Contracting Lillian

Chapter 18

I was back on the plane, staring out of the window. I was tapping my fingers on the table in front of me. I couldn’t fathom what would happen now. There was an odd sense of peace that was found killing my father and I was okay with it, so okay with it that the only guilt I felt was the loss of the boy’s father.

I ran through the scene of how it all went time and time again but something didn’t make sense and I was curious as to why my father actually killed my mother. Why would she when there was no reason? Was it because he wanted every single emotional thing that was left in my life to be killed to make me into the monster that I was forced into?

I twisted in my chair, the letter coming to my mind and I wondered what she had written in it. I felt at comfort knowing my father died and I could read this letter without being dragged to the remembrance that I was taken away from my mom for his selfish reasons. I know my mother always loved me, even if I had come from someone who she could have despised. My brain could not wrap around a single thing my father said. She couldn’t have stopped caring or loving me. I remembered her favorite flower because she always said she liked them and we were always together when she told me. She would take so much care of me.

I pulled my luggage out and sifted through the items that I brought until I found the letter. I sat it on the table and stared so hard at it. The white paper that wrapped so professionally around the slip of paper that she had once wrote on.

I finally picked it up and started opening it carefully, like the paper was fragile and would shatter or dissolve in my hands if I wasn’t too careful.

I had finally pulled the single piece of paper out and sat it on the table. I inhaled deeply so I could keep the rising emotions at bay. Once I had read this, I would be crying and this time, I was okay to cry. The reason was still to mourn for my mother but also to give myself tranquility. Everything was going to be okay, unless Cassandra decided to spill.

I opened the paper that was folded three times into a perfect square but it looked to be folded multiple times before being folded into it correctly. I smiled. The small detail meant so much to me. My mother knew she wasn’t perfect and had made mistakes. I was glad she had done this, that she had made this small mistake of folding the paper wrong, time and time again. She could have practiced on a different paper but she hadn’t.

I turned my attention to the delicate cursive that was in her writing. It was neat and readable. Then I started to read the letter my mother wrote to me:

Dear Lillian,

I needed to say a few things that I never got to tell you in your teens and your becoming adult years. I know your father wasn’t agreeing with me visiting you and I wanted to. I had written to him about the visits but he wouldn’t ever write back. He would make sure I had no absolute contact with you and I hated knowing you were being raised by him but now you’re a grown adult and I’m so proud of what you have become. Your father visited me in the hospital multiple times before my kidneys were beginning to fail. I’m tired a lot. Writing to you was a lot of energy for me but I needed to let you know that I had always kept you in my mind, that I loved you even when you were gone. I am realizing how much I missed you throughout those years. I had cried when you were gone but I knew I couldn’t do anything about it because your father had you and would take care of you better than I would. He gave you a good education that I could never afford and I was even struggling when you were with me but I was never going to let you go, even if it were my choice because I know he forced you to hide who you were.