Chapter II: Through the Eyes of the Past.
Death maybe just a burden to those who see it that way, but to some, it's a release, a gateway to escape from this complicated world.
Death was a gift to those who ready to take it, or have to, death is needed, without death, there is no life, and if there is no life, there will be only death.
Death was kind to those who are ready to embrace it, and was cruel to take those who weren't at the same time.
Death welcomed her, and she falls into its arms like a sleeping child, but haven doesn't welcome her, even the afterlife reject her for some reasons a mortal like her doesn't know.
Maybe she would find out sooner or later, maybe it could be tomorrow, or today, or an unforeseen future ahead.
But for now, she has someone to make up to.
Someone she left behind so suddenly, and unexpected, that they only said goodbye for one last time, but never she would heard a hello from them again.
They don't welcome her home, ever again.
It was funny to think how she walks her own home without anyone there to salute her like the day when she was breathing and really walking, her youngest playing, and laughing echo throughout the hall.
The hallway stretch like forever, and the echo just keep louder and louder, while actually nothing but the luminous silence before her, only her own memories playing before with the same scene.
And those who walks the hallway before her, were just shadows of the past, the chatting, the stepping, the laughing, everything were ghosts from a different reality.
A reality she doesn't belong to anymore, quick as it came, the hallway once again drowned into darkness, only the moon light sneaks its way through the windows, gentle night came, and she keep wandering on the endless hallway.
It was quiet, it was always quiet in the middle of the night, only those who still hold on to this world walks the path leads to somewhere they wanted to be.
Her legs carry her, to somewhere, down at the end of the endless path, the doors was locked, but nothing could stand in her way, no one there to stop her, she have another ghost to see.
How Joan of Arc came here, she doesn't know how she became her youngest daughter best friend, that she knew all too well.
The maid of Orleans ( Joan ) still sitting and bravely leading her men to battle, her eyes spark the determination, and she still keep charging, forever, in the picture hanging on the wall, her sword raise high.
And seeing her daughter dragging the sofa across the room to where the portrait was hang, and sitting under it and talk to the immortal heroine about almost everything, even the smallest things, simple things that a hero like Joan didn't need to hear, didn't need to bother.
But Joan stayed, and listens, and she isn't going anywhere soon, but she can't say anything back.
Moments like that, it just keep tearing the heart of the queen apart, when she quietly standing on the doorway, and listen to everything, and every questions the young princess have for a picture, instead of her.
''Where is she?''
''Why can't she come out?''
''Is she hate me?''
''She doesn't want to build a snowman with me anymore?''
''I am a bad princess, right?, so that's why she can't play with me…''
''How long?''
''How many times I asked?''
''How many times I cry?''
''How many tears I have to shed for myself?''
In time, the question got shorter, and shorter, until Joan was just an old friend in the young princess's mind, and the queen keeps listening, and tears was no less.
''Why do yu cry, mama?'' the 6 years old princess ask her, unexpectedly, she look to where the princess eyes are, and it was someone she knew most of her life.
But sometime she doesn't know who that person is anymore.
Her shadow kneel down to her daughter's face held her little hand, before briefly looking at former queen, and walks pass her, with the princess towing behind her, into the hallway again.
Something in her shadow's eyes made Idun wanted to leave, the eyes that penetrate her very existence, only it was just a shadow, and she, was just a lost ghost looking for something.
The eyes filled with regret, filled with every painful memory she had endured, and now she was here, with flashbacks haunting her.
She walks through the door, and continues on, passing the dining room where she saw her family having their meals in silence, passing the servants who weren't there, listening to the conversations that only appear in her mind.
And ended up near another door, a place was too familiar to her, she walks through and the only source of light in the room was a candle, echo of falling snow outside the window.
She can't breathe, but she knew the air was too hard to, ever since that day, only the chorus of continue silence lingering in the air, but sometime, silence was good, it was good to forget, just think about the luminous quiet and nothing else.
Her shadow was there, sitting by the table, her eyes focus on a book, but let out a heavy sigh, lean back into the chair she let her brown hair hanging loosely with the wind, and under her eyes are black bags because of so many sleepless nights.
She talks to no one, but herself there to listen, only the words she couldn't remember when she said it.
''Why?, Why her?, why not someone else, but her? Why she have to suffer?, why not me?''
''How? How did she have to suffer for all of this?, How can she control it?, How can I touch her without fearing she would hurt me?, how can I love her again?''
''How?'' A tear striping down her shadow's cheek and Idun just stand there, watching all playing out before her, and let her eyes wanders into the ceiling, how many questions she asked to something up there?, how many times she frustrated and place questions to something that wasn't there?, all just because, she wanted to love her daughter again, like she used to be.
But now, there is nothing she can't do, she didn't find the answer, she didn't find the cure, she didn't love her daughter again, ever, and forever after.
Is this the end for her?, a ghost with so many regrets in life wandering aimlessly without a way out?
Her shadow was asleep, using the table as her bed, a place to rest, lots of time she wakes up finding her head hurt, and her back almost wanted to split in half, but still she look, looking for answer that wasn't there.
''Idun?'' A voice spoke behind her and the person step through her again, into the place where her shadow was sleeping and lean down with a blanket in hands.
She remember him, a man she love the most, a man she raise this family with, but sadly it didn't turn out a happy ever after for them, it's life, and it's never about happily ever after, there is no such thing is happily ever after, only an ending, a line that said ''the end ''and then no one know what's going to happened next behind the next page, because it was all blank or it doesn't have a next page.
Simply as that, an ending with one of her daughter having powers to control ice and snow, and isolated herself from the rest of the world without anyone there to love her fully, a chapter in her life with nothing more than just pains and treacherous paths.
And then came her sudden ending, just like a book that was written in half and then it was over, and the end with only 1 line '' Rest in Peace''.
Is this because she was gone?, all of thought raging through her minds because she was angry?, angry at herself for not being there, not be able to come back as a human being, but merely just a shadow on the wall, or just pieces in a memory fading away with the wind of time, is that it?.
But what choice does she have?, she was dead, there is no way back, there is nothing she could do but stand by and watch.
Watch as the fight between them erupted, deciding how to deal with their daughter's power and of course, future, it happens often, mostly after the '' accident''.
But it always ends up in a dead end, no answers were found, still bitterness lingering in the air.
How the past was playing out before her, she doesn't know, or it was just an illusion, and now she was here, walking the dark path guiding by the moon light again, pretending that she was alive, just pretend that she still actually belong to this world.
The past is in the past, but future was unsure, but what she doesn't know, she was heading up straight to the place where the memories haunting her most, like it was dragging her toward it.
The path beginning to shorter and another voice from the past catching up to her, to the place where, she have to see every bitter memory she have suffer.
''Do You Want To Build A Snowman?''.
