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WHAT DO PEOPLE DO WHEN they’ve been through something crazy, something unbelievable? They return to normal life, of course. They go back to work, back to everything they had to do before because the world doesn’t stop turning just because your soul has been rocked by something unimaginable or terrifying or amazing.
Jade went back to her life and her routine, normal on the outside, but on the inside, nothing felt normal anymore. Nothing felt real anymore. What she went through didn’t feel real, the mundane stuff didn’t feel real. She didn’t feel real.
She tried not to think about anything too deeply for the fear of spinning off into the deep end. Afraid she’d discover that nothing was real, or that everything was.
She was in a perpetual state of limbo where externally, everything seemed the same. Work was the same, her mom was the same. Her mornings and evenings and nights were still the same.
But on the inside, so much had changed.
She probably needed therapy, but that seemed like a one-way ticket to a mental hospital. Who would believe her? It all seemed unbelievable, and she’d been the one who lived through it.
And Micah... She couldn’t think too deeply about him either. She’d given her heart to him, had it battered repeatedly by all the experiences of that day. And she’d kind of expected, hoped, he would come after her. But he hadn’t. The days ticked by, her heart cracking open a little more.
She was grateful to be alive, truly, but also broken up inside. Everything between her and Micah had apparently been for the sake of duty, for her protection, and nothing more.
The problem was, that was only true for him. All her feelings had been real, were real, and were eating her up. She missed him.
It was probably better this way.
Micah was free to protect the world from those awful Chaolt, and she was free to care for her ailing mother. Only an insane person could ever think those two things could mesh. Only an insane person would wish, ache, for a way for it to work out, after everything.
Turns out, she was insane. Maybe she should look up a therapist, after all.
Jade gave a sad laugh as she threw her truck into park in front of the Shady Oaks Nursing Home. Hands resting on the wheel, eyes seeing nothing, she tried to just breathe around the constant ache in her chest.
She had nothing to even prove that Micah was real, that everything she thought had happened, actually had. Her scrapes and bruises had healed. The only things she had were her memories and her feelings.
She didn’t know what to think, how to feel about him. She’d fallen in love with him, but then he’d betrayed her, screwed her out of a way to give her mother better care. But then it turned out he’d done that for a good reason, saving her from death. Probably saving her mom from it too, because if Jade was gone, she would just wither away here until she died an early death. And she couldn’t forget the home itself, all its occupants and workers. The entire town and population of Topaz Ridge. He’d saved them all from the landslide.
Jade focused on the mountain on the horizon behind the home. It wasn’t visible much lately, the storms of fall shrouding it in clouds and snow. But she was seeing it now, the outline of it lit with the light of the setting sun. She could see the scar the landslide left from here, a darker shadow in the amethyst light of dusk. Sometimes she felt like she was still there, the rocks coming down on her, and other times she felt like she was as far removed from the event as she was from the mountain while sitting here in her truck.
That had all happened to someone else, right? Not her. Someone else had been targeted by beings of Chaos, had almost died in a landslide. Had fallen in love with an Elemental.
Was he up there, now? Still watching, waiting, still guarding? Maybe he was. Maybe that’s why he hadn’t contacted her. But she couldn’t be that hard to find in a town of this size.
Maybe he didn’t want to find her. Did she want to be found?
Most of the time the answer was no. She had her mother to care for on top of a full-time job to pay bills, and a part-time job to try to save enough money to get her mom to a better home. She didn’t have the time, or the energy, for anything else.
But sometimes it was an unequivocal, aching yes.
Jade looked away from the mountains and took several deep breaths to center herself and keep the sting in her eyes from becoming anything more.
She went inside, to her mother’s room, and almost turned back. Her mom held that glazed look as she stared out the window at the sunset that said she wouldn’t know if anyone had been there to visit today or not, anyway. She wouldn’t know if she had eaten either, or soiled herself, or even put on pants. And that was what ultimately brought Jade another step into the room.
She needed care. Her mind was gone today, but the vessel, her body, was still here. And Jade would take care of her body, of her, in preparation for the next time she returned.
“Hi, mama,” she murmured as she stepped forward.
“Oh hello, dear. Can I help you?”
Rather than upset her mother with the things she couldn’t remember, she would be anonymous today.
“Hi, Mrs. McNally. I’m Jade. I’m here to see if you need anything?”
Jade put the tiny solar flower, the ones that move with the sunlight, on the windowsill. She brought her one sometimes. No dead flowers to depress her mom, or live ones to kill with over or under-watering. When she was lucid, maybe she’d notice she had a new one and know Jade had been here to visit.
“Oh no, I’m just fine. I don’t need anything.”
She ran through her list of questions to see if she had eaten, changed. Even moved from this spot at all at any point.
She put a straw in a glass of juice and handed it to her. Her mom said she wasn’t thirsty, but she drank it anyway. Could one dehydrate on accident? Jade hoped not, but wasn’t taking the chance. But that also meant she’d have to get her mom to the restroom before she left for the night.
Not always easy when your mom was a strong-willed woman who thought you were a stranger.
She flopped into the chair across from her, lacking the strength and fortitude that today required of her.
Her mother didn’t notice, merely continued to stare out the window and sip her juice.
Thank god it wasn’t a questioning day, a belligerent day, a try-to-leave day. A weeping day. Jade just didn’t have the strength for it.
She dropped her head on the back of her seat and closed her eyes, throat closing with tears and guilt.
