Chapter 24 #3
“Shantavia. I’m sorry. I wanted to tell you about Patron De Londe, but my mom didn’t kill herself, my father killed her.
And after that, he tortured me with steel and fire, burning this snake tattoo into my skin.
And he forced me to be adopted by him. I didn’t choose it.
He killed my mom and framed it as a suicide.
I had to stay with him and lie all my life.
I had to pretend like I didn’t like you many times in The Commons.
He would’ve killed you if he knew that I was helping you.
I couldn’t let that happen. I’m sorry I put you in danger by even letting you step foot in The Seventh Zone. ”
“Pesh, I understand! I do!”
“No! I need to tell you everything tonight! I can’t afford you not trusting me, ever.” His voice cracks.
I hold onto his hands tightly, looking intently into his eyes.
As he begins to describe his pain, I am caught up in agony. My heart is stunned as Pesh explains to me the worst day of his life—as a ten-year-old child:
“Are you okay, Son?” He heard Londe’s voice outside his bedroom door.
“Yes,” came a cherry reply. But Pesh dared not speak again lest he need to swallow.
He wasn’t ready to taste the bitter flavor of death.
So, he sat, frozen, trying to stall the inevitable.
But he knew it couldn’t last forever. He swallowed and remembered that just 30 minutes earlier, he had witnessed the murder of his sweet mother by Patron De Londe.
He saw her being held by Londe against her will.
He wanted to run in to save her, but his nanny grabbed him and forced him into his room.
He felt his lungs choke his throat, gasping for air to breathe, in pain and uncontrollable tears.
A bitter taste saturated his mouth, and suddenly, he felt propelled to throw up.
Now, when Patron De Londe knocked on his door to check on him, he immediately wiped his tears and put on a pretend persona to please Patron De Londe, lest he be killed also.
Londe soon reiterated to him the evil lie that his mother had just committed suicide.
He explained it in gruesome detail to a ten-year-old child, narrating it with a delightful sly leer.
“Her body jerked as her feet swayed, her torso spasmed as she screamed for air though she made no audible sound, and crack! She collapsed and came tumbling down. She killed herself because of the stress that came with being your mother, Pesh. But now, it’s all gone, and you never have to worry about her, ever, ever again,” Londe completed.
Pesh’s sun-dazed eyes were covered in complete darkness, masked in the dark clouds of Londe’s eyes. He was stunned, in utter silence. Never had a child hated a father with more perfect hatred as Pesh did.
It had started like any other day, until his mother sought to escape, to go outside of the country with ten-year-old Pesh.
She had just stepped out to drop Londe a note when he demanded that she leave without their son, never to come back.
When she sought to find Pesh, screaming his name, Londe took her into the room to be hung.
This crushing event of his mother’s death changed him forever.
To Pesh, not only did he lose a mother that day, but he lost his father all the same.
His mother was his best friend. She was the joy in his booming life, the ocean of peace in the chaos.
So, while his ten-year-old face showed nothing but allegiance to Londe, he solemnly swore in the depths of his soul that he would one day ruin Londe and avenge his mother’s death.
But time was of the essence—for the whole world believed Londe’s crocodile tears upon the announcement of his wife’s demise.
Therefore, Pesh underwent a perfect disguise of being the perfect son to this evil mastermind.
He was tortured to prove his allegiance to Londe on countless occasions—that’s how he got the snake tattoo on his wrist. It wasn’t a tattoo, as such.
It was a torture wound. Pesh endured being raised as Londe’s “star” while meticulously collecting evidence of Londe’s evildoings every year, every week, every day, every minute, every second.
It was only when he met me that he saw the means to act, for the first time in twelve years.
Tears stream down his face as he explains these painful events to me.
He can no longer continue the story.
Before I can say anything, Pesh begins to apologize to me, “I’m sorry for including you in my chaos, to be in my life without letting you know the magnitude of danger involved in knowing me!”
I interject, “Stop! You don’t have to do that!
My love for you is stronger than the ocean.
I love you too deep not to embrace every bit of your waves, even if it consumes me.
I would go to the end of the world with you.
I would go to the depths of the grave for you.
I’m only sorry I wasn’t here for you sooner.
I’m so sorry you had to experience such horror!
Thank you for including me. I love you.”
His sun-dazed eyes gaze on me with warmth, and ripples of raindrops fall down his cheeks, but the clouds do not cover it. This time, the clouds do not cover it.
His eyes radiate with rays of hope. “I love you,” he says.
I hug him, and we hold each other in a comforting embrace, holding onto each other with every inch of our souls. But. We are interrupted.
We hear a loud call for help. Our smiles instantly melt into dread.
“Pesh!” the voice screams. “Shantavia!”
We look at each other, perturbed.
We sprint toward the sound, terrified on what just happened.