Aurora was still out there, somewhere. It didn't matter that there had been a body. It didn't matter that there had been a funeral. They were so badly burned, not even dental records helped for identification. So there was still a sliver of hope. It wasn't her, it wasn't her, Joaquin prayed. Even as all the mourners shook his hand and mumbled condolences, he prayed. Because nothing about Aurora's existence was ever normal, and her d**h would be no exception.
But it wasn't until he went completely numb from the agony that he remembered that even though the room across the hall was empty, so was the bed next to him. In those moments, the guilt struck him in the stomach like a blade. How could he obsess over his (presumably) missing daughter when his own wife had perished in the crash? But he hardly remembered that he'd been the one at the coroner's to say it was definitely Alma. That day was so burned into his mind, it often glowed with a blinding haze and only came back in fragments.
Every night, he saw her in the corner of his room, telling him she was okay. But every time he reached out for her, she was gone. He would turn to his empty side of the bed and grieve Alma instead. His sweet, sweet Alma, he knew, was gone. That much was the truth and he clung to it in desperation, her pillow in one hand and the empty bottle of bourbon in the other. He lay in a pool of his cold sweats, unable to feel.
The night he dreamt about Alma, however, turned into the day he finally did something about Aurora. In his rare but fitful sleep, she begged him to keep the promise he'd once made her and not let their daughter go. She'd sweetly kissed his cheek and cupped his face, whispering one last sweet nothing and then evaporating before him. He awoke invigorated by the sun he finally let in from the windows at 5 AM and practically leaped into the shower. Once he dressed and refueled with coffee, his weaker substitute for bourbon, he ripped open his laptop and started running through his old contacts from the war. Most were in different time zones, so he caught some finishing up dinner, others headed to work. But all his comrades offered the same answer: “Of course, brother. Anything you need.”
***
“Promise me something,” Alma proposed one night, her voice soft as a cloud as to not stir tiny Aurora. She lay next to the sleeping baby in bed, a bundle smaller than a pillow, and dragged a finger over the valleys and peaks of her little face.
“Hmm? What is it?” Joaquin had drifted off in the rocking chair and woke abruptly. He rubbed one eye, sniffing as he realized he'd already been dreaming. Alma's silhouette came into focus on the bed in front of him and she was watching Aurora sleep in such awe, he thought Alma was in shock. He froze at the sight.
“Promise me if anything ever happens to me, you'll tell her. You'll tell her what we found out. She deserves to know,” she said sadly, as if she knew already. That she would not be the one to tell her daughter the truth about her origins. She still shivered in her nightgown at the thought of the ominous, cloaked figure at her door just weeks ago. They'd made a deal with the devil, it'd seemed like. But desperation will drive you to drastic decisions.
“What will she think of us, Alma?” he asked, his biggest fear leaking through his sleep. His palms began to sweat on the arms of the chair, his anxiety stirring him awake once more. He opened his crusty eyes, suddenly paranoid that they were gone. But Alma had peacefully slipped into her own slumber, one hand placed softly on her newborn daughter's stomach. “She'll never forgive us,” he mumbled to himself as he felt his head falling back against the chair again.
***
The rattling in the child's hands started click-clacking in her head. She envisioned taking that delicate wrist and twisting the arm one way and the hand the other. Like an old rag. Even imagined the little snap her bone would make. The silencing of it all twitched her hand and she reached, the pale new skin of the infant so close she felt the heat of her blood underneath. When her fingers had a steady grip, she squeezed and closed her eyes.
When they opened again, all she saw was clear sapphire and she gasped. Mistaking it for the ocean, her body shook, determining its next move for survival. It's the sky, she thought. Sighing, her surroundings began to come into focus. That stupid rattling was still in her ears. Her reality had sunk into a dream, and when she tried to sit up, it was hard to tell what was anything was. The blue blended into this tan landscape and she disappeared right into it. It's a desert, she realized. How in the hell did I get here? Before that registered, her eyes caught movement near her foot, finding the source of the rattling. sh**, no! Both her feet peddled against the ground furiously, moving her backwards, shaking up a sand storm. A rattlesnake was an inch away and as she scrambled, its tail swept across like a windshield wiper and landed directly on her calf.
