The forever piece
Chapter 5: A cup of coffee
Ever since we got home from Liz and Kid's mansion, I immediately started to search for clues in my mom's things I inherit. I looked through books for clues, old Japanese vases for paper pieces for any hints of where I would be going but nothing. There was absolutely nothing. I even looked at my mother's piano my father wanted me to have and there wasn't anything out of the ordinary. My mother's song sheets were still there but with no clue. Eventually, Soul had forced me to stop searching since it was already dark and soon would the sun rise. I needed my sleep.
As the night before, my dreams were plagued with my mother's presence. She would sing and end up dragging me into singing with her before she disappeared into thin air. It was awful. One second we would be singing together and being happy before she would be taken away from me again. It is maddening.
"Maka!" Soul yells and shakes me roughly. "Wake up!"
I gasp loudly and I'm covered in sweat and my body is radiating heat. My forehead has sweat pearls and they slowly trickle down my forehead.
"Are you okay? You were squirming and crying in your sleep." I touch my cheek and finding it isn't sweat, it is tears trickling down my cheeks. This is one nasty dream of mine. Soul wraps his arms around me and pulls me close to his bare chest. "Was it a nightmare? Do you want to talk about it?"
I break down. I sob loudly and bury my face in his chest and the tears keep coming. "I dreamed about my mother." I sob while Soul caresses my bare back. "She and I were in a desert. She was singing to me and I ended up singing with her as well but then, she was just… gone. She left me again."
Soul plants a kiss on my head while he gently rocks me in his arms. "It was just a dream. You know your mother wouldn't just leave you again. She loves you."
"It felt so real. It felt like she was really there in front of me and my heart broke when she disappeared again." I sob loudly and pull away so I can see Soul's crimson eyes shine in the dark. "I don't want to lose her again. I don't want to lose anyone. More importantly, I don't want to lose you."
"You won't lose me." Soul rests his forehead on mine and my tears stops rolling down my cheeks. His hands find my cheek and gently wipe them away with his thumbs. "I'm here for the long run. I'm here to help you get ready and love you. I'm serious when it comes to you and nothing will ever sever us. You are my dream girl and no one will separate us."
I cup Soul's hand and rub his hand on my cheek. "I love you Soul, do you really think I will ever learn how to be a good mother and a wife? You deserve the best and I'm determined to give you the best I can be."
Soul chuckles and kisses my neck. "I don't want the best. What I want are you, perfect or not. I love your flaws and I know we will be great parents because you are such a caring, loving, passionate woman and when you love, you love with your whole heart. There is no way you could be a bad mother. Not with those qualities."
I laugh a little through my sniffles and sobs. "You know you are too good for me."
Soul shakes his head and his arm tightens around me. "No. It is you who are too good for me. You don't even understand yourself how good you are. You are this wonderful woman who put everybody's needs before your own. It is a great gift of selflessness but it is crippling you. You trying to please everyone else's needs before your own aren't good. It is toxic." Soul pulls away from me and sits up in the bed. He entwines our hands and smiles gently toward me. "That is why you are going to be selfish for once. You are going to put your own needs before your own. You are going to do what makes you feel better and get ready for our wedding. I want you to find those answers which will make you ready to be a wife and a mother. I will be with you every step of the way."
I can't help but crying more. I throw myself at him and tackle him down on the bed. "Soul!" I wrap my arms around him and sob into his chest. "You are too kind. I love you so, so, so much!"
Soul's arms wrap around mine and he hugs me tightly to his chest while he caresses my hair. "I love you to and I know just the place where we can start searching." I raise my eyebrow and Soul smirks wide. "We should go to Spirit's place. You know he got plenty of stuff from your mother. Maybe he even knows something that can help you."
Of course, why didn't I think of it before? My papa spent almost his entire life with mama, he knows her best and he should be able to have something to help me be a mother and a wife. He must have something to help us find what I'm lucking for.
"Yeah! That's a great idea!" I jump out of his arms and wipe my tears away. "Let's get dressed and go!"
Quickly I grab my bra and put it on before I pull a shirt roughly over my head.
Soul chuckles and gives me a salute. "Yes ma'am!" Soul puts on a pair of pants and while he finishes getting dressed, I run inside of the kitchen and quickly makes us some toast. Soul walks out a few seconds after me with a pair of pants in his hands. "As much as I would like to see that fine ass of yours, I would rather have it covered up." Soul hands me my pants and moves extra close to me with a smirk plaster on his face. "You know I don't want any other person seeing your long legs or your fine ass. I want to be the only one."
I giggle and put my feet through the holes. "You know you will always be my only one. My first kiss and my last." I move closer to him and our lips are only a hair's breath away. "And you are my first and you will definitely be my last."
Soul growls hungrily and I was about to tease him by running away from him when I stumbled backwards on my pants. How could I forget that! I gasp loudly and Soul wraps his arms around me and catches me from falling. He chuckles while he holds me low toward the floor and his face is so close to mine. "I better be." Soul smiles and brushes a piece of hair behind my shoulder. "Or else I would be mad beyond irrationality. I would beat that guy into a puddle of flesh and bones and I would make sure he would be beaten into his after-after life."
