Wrongfully Claimed

Chapter One

Every night had been a futile of tussling thoughts for Aurora and tonight hadn't turned out to be any different.

As much as she tried to close her eyes, drift off to her happy place, and commit her mind to the Spotify selection of music playing on her phone, she couldn't seem to shake off the dreaded feeling that something ominous was coming her way.

As minutes bled into hours, she resigned the fact that she was never going to get any sleep, no matter how hard she tried to force the issue.

The idea of reliving those tumultuous, disaster-fueled nightmares she was having night after night were never going to go away that much she knew.

So instead of forcing herself to go back to sleep like she always did when Insomnia got the better of her, she decided to get out of bed and find something to occupy her mind for the time being.

After switching off her favourite collection of alternative nineties rock music from Spotify, she slung her iPhone down on the bed and found herself by her computer.

She decided to kill some time doing nothing in particular on it, by talking to a few friends on Facebook to pass the time away until the call came through. The call that changed everything and made the earth stand still.

It was her older brother Shaun on the other end calling with an update on her mother's condition.

"The doctor said the cancer spread," he told her. Something about the tone in her brother's voice aroused something in her: an infinite fear of losing her mother. " She passed away this morning. I'm sorry sis, but mom is gone."

"No," she choked those words in her throat. Her heart stopped beating for a moment as she clenched her hand around the phone, watching her whole world come crashing down on her. "No, it can't be."

This was a dream. It was a bad dream. This was an obscene phone call that made no sense at all. Her brother was out of his mind for saying such a thing. There was nothing wrong with her mother. Her mother was still very much alive. He was lying. She spoke to her mother just yesterday. This can't be happening.

"Just so you know you don't have to worry about the expenses of mom's funeral costs because I am taking care of everything," he told her, coughing into what sounded like his hand, his voice ragged and out of breath. " Please make a plan to come down to the funeral," he said, once he was able to say the words more clearly now. He sounded rough as if he had been crying for hours." We really need you here. Dad needs you. I need you."

It was as real as it was a nightmare. It was happening and there was nothing she could do to stop it. Her mind and her tongue were frozen listening to her older brother go on and on about how he was going to plan their mother's funeral as if it were the most normal thing in the world.

She felt as if this was happening to someone else, but it wasn't. This was real as it ever could be. Her mother was dead and she was never coming back. Those words stuck in her throat.

"Dad's gonna be there and he's dying to see you. Please try to make an effort to be there, okay? " he rephrased what he just said to her minutes ago again."I love you, sis. We'll keep in touch."

The call clicked off on the other end, but Aurora was finding difficulty in letting go of the phone and placing it back down on the receiver.

After she did, Aurora sat back down in front of her computer, thinking of her mother. It was impossible that she was dead. She'd always been so free-spirited, so full of the joys of life, so alive. They had such a close and loving relationship.

The best relationship any daughter and mother could ever wish to have and she cherished every memory, not a day where she never thought of her.

From the time Aurora was a small girl, she was able to go to her mother with her problems to discuss, school, her life, boys, and, later on, men.