The instant contact sent the ripple of trembling on her skin racing towards her brain. It felt a cigarette burn drilling into her leg. She yelped, and falling back into some branches, she reached for the closest one and swung it at the snake. It retracted, having met its victim and slunk away. But her leg throbbed, impossibly hotter than the air around her. Aurora wheezed, her lungs expelling the sand she'd whirled into the air. How the hell did I end up here? And where is here?
***
Jewel clutched the flowers tightly, feeling one of the thorns cutting through the plastic into her own hand. She bit her lip, but kept her stride. They crinkled in her grip, the only sound in the whole graveyard. She strolled the familiar path to the tombstone, beginning a dull fade in the gra** where she's made the trip endless times. The leaves were starting to scatter the graves, every shade of crimson and auburn imaginable. 16 years later and she couldn't forgive her mother, but she couldn't stay away. Most mornings she still woke up in denial and went back to bed at night hating her all over again.
Once the obligatory bouquet was placed on a grey stone with the name she cringed at, she took out the second bouquet from the bag slung over her shoulder and made her way to Twyla's grave. Here, her breath always shook a little, but it had been easier to say goodbye. She mumbled hello and pleasantries of the morning to her best friend, laying down the flowers from her own garden. Twyla had heard it all: her twins growing up and becoming teenagers, the day Aiden decided he couldn't do it anymore, and her own solitude she purged her soul with. Her mother's betrayal had ended in both of their d**hs, and Jewel was left with three babies (which included Twyla's orphan). Her phone buzzed in her pocket and she figured it was her twins' check-in call from the school across the country they attended. It can wait, she thought. I still have lots to share with her today. Rose's café wouldn't open for another hour and she'd have plenty of time to walk the three blocks.
Lunenburg, a small port town, was intimate and quaint, and despite the fact that everyone knew each other, they all respected their privacy. But it was hard to ignore the sympathetic buzz from the patrons gossiping about her life. An abandoned single mother who took over her mother's bistro after she was k**ed by a stranger led a sad life indeed. Not to mention, she'd let her best friend's baby be kidnapped shortly after her birth…
But when the phone buzzed for the third time, Jewel was alert again. She pulled it out and stared at the number, her eyebrows crinkling. She didn't recognize the number. It's probably the kids. Her lavender eyes scanned the horizon of the bay nearby as she tucked the phone behind her light brown curls.
“Hello?” she answered with a hole forming in her stomach.
“Hi, my name is Joaquin. I need to speak with Jewel immediately,” a man's voice echoed with urgency. Her hand holding the phone up to her ear shook with surprise. She cleared her throat.
“Yes, this is she. What is this regarding?” Oh god, it's my kids. Something's happened.
“I'd much rather not discuss this over the phone. Please, could we meet in person? It's urgent,” the man insisted in a hushed whisper now, desperation leaking through the phone.
“How did you get this number? Why would I agree to meet someone just out of the blue like this? You need to tell me what this is about,” she stated, anger fortifying her authority.
“Jewel, please,” he begged, using her name intimately, as if they known each other forever. “…It's about Twyla. We need to talk. Something's happened to her daughter.” Her eyes darted to the grave she was standing in front of, and hearing someone say her name out loud froze her blood. The last thing she heard was the phone clattering on the tombstone, her arm still raised in shock.
***
Joaquin's efforts had been in vain the last three months. He'd gathered all his resources and none of the intel he received got him any closer. He sat at the dining table, his hands in his hair, on the verge of pulling out of every follicle he had. Goddamit, someone must know something. There had to be something he'd missed. As he rubbed his face in exhaustion, he felt the cheekbones protruding from the skin. The search had taken a toll on him, and he couldn't remember the last time he'd slept. He stared hopelessly at the disarray of papers in front of him. They had his manic handwriting all over them, each line a clue, question, idea, or detail. A small knock at his door snapped him back to the apartment.
