Chapter 8.
The grass swayed around her as she stared up at the stars in the sky. She found herself recounting all the myths for all the constellations she could name and making up stories for the ones that she couldn't quite remember.
She was distracting herself. Telling herself that Adam was lying. She would have known if she'd had a child. Especially with Brennan. These were the fake memories. The ones Adam had unleashed. They were wrong. She never could have forgotten her own child. She wasn't her mother. She wasn't. She closed her eyes and breathed in the scent of the flowers around to calm herself down.
She'd found this place the day after they had moved in. She'd seen a rat behind one of the cabinets in the kitchen that she was trying to patch up and she had found herself so mad at Brennan that if she didn't cool down soon she probably would have really injured him. So she had gone for a walk and she found this. She'd been walking through the tall grass figuring they would now have to buy a lawn mower when she had stumbled across it literally. It was a hollow about eight feet in diameter and was completely filled with forget-me-nots. None of the grass could grow in the hollow it was so full of the tiny blue flowers.
Shalimar smiled. The flowers scent calmed her mind and body. It relaxed her. For the first time in her entire life she felt comfortable in her won skin. She could forget she was a new mutant. Different from everyone else. She just was. All the pain that she had felt as a child unloved and as a teenager teased and tormented and as a broken and damaged adult was healed and forgotten here. In this fairy ring.
Shalimar's eyes opened and she bit the inside of her mouth as one of the memories Adam had given her surfaced. Her eyes slid shut again in pain.
FLASH
The sun was beating down gently and the wind pulled playfully at her hair as she attempted to give her daughter her first picnic outside.
"Look, Emma, a butterfly" she said as she picked her daughter up out of the carrier and set her down on the blanket she'd already laid out over the grass. She watched in amusement as the tiny bundle of purple crawled after the monarch that was fluttering from buttercup to buttercup.
Smiling softly to herself she turned to the basket beside her and began to set out the food she had packed for herself and the baby jars she'd packed for Emma.
Glancing over she saw that Emma was almost off the blanket and she crawled over and deftly picked up the infant and plopped back down on the checkered blanket with her in her lap.
"Now, Emma, if I let you go will you stay on the blanket like a good baby?" she asked her daughter with laughter in her voice. She was a perfect blend of her and Brennan. Dark curls framed a heart shaped face that had shocking golden eyes that stared out at you. The tiny bundle cooed in response to her question and Shalimar laughed as she set her back down on the blanket and went back to setting up the
picnic.
A few minutes later she found what she had initially been looking for and turned around to give Emma her bottle of juice.
"Emma, I've got some yummy yummy apple juice for you....Emma?" Shalimar took in the empty blanket and surged to her feet. "Emma!"
Frantically she searched the grass surrounding the blanket as she turned in circles.
"Emma! Baby where are you?" she called out almost hysterically. She heard a twig snap behind her in the direction of the trees and raced towards the sound swearing she would kill whoever took her daughter.
When she reached the forest she stood and listened for another clue. When none came she panicked.
"Please give me back my baby. Please." she sobbed.
The tree limbs to her right swayed and Shalimar spun around to face...
"Brennan! What the fuck! Why would you do that!" she asked furiously as she plucked their daughter out of his arms and headed back to the picnic area.
Looking ashamed and guilty he followed her and sat down beside her on the blanket while she held Emma's juice bottle for her.
"Shal. I'm sorry. I know that won't fix it but I am sorry. I just. I don't know....Shal I am worried about you. You never let Emma out of your sight. It won't kill you to leave her with someone else and take a couple hours off."
"I know that Brennan...I do. I just can't." she replied honestly.
He sighed, "Well you have to. Tonight Adam is going to watch both Iain and Emma because he needs us to go and follow up on a lead he received on a new mutant. No arguments."
"Fine," she smiled slightly for his benefit. "No arguments. I just feel weird Brennan...like something bad is going to happen."
END FLASH
In the hollow Shalimar frowned and opened her eyes. Something bad did happen dammit! Adam stole my child that night. And then he forced me to forget Emma. He turned me, completely involuntarily, into my own mother. How dare he! How dare he think he had that right!
Shalimar stood up and started for the house at a neck-break speed. I want my baby back. Now.
Continued in Chapter 9...