Untempered

It’s my own fault I suppose. The predicament in which I find myself, that is. Then again, maybe it’s not. Who is to say really, that this miserable end is not a fair final companion to this miserable life? Rushing on as it does unconstrained, dragging me along to learn lessons far too late. I had hoped for better, yet even now I cannot find the strength to lay blame on anyone. Not on myself for being a fool, nor on him for seeing that, and certainly not on you. You who wished for this even less than myself, you who had less say than even I. I could neither abandon you nor love you, even now.

It began little over a year ago; long enough ago that the sting had faded yet not so long that I could have forgotten the scent of tobacco, the taste of brandy, nor the haunting sound of empty promises. I had just arrived in London, a fresh young flower. Still a bud in all truthful and meaningful ways, not unlike those that decorated the gardens upon my arrival. He was a close friend to my older cousin with whom I had taken up residence for the summer. Like a mighty oak, he cast a great shadow over the blooming fields and fruit trees. I was enraptured with him as he towered to the sky, and to my delight, he seemed quite fond of the fresh blush that gently graced the treetops. His voice, a deep rumbling like the shaking of the earth spoke gently in my ear. His eyes, like the boundary between night and day, seemed to cast their gaze upon me alone. And, his touch like the warmth of the sun enveloped me as spring gave way to summer, burning from my soul the last of my springtimes.

That was the summer of fire, and as beautiful as it seemed in the moments of passion and heat, a fire can only scorch the earth when let to run untempered. Two months had barely passed when the flames reached too high to combat, and I blamed the rain. Had it not fallen so persistently in those first few weeks we may not have had the time to become so well acquainted. It was in that first wet month, the world shrouded in shadow and mist, that the fire sparked. As if without my noticing I was consumed and yet he —who was less like an oak rooted and firm and more like an ivy vine— danced away from the blaze without so much as ash on his coat tales. After I noticed the scent of smoke and found the first traces of soot, it was too late to quench the flames.

Nine months after I learned the truth and seven months after it became too obvious for him to deny; he bought the ticket, and I boarded the ship with a single case of all that I held dear in this world and the promise of reunion on the other side. It is one year to the day now since he walked through the door the scent of cigars clinging to his clothing. It is Six months now, to the week, since he convinced me to return to my family’s home, for my health. It has been only a few days since I had felt the true loss of him. Call it love, or naivety, either way, I was a fool. Because I never doubted him, with his smooth way of speaking, and the way he could be the sweetest of men when he so desired. I never thought we would be anything but happy, not when I was sent back to my parents, not when his few and far between letters grew evermore spares, not until I looked back from the boarding ramp and found not a trace of him to see me off. I thought my heart had frozen at that moment. I thought I had lost the will to care, and that all living things would be stalled outside the walls of frigid my soul for the rest of my days. I went through the motions, alone.

But when the boat shuddered, and I was knocked back onto the deck before I could climb the railing, all I could think of was you. I have never felt more longing or regret than in that moment knowing that I left you down there alone. How could I have been so foolish? Again. Without knowing what had happened I hurried from the rear of the ship, wanting nothing more than to see your face, to touch you, and know that you were safe. Images of you on the floor having been thrown in the ship’s heaving flashed in my mind as I pushed passed the growing crowd to get to you. What a fool. I had thought I would never love again and yet there you were, reaching to me with all that you had, and I, the selfish child that I am, could not see it. Since the moment you came into my life had I ever truly considered you mine before this moment? Certainly, if I had, I never would have been alone on that deck. The moment I burst through the door the tears fell from my eyes, to see you there exactly as I had left you was the greatest of blessings. I embraced you as if I had never thought to abandon you as cruelly as I had been abandoned.

It was then the chaos of the moment reached me, the screams of terror and panic, the pounding of footsteps, breaking glass and rushing water. And, above all else a single sentence repeated over and over, ‘The ship is sinking’. The next moments are a blur of bodies and voices and flailing limbs as the ship shook and rocked in its death throes. Then the cold. As sudden and intense as a flame.

I did all that I could to hold you up. I hope it helped. When the boat reached us there wasn’t room for me, please know I never meant to leave you again. But I passed you to a woman who quickly wrapped you in furs, and looked at me with pity in her eyes. I could never give you the love you deserved, but I have given you life twice now. Should a fool like me find herself before the Father’s throne, I will ask him that this second life of yours be better and filled with more love than the first. It is the very least I could do for you, my tragic child, my Daisy.