He groaned as he got up, and swung the door open to find Jewel standing there with multiple tupper ware containers in her hands. She was beaming under her thick parka, her cheeks flushed with the cold. Joaquin couldn't help but smile, his burden evaporating for a moment.
“Hi, Jewel,” he greeted weakly, taking a couple tubs out of her hands as he pecked her on the cheek. She stepped inside, bending down to remove her snow-covered boots in the entrance. When did she make herself so at home here? Why does she insist on the three-hour drive to check on me?
“Joaquin, it's seven in the morning and you look like you haven't even gone to bed yet,” she reprimanded as she hung her parka on a hook behind the door. He was in an old t-shirt and pajama pants, while she stood with her hands on her hips wearing a long-sleeved thermal shirt and jeans.
“There were too many things on my mind,” he shrugged, one hand scratching his temple.
“Well, you should at least eat something. Go sit down,” she ordered, already putting on a pot of coffee in the kitchen. Joaquin dragged his feet to the couch, hearing a carton being taken out of the fridge. Soon, the sizzling of eggs and roasting coffee beans made his mouth water. He didn't realize he'd fallen asleep until the hot plate was in his lap and she startled him.
“Sorry. Eat up,” she cheerfully stated. As he chewed, she sat opposite him, clasped her hands and waited. Jewel pursed her lips, trying to hold in the news until he was done. She took a quick survey of the room and besides the mountain of papers on the dining table, it still looked clean. Not like the first time she'd come in months ago, where she had to step around liquor bottles and wonder if she'd fallen into some drunk's trap.
But he'd known everything about Twyla, down to the day she helped Jewel give birth. He'd found a trail she didn't even know existed. When she met Joaquin, she saw how tortured he was by the most important path he just couldn't find. Aurora. They connected the dots from the moment she was snatched from Jewel's arms and delivered into Joaquin's. Despite that darkness, she couldn't believe how perfect the name was for her and Jewel smiled at the thought of that little baby growing up. But she was a dying flame, fading faster every day.
Once Joaquin finished his breakfast, Jewel pulled a notebook out of her purse. Wordlessly, she handed it to him. Puzzled, he ran his callused fingers along the frozen spiral and tanned leather cover. She smiled with a secret on her lips and she nodded for him to open it. His jaw dropped as she revealed to him the last piece of the puzzle. Joaquin stood suddenly and kneeled in front of Jewel, who watched with softness. He cried into her shoulder, having finally found an ally in his immense sorrow.
***
The old mansion was still there, just as Twyla had described it some 20 years ago. It had taken Jewel months to track down all of Twyla's belongings she had sorted after her d**h. But sifting through old boxes of her old stuff had awoken a purpose in her again. And it gave her more and more to tell Twyla when she felt lonely. Everyone from Twyla's time was gone or scattered and before, she didn't do well alone. But she was alone in her car the day she watched Joaquin lead a group of his old war friends on a raid in the middle of the night. They'd argued about her presence there at all.
“It's too dangerous! You don't know what we'll run into!” he screamed, throwing his hands in the air. They'd resorted to fighting about what to do next after finding the notebook.
“This is my story now, too, Joaquin! It was from the moment you called me. I owe it to her, to both of them,” she said softly at the end of her rant. She was 20 when Twyla died, and whenever she brought her up, Jewel shrunk back into that lost young woman with those amethyst eyes. Joaquin's hair was graying, the veins in his hand popping out with age and he sighed as she played that card again. Finally, he huffed.
“You'll watch from far away. We're going in three days from now.”
In the dark, Jewel squinted at the figures sprinting towards the abandoned house. They ran in perfect formation effortlessly, despite their collective age and she admired their stealth as they disappeared into the darkness, invisible now to her eyes. Her legs shook impatiently as the mansion in the middle of the woods was overtaken.
