Sincerely, Julia

Alison walks into the old, rusty attic. She looks around curiously, wondering if she needs to take anything important from here. She lets out a loud sneeze as she carefully manoeuvres over the objects on the floor. She looks around one more time, scanning the room until her eyes land on a locked brown box. She steps closer and picks up the box. Curiously, she shakes it up and down and brings her right ear near the box. She can hear something clink. Okay, maybe this is worth a further investigation. She makes her way out of the attic and towards her childhood bedroom.

RINGGGGG.

“Hello?” Alison picks up her phone. She can hear some rustling noises in the background before a deep voice answers back.

“Ali hon, it’s me. Sorry, I couldn’t accompany you today. You know-,”

“Yea I know Peter. You were not even there for funeral so surely I did not expect much” She spits out in a rapid fire. She breathes in and out, giving herself a few seconds before saying, “it’s okay, I’ll just pack mum’s things on my own.”

“sorry….I’ll see you next weekend, okay?” Peter hesitantly asks Alison. Alison sighs and opens the door. Slowly settling herself in her bed as she answers back, “whatever dad. See you” She hangs up the call and throws her phone away. She crosses her legs and places the box in her laps. The supposed lock on the box was so rusty and old, that just by pulling on it with some strength broke it. “Well, that was easy,” she whispers to herself.

Inside the box, there were numerous photos. Her eyes light up with curiosity as she traces her fingers through the photos. The first one is of her beautiful mum with her brown hair dancing with the wind. She has a big awkward smile on her face as she’s surrounded by her friends at the North Star Beach. She tries to look for her dad among the unfamiliar faces, but he was not there. Well, this must be before they met. She continues going over the photos one by one, a small smile forming in her face. Sometimes she forgot that her mum was more than just a ‘mum’. She had a name of her own, ‘Julia’ and she sure did have a fun, and exciting life as shown in these photos.

Her eyes start to glisten as she continues to stare at a smile that she dearly misses. One she used to see, one so contagious that she can’t help but return with a smile of her own. She continues flipping through her mother’s memories, trying to relive them as if she herself was there. She suddenly pauses, this one photo didn’t have faces. Instead, it was a picture of a pinky promise between two people. She flips to the back, ‘Julia & Kami, 1995’ it reads.

Kami? Who is Kami? Alison wipes her tears and looks for more photos in the box. She does not recall anyone named Kami. Never heard or seen her even in her childhood days. Her fingers stop and lifts some more photos with 1996 written on the front of a yellow sticky note. Wow, kami is a beautiful woman with long black hair. Alison stare at Kami blowing out the candles with her mum right by her side. She scans the photo for every clue she can find on who Kami was to her mum, when her eyes drop to the bottom of the picture. There, she sees two intertwined fingers under the table which the cake was placed on.

Oh. Oh.

Her eyebrows move closer together as she goes over more photos. Kami is everywhere. She looks for earlier photos that are now scattered around bed. She starts to notice Kami is in most of them and for the ones she was not in, Alison guessed she was behind the lens. There is one particular photo that she loves. Her mother is staring directly at the camera. A big smile on her face, with the sun also smiling gently behind her. In her hands, she’s holding fresh sunflowers wrapped in some newspaper dating in mid 1996. The more Alison stared, the more she realised how gentle and warm her mum was starting at her through the photo. She turns the photo to find her mum’s neat handwriting – ‘Happy Anniversary My Love.’

A chuckle escapes her lips as she softly says, “you never told me you loved someone named Kami mum.” She grabs a tissue from the top of her drawer and blows her nose. “You should’ve told me…. I would love to hear about her.”

Alison gathers all the photos together and neatly puts them together. She carefully places them back in the box when she notices a brown envelope with a red seal on top. She inspects it and puts it up against the ceiling light to see what’s inside. Alison can only see what looks to be a folded paper and a circular object. She pouts her lips and inspects the envelop, should she open it?

Alison looks to find her phone she just threw away and types in the address she finds at the back of the envelope. She hopes Kami is still where her mum remembers her to be.

***

A lady in her 40s named Kami is seen gently rocking in her chair. She gently stares at an envelope delivered by a young woman in her 20s. Confused, she gently tears the red seal and pulls out a neat, folded paper and a silver ring. Her eyes immediately stings and her throats itchy. Kami takes her time to read the letter, she reads it over and over as the sun slowly set in front of her. After the paper had too many droplets of tears, she carefully sets it on a table next to her. Smiling, she softly slides the silver ring into her ring finger and sends a flying kiss towards the sky.

Dear Kami,

To my one and true love.

If you knew half of my hearts been taken by a baby girl named Alison,

Would you be mad?

My one and true love,

If you knew how much I craved for your warmth,

Especially when the moon disappeared,

Would you have made your way to me?

My one and true love,

If I ignored their disgusted stares and hurtful words,

Would you have chosen to stay?

My one and true love,

I miss you,

Please come back,

Even if it’s for just a moment, it’s alright.

To my one and true love,

I love you.

Sincerely Julia.

THE END