I have been having exams so I have been in a bit of a dormant mode up to now. First, I'd like to say that chapter 18 will be out on youtube soon! It isn't exactly easy reading so I decided to read it out.

As for this chapter, I quite love it, it wasn't easy to write, and I hope you enjoy it. Keep some tissues handy. Review!

XXI. Chère Maman

Cold, stone cold are the walls in my prison. When she spoke these words, some of the few she ever spoke, she sang them. And when she sang them, she did not know how she knew the music; she did not know that it was a nursery rhyme about the twinkling lights that shined in the sky, twinkling at her through the bars, at night. She only knew that someone loved her. He loved her because he had told her, he had whispered in her ear.

It was not a pleasant memory; and yet, nightmares are only nightmares if one has dreams to counter them. She had none of them, and thus, all memories were one to her, all nightmares one dream.

And yet, she shuddered with revulsion when she relived the moment. She knew he loved her – for he had said it, is it not so? Did words not offer consolation from the eternal silence and emptiness, the detached numbness that buzzed in her head like a relentless insect one cannot shoo away? His breath had been hot against her neck, hot and repulsive. His entire body too heavy to shift, especially when her hands had been somehow pinned above her head…She remembered screams, though she did not realize that they were her own. And she remembered his heavy hand grip her by the hair and push her head to the side, whispering, I love you. She remembered the cries of a baby, growing more and more distant by the second, until she stood up and ran to the door, pounding it with her fists, for the cries were so close, so close…

A baby, there is a baby crying, she would say, panting, struggling against the hands holding her down, and they, the owners of those hands, those hard, unfeeling hands, hurled insults at her, told her to stop before she was dead. There is no baby, they would say. You're imagining things. And yet, was it indeed her imagining things? Or was it everyone else pretending in order to uphold a reality they were used to? The baby's cry always came from the right side of the room. From the mouse-hole in the wall. And by night, when the moon rose and cast its pale shine on the barren floors, she would kneel at the mouse-hole and scrape at it with her nails, until her hands bled.

In the morning she would see red marks, red finger-marks around the mouse-hole, and weep for whatever shed that blood, whatever creature, big or small. Weep for the mouse, killed by the cat.

Morning was her favourite time, because of those curious twittering songs of the creatures outside, the creatures with wings, green and grey, that could soar above the ground. She wished she could soar and forget, although she did not know what she wanted to forget. She did not know how she could want to forget if she had nothing left to erase. Perhaps, she wanted to erase his words. I love you. She did not want that kind of love.

Perhaps she wanted to forget the eyes. The eyes that were imprinted on her mind, the eyes that, with their warmth did not let her die of cold when she lay alone and abandoned in the dirty hay. In those quiet hours, she would picture these eyes, and whisper, don't I know you? Don't I know you? Over and over again, in the darkness. With no-one to talk to but the still cold air, than the pale light of the moon, in which dust danced slowly until it fell.

It was night. Something loomed over her in the dark. She shivered, once, twice, and then started to shake in earnest.

The cold. The ice-cold. The ice-cold water, the bonds on the chair, the breathless pressure. Had he come to strap her down and drown her in freezing water? When she resurfaced, the shards of ice that floated in it would caress her face. Slip down her cheeks, into her lap, as she shivered. The moonlight evaded the depressions in his face, and he looked like a skull.

Despite the dark, she could see his smile, the teeth glinting slightly in the scant moonlight, teeth riddled with holes like mouse-eaten cheese.

"Letter for ye…" a few insults followed that statement, the statement she barely understood. The man, that man with the skeletal face, walked away, mumbling to himself. She did not even try to deduce the jumble of words coming from his mouth. It was hard for her to force herself to look through the mist sometimes, the haze that seemed to hang behind her eyes. Something fell with a soft whoosh, and landed next to her ear.

The soft sound of paper hitting the hay rang in her ears like a bell, like one of the many voices that no longer sounded human, one of the many voices that surrounded her. One of the many voices, among which, undoubtedly, was her very own. She lay there, motionless, for a while longer, watching white wreaths fly over her. Were they wreaths? Or angels? Or simply mist and dust? Just the putrid air? She rolled her head, right and left, humming, her fingers already tracing the creamy edges of the letter.

She unfolded it, slowly, like one would unfold a letter, wanting to remain unnoticed in the dead of night, how one would peel a new potato. Perhaps it was a letter from that man who had told her he loved her. Her eyes, those eyes that hid behind a mist, skimmed over the letters. It wasn't a long letter.

Dear Mother,

You probably don't remember me, and perhaps this letter will never reach you. He tells me you are dead, long since dead, but I never wanted to believe him. Then, a few days ago, I was feeling unwell and he had a doctor called in to see me – he whispered to me, that he knew me, that he had been there when I was born. When I asked about you, his face became very sad and he told me that you were too ill to be visited. He told me that you had lost your mind. He did not say why, but I swear I will find out.

Do not trouble yourself with thoughts of me. I am fine, and when I am free to do so I promise I will set out and find you, take you out of there. You are always in my heart, and when I wish upon anything that has the tiniest part of magic in it, on stars and enchanted rivers, I wish to see you one day.

Perhaps you cannot read this, but I want you to know that you are always in my heart. As a captive in a house, I learn everything from books, and I have learned that one must believe in magic. I do. I have always believed. Maybe one day I will embrace you.

Your daughter Johanna

She did not understand the meaning of those words in her head, but something seemed to move in her heart, the heart that was separate, alone, shut off by that veil of mist that engulfed her whole. Something moved in her and she stood up. This was not a letter from that man who loved her, whom she despised for twisting and warping that word, "love", until it was barely recognizable; this was a letter that brought that dear pair of eyes to her mind, the pair of deep brown eyes that soothed her like a caress when she screamed and thrashed.

She stood up, and moved forward, swaying from side to side. Right, left, right, left, like a drab metronome. A metronome, counting the beats in a tune she could sing in her sleep, but never remember. A tune that she came to associate with the feel of something smooth, black and white, beneath her fingers. Right, left, right, left. The old janitor slipped in, and she slipped out, quietly. She moved along the hallways, the floor at her bare feet wet with water; or, perhaps, it was tears, or blood, or something worse and more terrifying; She clutched the letter in her hand, moving forward like a broken marionette, hitting walls and corners, bruises blossoming on her skin like purple flowers.

She heard shuffling behind her, but she did not turn. An old feeling had risen in her chest, warmth had spread from the fingers carrying the letter, now scrunched in her trembling fist, an old feeling she had come to associate with those deep brown eyes that shone when the world had no light to offer her.

Let her go, she heard someone say. …Let her out anyway…loose words, with no sense. Well, only some sense. They presented no hostility to her, she would not have to fight. Her feet carried her forward, autonomous, irresponsive. If she had willed them to stop, they wouldn't have.

The door swung open, and she walked out. Cold air hit her with a blast, the rain beat down on her in sheets. She swayed, side to side, like that accursed metronome she could not remember, she swayed, her feet splashing in the rain puddles.

Maybe one day I will embrace you. Maybe one night, one dark night, they would set out to find the moon.

And maybe, whoever it was that had those deep brown eyes, would be with her too. Don't I know you? She whispered. The rain answered as it always did, in its unintelligible sound of falling water.

The memories, broken and irrational, came and came; she let them wash over her like foamy sea waves wash over pebbles. She closed her eyes and walked forward, and forward, the rain running down her face, hands, and body; she closed her eyes, and as her hands loosened, the letter fell to the floor.

The black water from the puddle seeped into the paper and dissolved the black ink.