and wife, and a few close friends. Hélène was agreeable. They passed the remainder of the afternoon discussing Philippe's protégé.

Vladimir returned home to find them seated almost as he had left them in the morning and yet he knew that so much had discussed. The shadows, deepening the lines on the face of his partner, had disappeared.

New York

Catherine sat in the large SUV in stunned silence. She managed a slight smile to reassure Rob but her heart rate was almost stifling with its irregular tattoo. She willed it to silence its pounding in her ears. The story! The incredible story of Diana's fight for Jacob's life, his recovery from the hands of Gabriel and the freedom almost denied to Vincent shocked her into silence. She could not in a million years imagine that her own life had been so brutalized by the monster Gabriel. Catherine was shocked by Diana's persistence in searching, not just for Jacob, but also Vincent who had given himself up, in hopes of saving his child's life. What was even more shocking was the knowledge that Jacob had seen the videos of his mother's captivity and his birth. Catherine wondered if he would hate her for not fighting longer, waiting longer to see if Vincent would come and save them.

Allowing access to the blocked channel into her past was revelatory. It opened like a festering wound and once flowing with its incessant poison, it continued to pour out the worst memories of those months of waiting and waiting for the superhuman lover to save her. Catherine was angry, then sad in turns, just as she had been throughout the pregnancy. In all her life, including the death of her mother and father, she never felt so alone as she had in those weeks before the birth of her son.

The contemplation of all it meant disturbed her. She felt anger inside but it should not be directed towards her husband. In retrospect, he had been weakened by an illness brought on by Pater's interference in his life. His memory was blunted by the fever which ravaged his body. His strength had been weakened. Catherine recalled that their emphatic connection was lost. Vincent could not even remember her name much less cope with the news of her impending pregnancy. He even lacked the strength to fight for their relationship.

Bits and pieces had been strung together in her mind. It became quickly apparent that Vincent had been very selective in recounting the historical events to his recovering wife. At Catherine's insistence, Diana was not. It was clear that they had been lucky but what a debt of gratitude Catherine owed to the woman who was able to extract revenge and save father and son. The feelings she felt for Diana began to ebb and flow in her heart. How misguided she had been. Diana could not have saved Vincent if she didn't love him. Catherine was suddenly and inexplicably tearful about the love which passed between her husband and his friend.

'Rob, don't take me home just yet. I need to think and I have to do it alone.'

'Is there somewhere you want me to take you Catherine?'

Both hands were wrapped around her face. Catherine thought of the few places where she could go to find comfort. There weren't many. She still had not reconnected with many of her old friends.

'Just drive around for now, I don't care where. I'll let you know.'

Catherine watched the stores pass by outside the window. She kept her mind blank before allowing selective thoughts to enter her consciousness. It was quite a while before she pulled out the shiny new cell phone which Jacob had insisted on giving her. A few numbers had been programmed into its keypad. She scrolled down the list wondering who would be the kindest soul. Of all the people to call, Vincent would have been the best person to offer comfort to his wife. Catherine felt that her lack of understanding, about the true nature of their twenty five year odyssey made her seem very selfish indeed. Considering everything he went through it was a wonder that Vincent still loved her at all. She would not burden him further with her foolishmess.

One thing Catherine understood right away was the need to calm herself. She hoped that her husband's preoccupation with the flooding water channels below would distract him from her very real distress. Jacob was another matter. She pleaded with some unknown force to give her strength to hold the rising distress within the confines of the car. Like a reprieve, the name she most trusted scrolled up on her phone. Without hesitation, she dialed the number.

'Catherine? What on earth? Are you alright?'

'I am not in trouble if that's what you are asking. I need a friend. I can think of none better. Where are you?'

'As luck would have it, I am in Manhattan today. Tell Rob or Carl to take you to my apartment. I'll meet you there.'

Catherine sighed and hung up the phone. She gave Rob his instructions and settled back in her seat. Within minutes of completing her call she received one from Jacob.

His anxious voice increased her sense of guilt.

'I am fine son, really. I had a great afternoon with Diana. I am stopping in Manhattan to do a bit of shopping. I'll see you at home later.'

'Are you sure Mama?'

Catherine could hear the pleading for a truth she could not express. She chose to ignore it. Jacob had already worried about her enough. He needed to get on with his own life. She suppressed her natural inclination to mother him and ended the call.

Less than thirty minutes later she was seated in the sterile living room of her childhood friend Patrick.

'You always seem to come to my rescue these days.'

'It is hardly enough to make up for years of leaning on you Catherine. Tell me' he said handing her a cup of tea, 'what is troubling you?'

'I was confronted with a past I hardly wanted to remember.'

Patrick's eyes asked the obvious question.

'My missing life is here to remind me that I am old, well older. Much of it was spent without the love and support of my husband and son. Guilt plays a big part in my being here with you now instead of them, but I mostly feel disconnected from the made-up fantasy of those missing years and the truth of what actually happened. Today doesn't feel real. I picked up where I left off, but I didn't really. Neither my son nor his father hate me for not being with them since the beginning, but I hate myself.'

'Come on Catherine. You know how I feel about hate. You are, in reality, the luckiest woman alive.'

'Yes but why don't I feel it Patrick. My aging body has only just woken up to it's new life, not because I have a profound sense of self but because it has begun its decline into old age before it had a chance to be young and happy. How can I face reality like that?'

Patrick sat on the couch and gathered his friend into a warm embrace. 'Tell me what you found out today which has brought on this sense of aging?'

'It isn't just today. Since the wedding I have been playing with youth as if the years didn't matter. Every time I turn around I am reminded that I did live those years but where are they? Will they ever exist for me? I thought I wanted to know about all the things which happened but now I don't know.'

'You are grieving for those lost years Catherine. It is a natural circumstance of your coma. Are you thinking in terms of what if this and what if that?'

'I am.'

'It's futile. Your present is what it is. You can't alter the circumstances of the last twenty-five years, no matter how hard you try.'

'I would like to alter them but I know I can't. It would help me to know them again, see them in perspective.'

'You son is blessed with the capacity to do this for you. Why don't you ask him?'

'He has been without me too. He suffered all those years we were apart. So did Vincent. If my life was not good, we will all feel the burden of it.'

'Sharing it may release you from the self imposed prison of it as well.'

'I'm scared Patrick.'

'Don't be. Your faith in the love you share with this incredible man is unshakeable. Whatever you think about your experience, his love will never falter.'

Patrick went on to give more reassurances. He could feel Catherine's tension lessen.

'What brings you out today anyway?' he asked finally.

'You know, I forgot all about my reasons for going to see Diana in the first place. Howie is worried about his community committee. I am realizing that the woman who is heading it does not fit the profile of a community leader. I wanted to ask about her.'

'Fishing or investigating?'

'Neither today. I was reliving,' Catherine said derisively.

'Listen Catherine, Howard has some brilliant ideas and his heart is in the right place but he also has people around him who are unscrupulous. Be careful. You are hardly in a state of mind to be looking for trouble.'

Catherine looked up startled. 'Do you mean that?'

Patrick's nod was firm. Far from discouraging Catherine, the worried look only generated more impetus to get to the bottom of Susana's involvement in a project which held little interest for her.

Catherine thanked her friend for his support. Feeling calm and thoughtful, she left the building. The glance she gave Rob, pleaded with him to be the soul of discretion.