Author's note: Here comes the new fic; it won't be as light as the last ones I have written. It has a lot of angst but chapter after chapter, I will add sweet scenes that will lead to Rizzles. I hope you will enjoy it nonetheless. Reviews are more than welcome.
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"And you'll sit beside me, and we'll look, not at visions, but at realities." Edith Wharton
April
Chapter One – She Would Have Turned Thirteen
"Jane...?"
Maura's voice softly embraced her. It passed underneath her skin then rushed to her heart to make it beat faster. She opened her eyes. The endless ribbon of gray asphalt had melted into an impressive – almost intimidating – monochrone of green. They were surrounded by trees, immense ones.
"We have arrived."
She must have fallen asleep at some point, rocked by the purring of the car and the music that played on the radio.
Bitter miracle. A glimpse of logic in a life that didn't make much sense anymore. She hadn't slept in days and when her body seemed to succumb to an inevitable fatigue, her brain betrayed her playing tricks that kept on making her shiver. Nightmares, flashbacks. A whole series of scenarios that made her fight against the dark.
A metallic sound put a definitive end to her slight lethargy. The trunk. Maura had opened it and was already taking suitcases out of it. Their suitcases. Her suitcases.
The moment she put her two feet on the ground, the quietness of the alley deafened her. It was too loud for someone who had grown up in a city. She missed the buildings, the sound of the cars. The murmur of the wind in the trees and the lapping of the lake a bit further were not friendly. She hurried up and brought their suitcases up to a covered porch that ran length of the cabin. The sun was already going down. What time was it?
Maura opened the sliding doors and stepped in. The halo of a lamp slid on the wooden floor of the porch and the first mayflies appeared, dancing their frenzied waltz; feeding themselves of the light. Jane observed them for a while then swept them away with a gesture of the hand.
She didn't bother to check the rest of the cabin. As soon as she came in, she put the last suitcases down by the door and went to sit on an old couch. The decoration was extremely rustic: a stoned wall – wood everywhere – and an old wood-burning stove in a corner. There was no television. No phone either.
"What would you like to eat?"
She took a deep breath and closed her eyes. Maura's cheerful voice went on her nerves. She envied her energy; her desire to be alive and enjoy every single minute of it. She had herself lost any kind of interest in all these things.
"I'm not hungry." A whisper, barely audible; the ghost of the hoarse voice that had been hers, once.
"You still have to eat something."
She couldn't care less. She lay down in a fetal position on the couch and stubbornly stared straight in front of her.
She hadn't asked for all this.
As a matter of fact, she hadn't asked for anything. She had been forced to leave Boston, to leave everything behind; all her references. Why should she make an effort? She knew that Maura wouldn't take it personally. It wasn't about her, it was about a thousand things.
"Fine. Then pasta it will be."
They ate in silence, sitting at a small table in the kitchen corner. Like two miserable souls, surrounded by this defeaning silence that was becoming more and more oppressive.
Sometimes, she wished she could speak if only to reassure Maura; to let her know that it would be alright. But she didn't manage to do so. Instead, she kept on focusing on what she was supposed to forget. A complex machine set off by then and she started analyzing every single detail with a crazy meticulousness. The passing of the time had become her worst ennemy.
Why was she – Jane – still alive when the other one had stopped breathing?
She would have turned thirteen on Friday. It came back to Jane's mind like a cruel lullaby of some sort; a poem that dug deeper and deeper wounds in her heart.
She would have turned thirteen but instead of presents – instead of a cake, instead of laughter – tears would be running down people's cheeks for her not being here anymore. And it was her fault – Jane's fault – if a whole family drowned in a sorrow that nothing would ever manage to heal.
"It is still early. I would love going for a little walk by the lake. What do you think?" Chin leaned on the back of her hands, Maura let a hopeful smile light up her features.
She tried, she really did.
In vain, though.
"You can go, I'll stay here."
She didn't want to go out. She didn't want to witness the world that kept on turning after what she had done. She didn't want to take part in it anymore. She didn't deserve it.
Physically, she is fine. Her body is functionning. It is her soul – her conscious and her subconcious – that is bruised. Heavily bruised. She needs to work on it, to accept that it will take time and that it will never be the same ever again. The trauma never really goes away. Patients simply learn how to live with it, how to control it. Jane will get there too. One day. She needs all the support she can have. She needs you more than ever right now.
Maura had replied to the psychiatrist by a silent nod and – after a long conversation with Angela and the others – she had put a plan into action.
She had taken a leave – had found the cabin – and had prepared everything with meticulousness. They wouldn't go very far, anyway. Not really.
Yet the moment she stepped outside on the covered porch after dinner and she looked at the waters of the lake glimmer under the moonlight, doubts began to invade her.
What if she had taken the wrong decision? What if something happened here? They were in the middle of nowhere. The closest town – Greenville – could only be reached by car. Of course, the landlords of the cabins were nearby but still, she barely knew them and they completely ignored the reason why she and Jane had come here in the first place.
She swallowed hard and leaned against the guardrail to observe the mountains through the crown of the trees. Fifty acres of woods and nature trails were currently surrounding them. The terrain varied from deep woods with meandering streams, to lush raspberry and wildflower fields, to glades with unbeatable views of the lake and moutains. They would go on top of Mount Kineo and rush through the pristine wilderness river gorge of the Kennebec.
Jane would love whitewater rafting.
But one thing at a time.
Maura turned around and looked at her friend inside the cabin. Jane was back in a fetal position on the couch, a strong fragility emanating from her frame that suddenly looked so petite.
"Come on, let's go to bed."
Maura slid the door closed and waited for Jane to stand up. It was a two-bedroom cabin but there was no way she would let her friend sleep alone as much as 'sleep' was very theoretical. Jane barely slept. They walked in silence to the master bedroom and let the night ceremonial carry them to bed. The silence was almost monastic, pure. Full of uncertainty and fears.
"Don't turn the light off." Huddled against herself, Jane clutched to the blanket. "Please."
"I won't."
Maura had brought a dozen of books. She hadn't taken any tablet as the cabin didn't have WIFI and could only support basic appliances. She had put everything into parenthesis; for Jane. But then she would have put the whole world into parenthesis if she had been able to do so.
She would have quit her job, would have moved on the other side of the world. Anything. She would have done anything to see Jane smile again and get back a taste for living.
With all the care in the world, she slid under the blanket and slowly took Jane in her arms. Inch by inch. A brusque movement – a second of inattention – and they made a step backwards. She couldn't afford that.
She only relaxed once she felt Jane's own body relax in her embrace. Two fragile souls lost in an immense bed. She looked by the window but couldn't see anything. It was pitch dark. The lights of the city had never seemed so far.
Welcome to Moosehead Lake, Maine.
Enjoy the wilderness setting of the largest lake mountain of the eastern USA.
Give your family and friends the true gift of an unforgettable adventure together.
The text had been embroidered in emerald green then framed before being hung on the wall opposite the bed. Little moose had been embroidered as well, one at each corner of the text.
Maura closed her eyes – took a deep breath – and delicately tightened her grip on Jane, trying to ignore the little voice in her head that kept on repeating the same question over and over: what were they doing here?
Why did it have to happen?
Her name was Hannah. She was born in Boston and lived in Back Bay. She had a big brother and a dog named Jupiter. Two loving parents. She would have turned thirteen on Friday. Now all was left of her was endless tears and an epitaph which marble insolently shone in the sunlight of the cemetery. Because of Jane.
It was Jane who had made her bleed until she stopped breathing.