Full Circle - Day 14

If you are new to this blog, start with the first post (Day 1). Happy reading and don't forget to leave your comments.

Day 14

Everyone silently braced themselves for the next phase of the past they would have to confront. Ivan’s eyes brimmed with fresh tears as he silently opened himself to remember and reveal more and more of the night that had tormented him for so long. “For awhile,” he began, slowly. “I just sat there in the car.” Instantly, the image became all too real to him. He could actually feel the cold leather of the steering wheel in his hands again. “I really had no idea what to do,” he continued. “Part of me wanted to call someone… anyone and beg for help. But who could I have called? No one else even knew Camille existed. I could not even trust to call the doctor that mother had appointed to care for Viola and the babies after the birth. Could I have told him that she was dead? Could I have trusted him to keep a secret of that magnitude? There were no options. I had to handle this alone. So I just started to drive. I drove around for awhile, just trying to gather my thoughts. I didn’t have a plan. I had never expected anything like this to happen. Eventually, I went to the rail yards… And that’s where I buried her,” he whispered, his voice filled with the anguish that had been in his heart for so long.

Victoria stood and walked over to her parents. “I don’t understand. You still haven’t told me how or why I would have killed my sister… my twin… someone I loved so very much.”

Ivan looked into his daughter’s eyes. He saw her desperate need for closure from all of this. “At first we didn’t have an answer for any of it,” he said slowly. “When I got back to the house, I cleared out all of Camille’s things from her suite. I had to get rid of everything. The next day I gave Nanny a very large sum of money and put her on a plane back to her country.” He paused, reflectively. “By this time, you had begun to withdraw completely from reality. You were still clutching something tightly in your hand. At that time, we had no idea what it was. But what we had found out was that you had turned up the thermostat in Camille’s suite. At the time no one had notice, but as we began to clear the room out, I realized the temperature in the room was almost eighty degrees.” Ivan watched as tears began to fall down Victoria’s cheeks as she took in all that he had just said. She could feel her heart ripping in half as she accepted the fact that she had actually been the one who had killed Camille. For so long she had hated her parents and even Alexandria, blaming them all for not loving Camille enough and then ultimately, for her death.

Ivan looked into his wife’s eyes. They both knew things would never be the same again. But perhaps that would be a good thing…. Somehow. For awhile, no one spoke..

Viola silently watched her family, carefully contemplating everyone’s ability to handle all that still remained hidden behind the dark doors of the past. She gave Ivan’s hand a gentle squeeze, encouraging him to continue.

“For several days,” he began slowly, “we tried to get you to open up. But nothing we did seemed to do any good. So we decided to just give you some space, let you work through your grief in your own way. We were all really just trying to deal with it on our own. It actually seemed to be working, for awhile. But we knew we had to do something when… “ Ivan struggled with the words. “when you started to take things down to the rail yards, things that had belonged to Camille… things I had locked away.”

Victoria squeezed her eyes shut tightly, trying hopelessly to lock out the haunting images of those trips to the rail yards that were rapidly appearing. “The locket,” Victoria whispered in horror. “The locket.”

Ivan took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “The locket,” he repeated. “Do you remember what you were doing with it?” he asked. Victoria shook her head slowly, unable to speak. “You were trying to give the locket back to Camille.” he said softly. “The one you took from her the night… “ he couldn’t bring himself to say the words.

Victoria gasped. “But why? It was my locket.”

Ivan dropped his gaze and let his shoulders droop. “I don’t know. I still can’t even figure out how you knew where she was. But somehow you did,” he added softly, still not looking up at her. “The fact that you kept going there was enough of a problem.” he continued, “But the night you tried to dig her up… “ Ivan found himself again choking back tears. “You kept saying she needed the locket so… so she could come back home.”

Victoria felt a chill crawl up her spine. She shuddered at very thought of all of this. “What was so special about that locket?” she whispered, unable to remember.

What would have compelled her to go to such great and unimaginable lengths as to try and unearth her sister’s body.

Be sure to look for the continuation of this story in about 3 days.