Musing #66789 - Remembrances, Pt One

Chapter 1

The autumn rain dripped cold but quietly around the Reese family’s private cemetery.  From the kitchen window of the family side of the Morganwg estate, Ciara Mac Innes-McBatton watched a lone figure sitting on a bench by a recently installed headstone.  Typically, the Jewish family waited until the dedication ceremony before uncovering the headstone but this was not the typical Jewish family. 

She was grinding herbs for a special tea she had been making throughout the year of mourning.  Ostensibly it was to help the mourner better manage the inevitable sadness that accompanies loss.  But, this activity was more for her benefit, giving her something to do, some way to cope with what was a loss for her as well.  She was stuck at Kubler-Ross’s anger stage of death and loss – the pulverizing of the herbs in her mortar and pestle.  But anger was not an emotion the elderly animal whisperer and druidic priestess was used to as it was not normally part of her nature.  And as she considered the figure in the distance, she finally accepted that her anger was simply a reflection of her helplessness.  There was nothing she could do for the figure now slumped over, likely crying.  She knew he was dying.  The rest of the family did not, particularly the younger ones – he had insisted that she say nothing and there weren’t any external signs.  He didn’t want the kids to worry and she knew his sadness would kill him long before the cancer did.

“Mum?”  Brianna, Ciara’s oldest daughter, came in the kitchen and her presence shouldn’t have startled her but it did.

“Sorry?”

“Mum,” the concerned daughter said as she rested her hands on her mother’s slumped shoulders, “shouldn’t we convince him to come inside?  The groundskeepers need to put up the tent before the grass turns to mud.”

Brianna was the practical, salt-of-the-earth one of Ciara’s three children and the most like her.  She was practiced too at handling death as her father had passed just three years prior.  This informed Brianna’s concern for she was clairsentience and thus knew about the pending loss.  She understood that for her mother, an entire world was leaving her.  The two of them did not speak of it – Brianna held silent out of respect and Ciara held silent to prevent her mind from shattering.  “Yes, you’re right,” Ciara sighed.  She put down her apparatus but had to rub her hands as a combination of moderate arthritis and stress had increased the normally tolerable pain.  “I’ll go talk to him.”

“No,” Brianna kissed her mother’s cheek assuredly, “no, I’ll go.  You finish the food.  Guests should start coming soon and I think that roast needs some attention.”  Ciara gave her daughter an appreciative smile.  It was a comfort to know that when the time came, Brianna would deftly take on the mantle as the family matriarch. 

Brianna was in her early 50s and demonstrated her own fair share of grays streaking highlights through her short bouncy hair.  She was stocky like her mom but she had her father’s facial features, including dark freckles around her nose spreading out underneath her light brown eyes.  Her clothes were revitalized comfortable hippie style also like her mom.  The callouses on Brianna’s hands were not from handing large farm animals but from the plaster she used for her sculptures.  She was typically fierce and determined but as she got closer to the seated figure, his sadness nearly overwhelmed her such that she had to stop, slow her stride, and collect herself. 

She glanced at the holographic image hovering above the headstone.  It was of two men dressed in Welsh cilts, under a chuppah, a Jewish wedding canopy, shifting their feet and looking terribly shy.  An older woman’s voice, likely Lady Nora who was now long since dead herself, echoed from the image saying, “Smile boys!  Hold hands, this is a wedding after all!”  Like on cue, the two men did, each shuffling nervously just a little more before one of the men turned and gave the other a loud, wet kiss on the cheek which made the receiver grin brightly.  The holograph looped around again, each time the gif was more painful to watch because of its accurate reflection of the love shared between these two men.

If postmodern medicine had made 80 the new 60, such was not the case for the man seated on the concrete bench who was allowing the rain water to baptize him in pain.  He wore a light blue jacket over a tee shirt and jeans.  His skinny frame should have been freezing but he paid the weather no mind and the water dripping down from his yarmulke, skullcap, simply helped hide the stream of tears crisscrossing his face.

“Uncle Deetz,” Brianna said softly, suddenly uncertain of what she could say that wouldn’t sound condescending.  She continued speaking psychically, as had been their way since she was a small child, “Please, come inside.  You’re scaring Mum.  You’re scaring me.”

Viscount Desmond “Deetz” Mac Innes-Reese was so lost to his grief he didn’t realize it was raining nor felt his own tears.  He had been like this since finding his childhood crush and love of his life dead from a sudden heart attack sitting in his favorite chair a year ago.  He’d told Angus, the 12th Earl of Glamorgan, to let the grounds keepers shovel the walkway after an early season snowstorm had blanketed the Cardiff area.  But Angus was always vain, constantly worried that old age had wilted a body he proudly kept up all throughout his life.  The idea of being weak, unable to push aside a few meters of powder was beyond his comprehension.  But because 84 years old is still 84 years old and despite a life of healthy living, his heart decided snow was stronger.  When Deetz heard their dog’s whining from upstairs where he was completing a conference call, Deetz knew something was wrong and before he reached the living room, he knew Angus was dead.  And from that moment on, the hole in Deetz’s heart made it hard to breathe.  “Please don’t worry.  I’ll come inside,” Deetz projected to Brianna.

He tried to stand but grief makes one weak and Brianna had to help him to his feet.  The wet grass made his steps uneasy, so he had to hold on to her arm to walk back to the estate.  For a former amateur MMA star whose physical prowess and agility were legendary within MI-6 circles, it should have been embarrassing to have to lean heavily on one’s niece to walk but at this point he didn’t care and she was pleased to be of service.  In some ways, she was closer to him than to her own parents.  They were kindred spirits who shared similar temperaments and psychic talents.  Outside of Angus, she knew him the best and during her tumultuous adolescence, he was the only one who could get through to her.  Now he needed her and she was grateful for the opportunity to honor the person, beyond her parents, who loved her deeply and unconditionally.

“All the kids and grandkids are here.  They are waiting for one of your stories,” Brianna said.

Deetz knew she was looking for some way to cheer him up.  “The babies too?”

“Yes, the babies might as well get used to your exaggerations and hyperbola,” she smiled while patting his hand affectionately.  “Their favorite has got to be the space shuttle to Mars.”

This made Deetz chuckle as that was a particular favorite of his as well.  He wanted to smile as well but it was difficult.  He found without Angus, his mouth didn’t move that well.  “I can’t promise you much time past today, Bri.”

She fought back tears.  “I can’t say I understand the kind of love you had with Uncle Angus.” 

Deetz squeezed her arm warmly.  She had just divorced from Kylie after finding her wife had been cheating on her.  Brianna had married late in life and put all her eggs in one basket that had a hole in the bottom.  If there was a reason compelling Deetz to keep living, it was to see his favorite niece through this difficult time.  “Love is to put your happiness into the happiness of another, it is said.  You did your part and cannot force someone to do theirs.”

Two broken souls reached the house, hopeful seeing family would supply some temporary relief.