Encounter
“Mom…what did you just say?”, Lia asked again, her voice full of disbelieve. The expression on her face changed every three seconds – from total astonishment to fear and blank horror. She couldn’t understand her mother’s words – well Lia did understand what her mother had told her, but she couldn’t understand the meaning behind these words. She had never even considered talking about themes like that. Her mother took a sharp breath and then sighed deeply.
“I just told you that I’m going to marry Ian next month. I finally said ‘yes’ to his proposal from last winter.”, she said and her lips formed a little smile.
“Are you not looking forward to it? I thought you liked Ian…”
“Well, it’s not that I don’t like him…it’s just that you always said ‘the man who would persuade me to marry again still has to be born, because by now, he does not exist.’”, Lia said softly. “It’s really surprising, that’s all. When did you decide that?”
Carolyn drove her twelve year old daughter encouragingly over the left cheek. Then she went still and the two of them avoided looking at each other for nearly six minutes. Lia didn’t know what to think in a moment like this so she just remained silent.
„Sometimes you do things without a reason and just because of a sudden feeling.”, Carolyn finally said. Lia raised an eyebrow. That wasn’t her mom at all. Carolyn Marchwind would never do things because of sudden feelings, she would always have a good reason.
“Mom, come on and tell me. I won’t kill you if it’s that you’re worried about.”, Lia said and saw a shimmer of relief in her mother’s eyes. She took her daughter’s hands and tried to calm down for a second. She didn’t know how to start. Lia didn’t feel good. She was seriously surprised, nearly shocked by her mother’s words. It was really unexpected. And she wanted to know a reason.
“Ok, you’re right, there is a reason. And a damn good one for you, too I bet. You know, Ian and I were often alone at home when you were at school or met with your friends. And somehow…well we didn’t know what to do then, we were just bored and then…” Lia blushed.
“Mom, please don’t tell me things like that! It’s disgusting!”, she said and her mom nodded.
“All right, all right. The reason Ian and I will marry next month is, because I’m pregnant again. And I hope that you will be looking forward to the little child, together with us. We’ll finally be a real family by then, isn’t that good news?”, her mom asked and looked quite happy to be finally able to tell Lia the truth. She didn’t expect her daughter to react like that.
Lia’s face went still, her body stiff and she didn’t know what to say.
I always thought that we already are a real family…
That was the last thing she expected her mother to tell. She had always said that she sure loved Lia, but didn’t want to have another child.
A few years ago, when Lia was about seven years old, she had asked her mom if she could have a little brother or sister to play with. She was a very lonely little girl with her mother always staying at work till seven o’clock. But Carolyn had never wanted Lia to have a sibling. There had been three good reasons for this decision:
First, because she hadn’t got a man to become a child with, anyway.
Second, because she had been stressed to death with Lia as a newborn baby.
And third, because Lia should learn to stand on her own feet and a sibling would just distract her from the real life. She had to be prepared. Pretty cruel, but Lia had learned to put up with it over the years.
And now, several years later, her unfulfilled wish should finally come true? That didn’t make any sense. Carolyn could see the shock and the fear in her daughter’s eyes. That wasn’t exactly how she had imagined it. In her imagination, Lia would have laughed with her and would have been very excited. But now she just seemed upset and anxiously. What would she say to her? Would she scream, would she laugh? But it happened differently.
Without another word and without any hesitation, Lia turned herself away from her mother, opened the door and stalked out of the apartment.
“Hilary!”, was all she heard her mother screaming, then she wasn’t able to hear anything more. Lia ran as fast as she could, through the evening heat in her hometown Phoenix and right to her favorite place: To the platform from where she could look down to the Salt River. She had always gone to this place when she felt upset or lonely. This beautiful place with its fantastically view would always cheer her up.
Lia walked to the front part of the platform which was demarcated by an iron fence, so that no one could fall down into the river. Some benches stood near the fence and some plants in pots beautified the place in addition. She came nearer and leaned against the fence.
Why did you react like that? What’s the big deal about your pregnant mother? Come on, don’t be so selfish!, she said to herself and took a deep breath. The warm air here in Arizona was really reassuring and common to her. She grew up in this town, she had never left it and she certainly wouldn’t do so in the future.