It wasn’t fair of her to think about her mother like that, wasn’t nice. She shouldn’t be thankful for a day when her disease stole all of her mind, instead of just parts of it.
But she was. And that made her feel like shit.
Jade shifted her chair around until she was sitting beside her, and stayed there until after the sun set, the sky darkening to deepest purple.
“Time for bed, Elaine.” It hurt to use her given name instead of ‘mom’, ‘momma’ or ‘mother’, but when she couldn’t remember, it would confuse her, upset her, and keep her from resting.
She’d see her safe in bed and tucked in before she left.
She helped her through her bedtime routine and then helped her in bed.
As she told her mom about the extra blankets folded at the foot of the bed, with little hope of her remembering, there was a knock on the door.
“Come in,” Jade said, expecting a nurse roused to action by the commotion they were causing.
But the door opened slowly, hesitantly, and standing there taking up the entire doorway... was Micah.
She couldn’t breathe, couldn’t seem to pick her jaw up off the floor and close her mouth, her hands frozen on the edge of her mom’s blankets.
“Jade,” he said, nodding to her.
“I’ll be out in just a minute,” she finally murmured.
He nodded and shut the door, and she stood there another moment, trying to get her brain to engage, to try to calm her heart from beating her to death from the inside out.
“It’s not bedtime. I haven’t even had my breakfast yet.”
“Mom. Mrs. McNally. It’s nine o’clock p.m. It’s evening, not morning.”
“No,” she said, voice raising, tugging the blankets out of Jade’s hands and sitting up. “I just woke up a little bit ago. I’m going to have my breakfast.”
“You can probably have a snack if you’re hungry, but the cafeteria is closed.”
“I can make my own.”
They didn’t put cooking appliances in a dementia patient’s room. That was asking for a disaster.
“Let me go get you something to eat,” Jade begged, her hand on her mom’s arm.
Her mom jerked away from her touch. “No, I don’t need help. I can do it. I’m not—”
There was a knock on the door again, and Micah leaned his head around the corner. She clenched her eyes and her teeth shut at his intrusion. “I just need a few more minutes, she’s having trouble. Wait outside, please.”
“I know. I wanted to see if I can try something? See if I can help?”
Before she could agree or disagree, before she could tell him it really wasn’t a good idea, to tell him he should leave and come back some other time, he stepped around the doorway and spoke.
But not to her, to her mom.
“You see, there’s this baby that gets upset sometimes,” Micah said, voice low and rumbling. “Really upset. His name is Jackson. No one can seem to help once he gets going.”
Her mom had stopped fighting her and seemed to be listening intently to what he was saying. Not freaking out over the appearance of a huge, intimidating stranger with braids and tattoos the way she thought she might. Jade backed up and sat in the chair by the window, just exhausted enough to see how this played out instead of insisting he leave and let her handle it.
“When he gets like that, I’m the only one who can calm him down. I know a special song.” Micah sat gingerly in the chair beside the bed. “Would you like to hear that special song?”
“I think I would.” Her mother smoothed her hands over the blanket, already so much calmer than before, simply by being distracted from the issue at hand. She would have to remember that tactic in the future. But she still had that pinch between her brows that said things could get bad again, very quickly. Jade held her breath.
And let it go in a rush when he started singing.
Right then is when she forgave him. Right then was when she loved him again, loved him a hundred times over, for singing to her mother.
He was hunched over, looking at the floor, hands clasped on his knees. But the notes he sang were so deep and clear and beautiful, that once again, it brought her to tears. Overwhelmed, she rested her fist against her lips.
The song started out slow and quiet, swelled in the middle, and then ended on a low, almost whispered rumble. It was in a language she didn’t speak, didn’t recognize. Probably Russian.
But she understood the meaning all the same. Peace, serenity, calm. Love.
With the last note still lingering in the air, she wiped the moisture from her lashes. Her mom was laying comfortably back against her pillows, eyes closed and a small smile on her face.
As quietly as she was able, she got up and turned off the lights, leaving one on so her mom could see if she woke during the night.
Micah took the hint and stood, and with a nod to her, left the room quieter than she’d ever thought a man his size could.
She tucked her mother in, kissed her cheek, her mind with the man outside the door. As she pulled back and started to leave, her mom gently grabbed her hand.
Jade turned back to her.
“He’s the man you’re seeing?” she asked, sleepy smile on her face.
Stunned at her sudden lucidity, stunned her mom remembered their conversation despite her state when Jade last visited, she nodded.
“I like him.”
Jade smiled, swallowed, blinked back tears. “Me too.”
“He reminds me of your father, just a little bit, in the eyes. Kind eyes.”
Jade nodded, remembering. Seeing the similarity now.
“Jade, sweety, when you leave, could you please send your dad in? I want to say good night.”
Her chest and throat constricted, her eyes instantly filling again with hot tears. If only she could. “He’s still on the mountain, but he’ll be back soon. He said to tell you he loves you.”
Her mom smiled again, eyes closed, so close to sleep. “Okay. Love you both.”
“Love you, too, Momma. Good night.”
Her mother didn’t answer, breath already smoothing out.
She wished she could spend more time with her now that she was calm and somewhat lucid, but it was so nice for her mom to ‘see’ her before she left.
She had Micah to thank for that.
Jade walked through the door, shutting it quietly behind her, her heart like a tattered flag. Frayed, ragged, but flying at the same time.