I giggle and kiss him quickly. "Fortunately you won't need to do that. I'm all yours and you know it."
Soul smiles and nods while he pulls me up on his feet. He kneels down and grabs my pants and starts tugging them up my legs. "Yes I do and let's go." The toast pops up from the toaster while Soul zips my pants. "We have some work to do."
We got our toasts and got inside of the car. Soul drove us to Death City and parked on papa's driveway. I smile wide at the large and very much safe house he had bought. It is much better than the little shed like house we had lived in before. I wouldn't have been surprised if the roof caved in when we were asleep.
I walk up to his front door and rings on the doorbell. Soul joins me by my side and grabs my hand. The door opens and papa smiles wide when he sees me. "Maka! You should have called!"
I release Soul's hand and hug my papa. "I'm sorry we didn't call you but there is something I need your help with." My dad hugs me back tightly before he pulls away.
"Come inside and we will see what I can do for you." Soul and I walk inside and my dad closes the door behind me. "Take a seat inside of the living room. I will come with some coffee. Do you want some breakfast?"
I smile and take a seat on the couch. "Some coffee would be great. You don't need to go through the trouble to make breakfast to us. We have already eaten." Soul takes a seat beside me and grabs my hand and squeezes it reassuringly. He smiles gently at me when my dad walks inside of the living room with tree cups of coffee.
Spirit has aged over the years. He isn't as young as he once was and he looks more like an adult with his now short red hair and wrinkles decorating his eyes. "So," Spirit says while he hands a cup to me and one for Soul before he takes a seat on the couch in front of ours. "What is it you need help with?"
I smile and take a sip of the coffee. It tastes delicious as always. My papa has always been good at making coffee. "There is something I need to tell you first." I say and I smile toward Soul. He seems to get the message through our eye contact just what I'm going to say and do. I expose my hand and the ring that is wrapped around my finger. "Soul proposed to me for a couple of days ago."
Spirit turns into a fountain for a few second. He spits out the coffee over the coffee table and coughs. Soul immediately gets up from his seat and starts patting his back. "You are getting married?! When is the wedding going to take place?!" Spirit says shocked while Soul pats his back.
"We have not yet decided on a date." Soul says and retrieves his seat beside me when Spirit has gotten all the coffee out of his lungs.
"The thing is, I'm not ready for a wedding yet." I say. It feels a little weird confessing it to my papa but it needs to be done. My father is the one who understands me the most. He is the person I can trust with these kinds of things. "Since mama passed away so early, I feel like she never taught me how to be a wife and mother so I'm asking you if you ever saw something in mom's things addressed to me or if she ever gave you something before she passed away."
Spirit takes a new sip of his coffee and he swallows it instead of it ending up on the coffee table. "I see." He rubs his chin while he stares up in the ceiling thinking. "There was actually a letter she gave me for you to read but unfortunately I can't give you it at the moment."
My eyes widen and I shot up from the couch and slam my fists on the coffee table. "Why?! It is my letter!"
Soul grabs my hand and sends his message to me. He tells me if I take a step closer to Spirit or try to pry the letter out of him then he will stop me. He is very thoughtful but this time he is very annoying. It is my letter and I need it!
"Because," Spirit sets his cup on the table. "It is supposed to be given to you at a certain time in your life. I'm not going to break that promise to Kami by giving it earlier or later. You know I always keep my promises so there is no need of trying to find it." I grit my teeth when my eyes lock at the space between his left pinkie finger and his long finger. There he had a finger once in an accident at work. He had been devastated at the loss of the symbol finger and that he couldn't wear his wedding ring on the correct finger. It took a long time for him to come with terms of his loss before he wore his wedding ring on his right ring finger.
"Papa," I say and my eyes are still locked at his missing left ring finger.
"Yes?"
"When you lost your finger, you were devastated. I remember you saying it felt like walking around in dense mist. You didn't know where you were going. You were just stumbling around before you found the courage to forgive yourself." My eyes find his blue once and I bit my lower lip. "I'm in that mist now. I don't know what to do. I need to get advice from my mama. I need her in order to find a way out of that mist, without her words, I won't ever be able to be a great wife to Soul and be a good mother to our kids. I need to get a connection with her. I have never in my entire life needed her as much as I do now." Tears trickle down my cheeks and Spirit stands up from his chair. He walks over to me and wraps his arms around me.
"We all need her in our lives. There is something that could help you get this connection." My eyes widen and I hug my papa back. "I know your mother asked me to send a package to your grandparents before she passed away. I don't know what was in it, but maybe there was something in it that could help you and if they are alive, they could help you know who she was before she turned into Kami Albarn the greatest opera singer ever born. I don't know if it can help you get out of that mist, but I do know you will find something there. It might not be what you want to find out, but it is something at least." Spirit pulls away and wipes my tears away. "You have to go to Japan. I will give you the address your grandparents lived at. I don't know if they live there today, but it is a start."
I smile wide and throw my arms around him. "Thank you papa! Thank you! Thank you! Thank!" I'm going to Japan. I'm going to find you grandma and grandpa, you just wait.