Lia looked down into the water. It was about ten meters below her, but it was as clear as you would see it if you would see it from a height of fifty centimeters. Once she nearly climbed over the fence, but her mother had stopped her. Why, actually? You wouldn’t be hurt from ten meters. Maybe she should try it out after all…
Lia shook her head quickly. Why would she think about something like this right now? The answer was easy, because a fall from this height would just be very dangerous. So she shouldn’t try it.
Lia wanted to turn away and to go home, but suddenly, she felt as if something packed her by her shoulders and pushed her hardly against the fence. She screamed in fear, too afraid to do something. Her vision went black, she felt cold, felt water around her and then she fell into deep darkness.
That had happened nearly four years ago.
Hilary Marchwind often thought about what had happened that summer evening. But she didn’t remember it clearly. All that had remained in her memory was the sudden feeling of cold, water and darkness. Because of that incident, she had started to fear a few things. And the fears had become phobias over the years. A phobia of water, claustrophobia and a phobia of darkness. But Lia had learned to live her life with them. Now she felt better than before. And her life had turned out very well. After her little Sister Charlotte had been born, her mother had been gentler than ever before. She had been right. They had become a better family, everything seemed to work out between them.
When Ian went to work in the mornings, he took Lia to school by car. Carolyn went to kindergarten with Charley and started to work at home. After school, Lia went to kindergarten to pick up her sister and they walked home together. She loved her little sister, she seemed to be the cutest child on earth and was always a little angel. Maybe it had been better for her after all, to become a big sister by then, and not any earlier. She could show her mother her responsibility. She seemed like an adult.
“Well, I gotta go home now, or we’ll be late for dinner. See you tomorrow!”, Lia said and took Charley by her tiny hand. The door closed shut behind the two of them.
“How was kindergarten today?”, she asked gently and smiled down to her sister. Charley returned the smile.
“It was great! I played with Kim in the dressing up-room till midday. Then I drew a picture of a dinosaur and then we played on the outside-playground!”, Charley said with her bright voice.
“That sounds great.”, Lia said and ruffled through Charley’s blonde hair. She laughed loudly.
“Do we really have to go straight home?”, she asked and looked a little disappointed. Lia made a toneless sound and looked to her watch.
“Well, we still have an hour left, so we could go to my favorite place in the whole city.”, she said and saw with a big grin, that Charley seemed to cheer up immediately.
“Ready? Three…two…one…start!!”, she shouted and both of them started running. They ran straight to the platform where Lia had had her accident at the age of twelve. But now, with her sixteen years, she was confident enough to believe, that something like that wouldn’t happen again.
Lia lifted her little sister up. She had loved the beautiful view from up here since she had been a little child. A big smile appeared on Charley’s face.
“It looks great sis.”, she said and laughed loud. For her it was her first time seeing down to the Salt River. Lia just had to smile, too. Charley was like a tiny sun to everyone, there was nothing she didn’t laugh at, she gave her smiles even to spiders and snakes, she wasn’t afraid of them.
“The River’s called the Salt River. But please don’t ask me why, I haven’t got any clue. I always sleep in geography classes.” she said to her little sister and a really confused expression appeared on Charley’s face.
“What does geography mean?” she asked. Lia looked quite amused. Charley was only three years old. When Lia herself had been a little child like Charley, she had been really lazy and hadn’t wanted to talk till she turned four. But then she had learned extremely fast to use all the expressions and words, her parents had been quite impressed.
It wasn’t unusual for Charley to don’t know what things like geography, love and other complicated stuff like that meant. But in return she knew how to behave in front of other people or how she wanted her toilet seat cover to look like. This month it looked like a pink cloud and was as fluffy as a real cloud might have felt like.
“I’ll explain it to you in a few years. You wouldn’t understand it by now.” Lia told her and looked at her uninterestedly. Charley turned her face to Lia’s. She pressed her little hand on her sister’s cheek and their gazes met.
“Why do you always tell me that I don’t understand such a thing?”
