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Missing You

The Words She Wrote

By Jamie RohrerPublished 3 years ago 3 min read
Top Story - February 2021
34
Missing You
Photo by Nazym Jumadilova on Unsplash

She opened the journal. It had been her mother’s. The black leathery exterior felt soft, almost feathery in her hands - the paper pages aged. Her mother had specifically willed the journal to her; the two had been close, but they had fallen out of contact shortly before her mother had passed.

“Feb. 16th 2021," she read aloud as her fingers skimmed the opening line. That had been six years before she was born: six years before her fingers had first felt her mother’s.

And yet, in a life before her life, her mother had been here. Here on this paper: each page a tiny time capsule of consciousness, of handwritten notes bearing the weight of a lost memory only just now re-articulating itself back into reality.

The world had changed since then: perhaps, too much.

Written thought had become rare and with it the interpretation of reality. Her mother’s words were her perception of the world - accurate or not. And by reading her mother’s words, she was able to not just step into her mother’s eyes, but to step into her mother’s mind: to live her stream of consciousness.

Paper too was rare now. And expensive. Reserved most exclusively for fine art. And with it, handwriting. She, herself, could hardly write. She had never been taught cursive, and what little she did know of basic handwriting had mostly degraded from lack of use.

And yet, awkwardly, the world still spun. The leaves still burst into a haze of green in the spring. And the winter still turned the reds and purples and yellows to dust.

And it is in that world - in that world of similarities - that she now imagined a youthful version of her mother writing in the small black notebook: perhaps snuggled tightly beneath a warm blanket in some small window at the tallest peak of her house on a cold February winter day.

Perhaps, nearby, a fire crackled in the fireplace.

And a pet. Her mother had once told her she had a dog. Maybe the dog’s nose nestled against her mother’s feet…

But she didn’t know. She couldn’t know. The memories were lost. The facts and details of her mother’s life had been erased from existence like the leaves in the winter.

Page by page the journal revealed what it could - words and thoughts written before her life, details about a place she could never be.

Her finger methodically followed each line on the page as she continued to read the words aloud. Oddly, she expected to see her own name hidden in the journal’s text, somewhere, amongst the beautifully scrolled words like a bottled message bobbing through the river of time.

As a child, she had read of clairvoyants who could perceive events in the future - and, not that she expected her mother was clairvoyant - but that fate itself may have been. That fate - in its twisted and mysterious ways - would send her a message if all she did was look hard enough.

Her mother’s passing - specifically without her by her mother’s side - left her anguished, and she hoped even the slightest message from her mother would offer reprieve.

However, as the pages and words passed beneath her fingers, her expectations dwindled. Each passing page became more an ever increasing disappointment rather than the intended journey into her mother’s mind.

She knew this. Rationally she knew this. But still her fingers continued to press their tempo, lingering only momentarily before the flip of each page. Whether her fingers actually moved faster or if the increase in tempo was just her perception, she didn’t know.

The time ticked and swirled - but did not stop - until her finger caught the last page:

Dec. 25th, 2022

USD: $20,000

to

BTC: bc1qxy2kfdygjrsqtzq2n0yrf2493pa3kkfjhx0wlh

Encryption Key: “I love you”

humanity
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About the Creator

Jamie Rohrer

Writer. Troublemaker. Rollerblader extraordinaire. Hanging out in #EastTroy. I’m fortunate to have found myself surrounded by a group of amazing, talented people - the projects we've completed would not have been possible without them.

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