The Darkest Eternities

XXI. Dearest

Cara

A shiver ran through me. The wind was harsh and the sweater I wore hardly helped but I was still here. I wouldn't leave.

The forest had become one of my favourite places to be, specifically the spot where Ivan and I first locked lips. The place had changed slightly, now it was colder and the flowers were not in bloom but I still liked it.

It reminded me of a time when I was happy, when Ivan was the wonderful man who rescued me in the woods and not...not a vicious monster who I'd watched rip a vampire to pieces.

The memory of his hands on me, his weight pressing on my body came back as the wind blew the forest's peaceful scent into my senses.

I no longer feared this place. My love of it strongly overpowered my fear.

I saw on the ground with my back pressed up against a tree trunk and my knee pulled up to meet my chest. This was my comfort position.

This cannot be avoided any longer ,I tell myself. I was quite the procrastinator. For weeks I had managed to avoid reading the letter my mother wrote to me, simply because I did not want the image I had of her to fade into something else, something possibly worse.

Pulling the letter out of the large front pocket of my hoodie, I opened it up. The penmanship was unfamiliar but beautiful nonetheless. The f's resembled my own, curvy and long, just how I had been taught to make them.

Dearest Cara,

My sweet beautiful daughter. It is through tears of guilt that I write this to you, my first words to you since we last spoke.

I have never stopped loving you. In fact, my love for you grows more and more with each passing day.

My, you have grown. I only know this through the pictures your father sends me monthly, a promise he made to me when I left. I have kept them for you.

You are beautiful, with hair like your grandmother's, long and stunning. I imagine it is very soft.

You are kind, loving, warm- everything I could never be. It is hard to believe that you carry my blood in your veins. You truly are a blessing.

You have questions, I understand that. You must hate me. God knows I hate myself more, for leaving you, so young, so innocent.

It was not my wish to abandon you like I did, I pray you know that. The last thing I wanted was to leave you but circumstances gave me no choice at all. For your safety.

You will understand in due time. Hopefully, you will find it in your heart to forgive me for what I have done.

I pray to the gods that I may see you soon. Once we meet -on your terms, of course - I will explain everything.

Till we meet, know that I love you, my dearest, Cara.

Mom,

With love.

It was as if I had stopped breathing. The tears blurred my vision, preventing me from seeing. It was suddenly so cold.

With shaking hands, I ran the tips of my fingers across the surface of the paper, over the words : Mom, With love.

So many questions were left unanswered. The weight that ever pressed on my chest remained. Now I was even more curious, more anxious to know the woman who wrote this letter.

The words, they were hers, to me -for me.

For years I had felt abandoned by her. She had instilled in me a fear that everyone may leave me if I was not careful and now she was telling me that it was not her wish ?