A Strange Little Desert Town - Chapter 12 (4/5)
A Strange Little Desert Town
Chapter Twelve - Accidental Truths
Part Four of Five
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It was raining.
Good. It suited the mood. Daniel only wished it would wash away reality. Or at least the pain.
Lightning flickered across the sky, thunder rolling through just moments later. The storm was almost directly overhead. Yes, he thought. This is precisely the weather suitable for today. Anything else just wouldn't be fair.
Daniel kept placing one foot in front of the other. It had gotten him through the last week at work & had gotten him through the earlier pre-cremation service. It was still difficult for him to believe that she was really gone. He kept expecting her to phone, or to bump into her at the shops. Or to see her hatchback in her driveway. After everything. In spite of everything. She was gone.
Steps. They'd climbed these together so many times over the years. Never again. They would never again try to climb in step with their arms around each other's waists. She'd never again tease him by skipping steps & changing pace. Nor would she ever again attempt to race him.
Ash looked down at her twin. He was really torn to shreds over Bella's death. It was obvious to most people that he & Bella had been perfect for each other, but no one besides Ash knew of Daniel's truest feelings. The twins shared everything, including their deepest secrets. Too much had gone before for them not to. Each was the reason for the other's survival & secrets found no place in their relationship as siblings. Even compared to most twins, Ash & Daniel were close. So it was that Ash was the only other soul who knew of Daniel's plan to ask Bella to marry him.
Oh Danny, she wished she could do something, anything, to ease the pain her brother felt. As he reached the top of the staircase, she reached out to him. He crumpled in her arms, sobbing as though he would never stop. Remembering the pain of Daniels' short-lived death, Ash couldn't even begin to fathom the pain he felt now.
They were going to scatter her ashes to the wind. Let her fly out over the town she'd loved so much. To become a part of its soil & sand where she chose to rest. Bella hadn't been born here, but she'd loved it nonetheless. She'd come from one of those seemingly "pleasant" little places that are all about sugar cups & baking for neighbours, until you turn your back. She had nothing but bad memories of the place & preferred not to speak of it. Daniel could remember the pain in her eyes just before she would change the subject.
Jacinta watched her nephew. He was a wreck, understandably so. For all that he wasn’t the type that would settle down, Jacinta always got the feeling that if he was it would be with Bella. There was something in the way he looked at her. Something that said more than words ever could. She wished that there was something she could do. But he could only handle Ash’s sympathy, not anyone else’s. For all that she was their aunt, Jacinta had never felt more like their younger sister than she did then.
Seated beside her brother, she felt totally alone. Mike had not been his normal self in weeks. He’d closed his laboratory & had stopped leaving the house unless it was essential. Jacinta was sure he wasn’t here. He was more likely reliving the memory of his late wife’s funeral all those years ago. Looking to Ash & her husband Cory only made her solitude at this funeral worse. She wished she could have brought her girlfriend, Wendy. But she couldn’t get time off work. Wendy worked twelve hour shifts, seven days per week, & was allotted no holidays. Not even a day off for a funeral. At least Ash had Cory for support.
The eulogy that Sam & Daniel had written for Bella was beautiful. It was different to the memorials given at the service earlier. This one wasn’t a memory so much as a release. Daniel’s voice cracked as he struggled to keep his emotions under control. Sam wept openly, unable to speak at all.
"And so we give you to the land & air that you loved so much," Daniel managed.
Everyone was given a handful of Bella’s ashes. Stepping to the edge, overlooking the town, they all said their own goodbyes to a wonderful friend & openly caring person. Daniel let the remainder from the urn go, catching the wind & blowing out over the plain.
He broke at that point.
Ash caught him in an embrace & he sobbed into her shoulder long after the others had slipped away the cars below.
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