Music Playing: "Yoisura" by Ikue Asazaki
It had been roughly two and a half years since I last spoke to the Mistress and Ryuuko has made many improvements. However, I would have to come terms with her abuse, the past, and the devastation left behind. That time came at what I would consider to be bittersweet and it would leave me asking questions for the rest of my life. Questions the answers to which would never come, however, I knew I would be left with some closure.
We caught wind of solemn news when Aikurou came one day. He told us that our mother wanted very much to see us. At first, we didn't know why but it would sink in soon enough. Instead of going to the asylum where she resided, we went to the hospital. For once, she didn't look or feel like the terrifying woman who gave birth to, raised, and abused us, instead, she looked like something fragile.
She was connected to medicines, machines, and IVs and her white hair was very thin. It took no words for us to realize the obvious. She was very sick and her time was borrowed from the machines, medicines, and IVs she was connected to. She wanted very much to make amends with us before her time was up and her time was running out. It was a shame really as she's had so much time and potential to be different, to be kind instead of cruel, and to give us a loving mother and normal life but it was gone, wasted, leaving behind an empty wish.
She opened her weak eyes and reached out her hand. Not knowing what else to do, we clasped it in ours. As she glanced off to the window, she smiled, asking, "You know I haven't much time, do you?" Tears poured from her eyes as she let out a bitter sob. While her cry was bitter, it had a twinge of acceptance. She accepted what was coming and she accepted the damage she's done, perhaps enabling her to die in peace.
She stopped crying and look at us, saying, "I'm so sorry, really I am. I know I have haven't been a very good mother, actually, I don't think I should even call myself that, after all, I can never make up for what I've done and, if I could do it all again, I would change everything. Neither time nor fate is on my side and, however, before I go, I want very much to tell you how much I repent for what I've done and to tell you, despite it all, I love you. Pity that I've waited too long to truly show it when I really should have done it back then."
Even though she didn't articulate it, Ryuuko seemed to have forgiven our mother despite the treatment she had given her. Despite it all, at the end of the day, she was still our mother and her youngest child, the one she's treated so cruelly and didn't even name, seemed to have understood that. Perhaps, she still yearned for her love in much the way that Nui or I really didn't seem to.
A few hours later, she slipped into a coma but, just as she was slipping, she turned to Ryuuko, saying, "Oh. 'Ryuuko', that's a pretty name." As we were leaving, Ryuuko hurried back to plant a kiss on her forehead, saying, "Bye, Mam." Not a few days afterwards, her illness had claimed her. We buried her alongside Rei and her funeral was a quiet but long one, one that would leave us musing.
As said before, she had so much time and potential, thus it was a pity that she didn't turn out different. I would never understand why she acted the way she did before she died but what I do know is that she wanted to accept what she's done, the damage she's caused, and to die knowing she at least got make amends with the daughters she's given birth to and wronged so much. She had died a victim of her own madness and, in her final moments, acknowledged how much she's loved us, her regrets, and redeemed herself. I would find myself weeping, crying about how much we've lost and what could have been.
In that moment, as I cried, I found I had forgiven her for all she's done, breaking that long psychological hold. I prayed that she would rest in peace.