Born to Suffer So My Brother Learns Chapter 08
On the other end of the line, Irwin’s voice was ice-cold.
“Mom, I’m going abroad and won’t be coming back. Take care of yourself.”
Mom’s hand shook as she gripped the phone. “Irwin, do you hate me?”
“Yes,” Irwin replied simply, but it pierced Morn’s heart like a knife. “But I hate myself even more. I was the one who got Helena killed, and I’ll never forgive myself for the rest of my life.”
With that, he hung up.
Still clutching the phone, Mom sat on the couch in a daze for what felt like forever.
The next morning, she went to the bank and transferred all her savings to Irwin. Then, she canceled all her licenses and closed out every account in her name.
Finally, she sat down at my desk and spread out a fresh sheet of stationery.
“Helena, I’m coming to be with you.”
After that, she opened the bottle of sleeping pills she had been hoarding and poured every single one into her mouth, swallowing them.
This time, she finally didn’t have to wake up again.
After Mom died, it was a neighbor who found her.
She was slumped over the desk, a small smile still on her lips.
Beside her lay a letter she had left for Dad and Irwin.
“Tyrone, Irwin, I’m sorry. I wasn’t a good wife or mother. I’m the reason Helena is dead, and I destroyed this family. I can’t live with myself anymore. I’m going to be with Helena now. You two take good care of yourselves and don’t come looking for me.”
By the time Dad made it back, Mom had already been taken to the funeral home.
He stood in the morgue, staring at Mom’s cold body for a long time.
Irwin never came back.
Dad placed her urn beside my grave.
Two small headstones stood side by side. One was carved with “Beloved Daughter, Helena Blanchard”, the other with “Rosanna Stewart”.
When Mom opened her eyes again, she found herself standing on a gray, hazy road. The sky had no color, and the ground stretched on forever. A thin mist drifted around her, dreamlike.
She looked down at her hands and touched her face-everything was just the way it had been.
She just kept walking until up ahead, a long, narrow bridge came into view. At the foot of it stood a hunched figure –an old crone in a dark cloak, tending a bubbling black kettle over a low fire.
Mom walked over in a daze. She was just about to take the goblet the old crone offered her when something suddenly flashed through her mind. Without a second thought, she smacked the goblet away, sending its contents
spilling everywhere.
“I won’t drink it! I want to see Helena,” she roared.
Just then, the mist parted.
I stood in a white dress at the head of the bridge.
Mom recognized me instantly. A jolt went through her body, and tears burst forth in an instant.
She ran toward me like a madwoman, shouting, “Helena! Helena!”
She lunged forward to embrace me, but her hands passed straight through my body.
We were both ghosts now, yet she still couldn’t hold me.
Mom looked down at me, tears streaming down her face.
“Helena, I’ve come to be with you.”
I gazed at her expressionlessly. “Why did you come?”
Mom froze. “I-I came to keep you company. I worried about you being here all alone.”
I let out a small laugh. “When I was alive, when was I ever not alone?”
Mom’s face went pale in an instant.
“When you favored Irwin over me, I was alone. When you used me as a prop to teach him a lesson, I was alone.
“When you watched the pesticide eat me up from the inside and grinned while you gave Irwin a life lesson, I was alone then, too. Mom, when have you ever been there for me?”