***
Joaquin had rushed the front door, made of stained gla**, knocking off the lock with a small battering ram with Nichols and Jones. Their feet had scrambled on the impeccable tile in the foyer and their element of surprise was quickly fading. But the limited range of vision from his night vision goggles didn't reveal the lack of furniture right away.
“Clear! … Clear!” he heard Linus and Milton shout from the hallway, coming towards them from the back of the house. He heard Thanes mutter “What the hell?” as they surveyed the ground floor. Besides a grand set of stairs to the right of the front door, the house was one large room, contradicting the blueprints they'd studied for days. The goggles came off as the tile was illuminated by moonlight as the five men with military weapons were suddenly walking in circles in the room. Removing their masks, they found nothing but walls and a small hallway leading to the back entrance.
“This isn't it, look! The wall, it ends here but the exterior of the house keeps going,” Jones excitedly ventured, running his hands along the east wall, opposite from the staircase. It was made of grey, stone bricks. With a light kick to a brick near the floor, Jones exclaimed “sh**!” as a piece of the wall shifted into an opening. The men raised their guns in instinct as a light emerged from the entry. Joaquin rushed towards the hidden room, Thanes on his six to cover.
In the center of the room, alight with floodlights from the ceiling, was a duel in combat. Their slaps echoed against the stone and both figures cloaked in black zoomed around each other. Joaquin caught sight of the man he'd seen only before, 16 years before in the dead of night at his doorstep. The man's blanche face watched the fight uninterested, but turned at the unexpected visitors. His jet black hair flowed behind him and Joaquin detected almost a crack of a smile on the man's face at recognizing him. That smug ba*tard.
Joaquin didn't hesitate and pointed his long range weapon straight at his temple. The men followed suit, unaware of who he was.
“Where is she?” he yelled in ire, with more anger in him than when he'd k**ed in the war. Surprised by the interruption, the two combatants ceased and stood in a defensive pose. Three of Joaquin's men pointed at them instead as he and Thanes stayed trained on the pale man. The silence was broken by one of the fighters, who stumbled forward quickly and ripped off the black cloth mask on their face. In one fell swoop, the guns pointed to the floor in shock as a mane of coffee-colored hair flew out of the cover.
“Dad?” Joaquin heard from his left, his fury blurring his vision. But when he turned, a pair of sharp sapphire eyes pierced him. His lungs flattened in his chest as he saw Aurora's face staring back at him. My God, what's happened to her? Even in her black suit of combat, he could turn she was toned and stronger. Her face had lost its baby fat and he swallowed in disbelief.
“If you and your men put down your weapons, we'll gladly explain everything,” the man behind him offered. Joaquin didn't register it. He could only stare at her. But when her gaze went past him to the man, Joaquin turned and surveyed the situation he was now in. He lifted his chin to Thanes and Linus and nodded towards the man.
“Subdue him, now,” he said calmly. Joaquin heard a scuffle as the two took him down, but he turned back to Aurora, now approaching her slowly. She was in as much astonishment as he.
“It's okay, I'm here now,” he comforted quickly, holding out a cautious hand to her. She stared at it in doubt. Aurora shook her head vigorously.
“No. You shouldn't have come,” she spoke for the first time, her voice almost deeper than he remembered. He furrowed his eyebrows as he caught a glimpse of Jones and Milton tying up the other fighter. “You don't understand.”
“Understand what? Aurora, I'm here to take you home,” he rea**ured her, laying his weapon down.
“Dad, there's a lot to talk about. There's a reason I'm here. There's a reason I was captured the day Mom died,” she said in the calmest voice he'd ever heard.
“Aurora, what's going on?” he probed, feeling a buzz of tension in the room. She was different, and at his question, she seemed too tired to answer.
“There's a lot you don't know about me, and I'll explain it all,” she said and sighed as she shook her head. “You've got it all wrong. This was the only way I'd be safe.” She looked straight at him and he felt her summing up how he'd take what she said next.
“I'm not supposed to exist.”