“Mum!”
Something lurches inside me.
“We tried to stop her-”
She throws herself against me, small arms around my waist. I raise a hand to touch her hair. Dark, like mine. When was the last time I wrapped it between my fingers to tie a braid. Was memory of my hair, or hers?
She turns her head up to look at me. Her eyes are filled with tears. I cup her face. I see my mother in her browline, my father in her nose, I see…
“Mum?”
I was seventeen.
“She’s just shaken up.” Taler crouches down to speak to her, voice so gentle.
Ash is watching me. I can see something in her face. Guilt. Sickness.
Gripping her hand as we climb into the car-
Rubbing her back as she retched on the boat-
Standing at the door of her shower cubicle-
Making her put the bugs back down-
“Orchidia,” I choke.
That name. It’s everything. She’s everything. I lost everyone but her. Did everything for her. Every step of this horrible, horrible journey, for her. I crouch and press my forehead to hers, hold her as tight as I can, feel every shake of her body against mine as I Remember-
For the first time in so long I am Remembering.
“He tried to take you from he,” I whisper, “never again.”
a place of words 
2 thoughts on “WANT TO FORGET YOU: Ch 49”