Vanessa shoved her way past Dariel and ran through her mother’s apartment, her mind and heart racing. The space was small and cluttered, yet every inch spoke volumes about the woman who lived there. It was like stepping into a fragment of her childhood. The walls were adorned with paintings Vanessa recognised, their colours faded but still vibrant with emotion. In the corner, a small table held an unfinished sculpture.
But it was the framed photo on the mantelpiece of the bohemian open-plan living area that caught Vanessa’s eye. It was a recent picture of Vanessa from the NovaScope website. Her mum really had kept up with her life, silently and from afar.
Vanessa turned her attention to the kitchen where two paramedics were working on someone who was lying on the floor. She darted over to see who they were tending to: a frail woman with greying hair spread around her head.
Yes, it was her mother. So different from the vital figure etched in Vanessa’s memories, and yet so unmistakably her. The beauty spot on her cheek. The cluster of colourful rings adorning her fingers. A long, beautifully patterned dress.
Dariel approached her. She knew the time would come when she’d be asking Dariel why he was here before them. Even worse, why he hadn’t called her to tell her he knew where her mother lived.
But now wasn’t the time.
‘We found her collapsed,’ Dariel said gently.
Vanessa took in her mother’s face, the slight swelling to her lips and around her mouth. The trace of dried blood at the corner of her lips. Her face was also very bruised, her arm, too, suggesting she must have fallen pretty hard when she collapsed.
‘We think she’s been here, alone, for a couple of days,’ Dariel continued. ‘We got here just in time.’
Alone. For a couple of days? Those words hammered Vanessa with – she realised in surprise – guilt. Rationally, she knew she couldn’t have been here. Couldn’t have known. Despite that, she felt some responsibility, like she did for her brother.
Dariel gestured towards a gift box being placed into an evidence bag nearby. ‘It’s the necklace,’ he said. ‘I think she was planning to give it to you, Vanessa. There was a note. She wouldn’t have known about how unsafe it was if this happened a couple of days back, before it all hit the news.’
She’d bought the necklace … for her?
Tears welled up in Vanessa’s eyes, but she blinked them back fiercely. She’d deal with the note later. Right now, all that mattered was the fragile figure on the floor. Vanessa knelt beside her. ‘I’m here, Mum,’ she whispered. ‘It’s Vanessa.’
She had fleeting images of her mum doing the same when she was a child. Rubbing her back when she was ill or upset, kissing her cheek. I’m here, Vanessa. Mummy’s here.
But then she wasn’t there, for so long. Why did she leave? Why stay away? Vanessa had to swallow the questions down, focusing instead on whispering words of comfort to her mother as the paramedics stabilised her.
‘Is my mother going to be OK?’ Vanessa asked.
‘She’s been unconscious for a significant period of time,’ the older paramedic explained, ‘so we’re treating her for dehydration and respiratory issues.’
‘What kind of damage could she have sustained?’
‘If Agent Valdez’s concerns are true,’ the paramedic replied, ‘and she’s been exposed to a toxin, then it may have affected her organ function. We’ll know more once she’s at the hospital.’
The journey out of the apartment was a blur. In the back of the ambulance, Vanessa continued to hold her mother’s hand, a turmoil of emotions churning within her, one sentence running over and over through her mind.
Live, damn it. Live.