“Because you’re too young. Ask me in a few years, it won’t be more interesting then.” She said and wanted to kiss Charley nicely on her right cheek, but she pinched Lia in her nose. This was the last thing she expected her little sister to do now. Surprised by her sudden move she let go of her and Charley fell to the ground. When Lia wanted to hold her back she already started to run to a near bench. Maybe she was planning to hide behind it.
A dark haired boy not older than seventeen sat on the bench, reading today’s newspaper. Lia ran after her little sister but she was too fast. She already played with Charley the entire day so she didn’t have the strength to run much faster than this. Her gaze wandered to the boy again, it was her only chance.
“Hey you, could you please catch her? I’m tired of running after her for today.” she called in the boy’s direction. The boy looked up, he seemed seriously surprised, maybe he hadn’t expected other people here. Just for how long had he been sitting there? Since this morning? Or maybe even longer?
Lia shook her head, that didn’t matter right now. The boy stood up quickly and made a step forward. Charley froze where she stood, the boy was really tall. He ducked and reached for the little girl to lift her up. Charley did nothing, she just looked into his face with these huge dark blue eyes of hers.
“Where were you planning to run to? Europe?”, he asked her gently und smiled. Immediately her blank expression turned into a little smile.
“Wanted her to catch me. She is really mean.”, Charley said with her bright voice and pointed her finger to Lia. The boy’s gaze met her. Lia shrugged imperceptibly. His eyes were beautiful. A warm gold, maybe like soft caramel. Really uncommonly but still beautiful in contrast to her own boring light blue eyes. That wasn’t enough. She had to see more.
When she looked at his entire body, she nearly started to drool on the floor. Not just his eyes but his whole appearance was incredibly beautiful. He was really tall and slender but still kind of muscular. His golden eyes stood out from his face because of their unusual color, but they didn’t seem to fit his hair. It was a little curly and so dark that it had to be black. Lia breathed quicker than before.
That wasn’t good. She had to stop looking at boys like him, most of them had a horrible character and were those types of men many women would fall for but never get a second call from after one night with them. And of course there was still Chris, Lia’s boyfriend.
She shook her head again. This wasn’t really the time to think about creepy boys or what they did to women. The boy had stopped looking at her and now ran his hand over Charley’s cheek and she started to laugh again. Lia cleared her throat loudly. Both of them looked at her.
“Thank you for catching her. She always does what she wants.” She said and came closer to them. Suddenly the boy‘s nice smile turned into an amused one. She didn’t know why, but Lia didn’t like that.
„Well, I think, back then, you were a little too young to give birth to a child, don’t you think?“ The friendly expression on Lia’s face was captured by total astonishment, she didn't know what to say.
“W-what?”
“I think, that is against the law. You could be arrested, you know?”, he told her and grinned bride. “Kids like you shouldn’t have sex so early, or something like that will happen.” He pointed out his finger at Charley. Lia went stiff, she gritted her teeth together and finally found her ability to speak again:
“What do you think you are talking about, you brain-dead moron!? This is obviously my little sister!”, she said with flowing rage. The boy raised an eyebrow.
“Brain-dead? Do I really look like that?”, he asked with an amused tone and looked at himself.
“I, actually, think I look damn good today.”, he said and looked pleased with himself. Lia made a face. She looked at her sister.
“Oh boy…I think I’m going to throw up any second…!”, she said, but the boy rarely seemed to notice. Actually, he looked a little bit disappointed.
“So you’re not her mother?”
“Don’t be ridiculous!” He grinned again.
“That’s good to hear. Then you should think about my words and don’t have sex till you’re married!”
“It’s not in your business to decide that, anyway.” Lia started to get really pissed off because of that boy. But he just started to laugh.
“You’re a naughty little girl, but it was fun talking to you and your charming little sister. Maybe we’ll meet again someday…”, he said and put Charley to the ground. Then he turned and slowly walked away, still laughing.
“Well I don’t think so…”, Lia murmured to herself. Charley smiled at her.
“That was a nice man. I like him!”, she said and laughed brightly. Lia shook her head.
“Bad taste, Charley...but now let’s just go home. Mom will freak out if we’re late.”
While going home, Lia thought about what had happened right now.
What the hell was that about?
