I twisted my hands. I realized in that moment that whether I chose to become friends with my father or not, the repercussions of what he had done to my mother--and by extension, to me--were something I would not forgive easily, nor ever forget.
I remember the day of the accident. We were living in California, near Berkley. I had just turned six...
But before my mind will allow me to remember the day I lost my mother, I am forced to dwell on the few fragments my young mind gripped onto-the few live memories I still possess, and the story of sorrow that plays over and over in my mind.
Fortunately for my mother I suspect, she was a "non-matriculated" college student; she was 28 when finished undergraduate school. After high school she had done some temp work and then worked as an EMT for a few years, before she got some kind of financial assistance (I think it was a legacy from one of her few relatives). This enabled her to finally go to school and earn a BS in psychology while working part-time for a legal firm.
Of course, somewhere in her senior year, she met a younger man, got involved with him, and I was the result. Her pregnancy completely destroyed her dreams of being a therapist, because with a little kid to raise alone, it would have been incredibly difficult for her to pay for a doctoral program as well as take good care of me. From what I gather my father had disappeared soon after she had found out she was pregnant, leaving no traces of ever having been in my mother's life aside from a squirming baby girl. Me.
My mother started working as an EMT again soon after I was born, and kept all sorts of crazy schedules. She often left me in the care of her roommate and best friend, Julia. I remember once, about week before the accident, when my mom and Julia were talking over coffee in the kitchen of our apartment...it was, of course, a sunny day, and I was alternating between playing with a set of blocks and reading "Charlotte's Web"...
As the kitchen was open to the living room, I was able to hear every word spoken. I remember my mother's face, her gently waving brown hair, her blue eyes that always seemed a little nervous...I remember she was still dressed in her uniform, it was early afternoon and she'd worked one of those arduous overnight double shifts... A white haze surrounds the scene now, a thick fog threatening erasure. I can hear her voice, faintly, as through a long tunnel, Julia's lower tones in response. I saw Julia with her left hand on my mother's shoulder, the other was fiddling with her necklace. My mother held her head in her hands. She had abandoned the coffee.
"Oh, Julia, how I would love to be in graduate school right now..."
"Soon you will save up enough. You are almost ready to try to get a loan."
"But how can I take care of her? I'd rather be with her than give everything up, but it's tearing me apart…I wish my parents were still alive…"
Julia brushed the hair back from my mother's eyes, and handed her a tissue. The sunlight glinted off a spoon on the table.
"Go ahead and cry, Carol. You need some sleep. I'll take Dagny to the park..."
Then Julia called to me, and I abandoned the wooden cathedral I was building and got my shoes. Julia and I walked to the park. I spent a lot of time on the swings, while she looked on. I remember Julia kept smiling at me as she fed the birds. The glint from the silver star necklace she often wore caught me in the eye a few times, and when I blinked, I saw the afterimages.
When we got home my mother was asleep on the couch, and she hadn't even bothered to change out of her uniform. Julia told me to be very quiet, and said I could watch television in her room if I wanted.
That was the last time I ever played in that park. The following week, while I was sitting in kindergarten learning the alphabet, the principal knocked on the classroom door, accompanied by Julia. My teacher went over, and they had a whispered conversation. My teacher's face contorted, and I remember she looked shocked. "Come on, Dagny, we have to go," I remember Julia saying. So I got my jacket out of the cloakroom and started out of the classroom. My teacher looked upset.
"Good-bye, Miss Roe," I said politely, like we had been taught that day in class.
"Good-bye, sweetie," she replied, and gave me a hug.
I wondered why Julia looked like she had been crying. As we headed towards her car, I asked, "Aunt Julia, what's wrong?"
Julia looked like she was going to start crying again. We got to the car, and she buckled me into the backseat. To my surprise, she sat down next to me. Julia took my hands. She took a deep breath.
"Dagny, honey, your mommy was in a car accident. She was driving to work and another car hit her."
She waited for that to sink in. "Dagny...the ambulance brought your mommy to the hospital, but she was hurt very badly. They did an operation on her, but...honey...your mommy died in the hospital."
I don't think it really sunk in for me at that point. I am pretty sure I started crying. My memory is blank from then until...
A flash. I am standing next to a hearse. Julia was beside me, in a dark dress. I look down, and my own dress is black as well. My insides hurt, as if a very important part had been ripped out and left me empty. I feel wetness on my face-it is my tears. Looking upwards, Julia stands, her eyes downcast, with a hand upon my head.
My mother really didn't have much family, so the service was small. There wasn't a wake or anything, just a funeral. They buried Carol Chandler with only a friend, a child dressed in black, a cousin or two, and a few co-workers to mourn her passing, her once-animated form imprisoned in a black box. Everyone seemed to be moving in slow motion. Julia kept me by her side the whole time…my mother's coffin was suspended above a slit in the ground. Somebody mumbles something, and the crowd departs as if walking underwater. Julia leads me away, and we go home.
The days passed, and the tears flowed. I missed my mother. Although her work schedule impeded on the time we spent together, she always found the time to sit with me for a few minutes every day, stroke my hair, and give me a hug. The last time I saw my mother's face was the broken memory of a school morning, a kiss goodbye in the car before I went my way. Had I known…I would have held on to her for dear life.
Julia tried to adopt me, but it fell through. My mother hadn't made up a will, and Julia was not a relation. I remember Julia getting very upset and speaking harshly to a woman who came to the house; the woman must have been a social worker or something.
"She has been living with me nearly her entire life! She knows me! She's like my own daughter."
"I'm sorry, that is not permitted. I am afraid that we…"
I was moved to a foster home which I do not remember-my only knowledge of it comes from looking at my records. What does stand out is a few minutes before the social worker came to get my things and me, Julia pulled me aside amidst my tears. She kissed my forehead and held out her closed hand.
"Dagny, honey, we only have a few more minutes before that woman comes back here. I will probably not be allowed to see you for a very long time. Take this-"
She dropped that necklace she always wore into my small hand. I know now that it is a pentagram.
"I am giving this to you so that you don't forget me. Keep it safe." Julia hugged me. Just then the social worker drove up...
A few weeks later we received notice that a nice couple with a little girl a few years older than me, the Thorsonnes, wanted to adopt me. The adoption went through, and that is when the life I am living now began. That is how I ended up sitting in a palace in a strange world, talking to a strange man named Luke Reynard who claims to be not only my father, but the king of this place.
I had realized very quickly as a child that my mother's life should have taken a much different path than the one it did. My mother was very smart, and should have gone to graduate school instead of working as an EMT and taking care of a little kid...if Luke had stayed around after getting her pregnant, maybe things would have worked out better for my mother. My bitterness grew. Maybe if he'd had the balls to be a man about it instead of disappearing so quickly, she wouldn't have ended up in the life she was living....
And maybe she wouldn't be dead now.