Chapter 19
Eden and Eric slowly walked back to the hotel, just wanting to get away from where they were and yet not wanting to see anybody. Eden was still a bit dazed and surprised to find that very little time had passed and that everybody was still in the workshop.
As she peeked in through the doors, they all seemed completely oblivious to what had gone on. As she went around the corner to head up to her room, the old caretaker was there, talking with somebody. Eric had told her that his name was Samuel.
He caught sight of her, then frowned and noted, “You don’t look too good, honey. Are you okay?”
She shrugged. “Can’t say that I’m feeling all that great.”
The receptionist stared at her in alarm.
Eden shrugged. “I’m sure it’s nothing.”
The other woman, not quite convinced, nodded and suggested, “Might be time to go lie down for a little bit?” Her tone was caring. “If you need me to, I can call a doctor.”
“No need. I just need some rest, and I’m sure I’ll be fine.”
Samuel looked closer. “Maybe, but if you need someone to check you out, one good fella can come by.”
“I don’t know at the moment. I’m just feeling a little off.” Worried, the two of them appeared to watch her as she headed up the stairs.
She didn’t know where she had lost Eric. She knew he would be around somewhere. She needed some time to just assimilate a bit. She didn’t really know what she needed, just a time out. He understood, or at least he told her that he understood, but, whether he really did or not, she wasn’t sure.
She just needed that moment, that glimpse of normalcy, that might come from some downtime in her own room. As she walked upstairs, she felt eyes on her again. At the top of the stairs, she turned and looked down to see both the receptionist and the caretaker whispering together.
She wasn’t sure if it meant anything or if they were just worried that she’d come down with something that could be contagious and could affect other people. As she got to her suite, she noted the door was open. She hesitated, then pushed it open. There she found the cleaning girl.
“Oh, sorry,” the woman said, looking at her. “I was expecting you to be in the seminar.”
“I was, but I’m not feeling well, so I’ve come to lie down.”
“Oh gosh,” she muttered, nonplussed as she stared at Eden for a moment and then nodded. “Let me just quickly finish up, and you can have your space to yourself.”
Her name tag read Jillian. Eden waited and watched as the other woman quickly collected the dirty towels and did a last couple swipes in the bathroom before walking out to the hallway where she tossed everything into the linen bag sitting there, waiting.
Jillian looked over at her and asked, “Do you need anything else?”
Eden shook her head. “No, I’m fine, thank you.” She wasn’t so sure that she would ever be fine again, but this young lady could do absolutely nothing for her.
There wasn’t anything anybody could do; it was just way too bizarre.
Everything that had gone on had stirred up horrible memories of her childhood that Eden had always kept locked down.
She thought those bizarre events would never happen again.
Yet here she was, looking at her life from the outside, and, for all intents and purposes, it was happening all over again.
As she closed the door behind the cleaning lady, Eden leaned against it and just closed her eyes.
Her phone rang just then. She looked down, not recognizing the number. As she went to refuse it, her instincts said, Don’t.
She sighed. When she answered the phone, wondering at the hit and miss reception, it was Stefan. Maybe that’s why her phone worked now? Something to ponder later…
“How are you doing?” he asked, his voice gentle.
“I’m sure you have a good idea how I’m doing,” she replied, “so it is probably easier for you to answer than it is for me. As far as I’m concerned, this entire weekend was a huge mistake, and I want to turn back the clock and to not have opened that door again.”
“And it’s the again part that is the real issue here, isn’t it?”
“Maybe. Once you’ve had those experiences,” she explained, “no way you can ever continue living your life normally.”
“And yet you did,” he pointed out.
“Did I?” she asked. “I think I was a shadow of myself. If anything, I stomped it all down and carried on.”
“Until now.”
“Yeah, until now. And I very much want to go back and shut it out all over again.”
“Understood,” he said, his tone light. “But if it does have something to do with your friend’s death—”
She cut him off because she’d had enough. “If it does, I’m not sure that it has anything to do with me. I don’t want to be the next victim, which sounds horrible, but I’m being honest. And I don’t want to open that door and give it any ideas.”
“Right,” he agreed. “It wasn’t much fun, huh?”
“Fun?” she snapped, her voice breaking. “It was horrific. I don’t even know how I managed to get past it all, and the reality is that somehow I blocked it all out.”
“You had help blocking it out,” he noted casually.
That irritated the hell out of her.
Stefan continued. “Therapists are like that, at least the good ones. They find a way to help you move on.”
“Get past it?” she repeated, her voice climbing with an edge. “Are you telling me this is getting past it? Because to do that, I need tools, but I don’t know what those tools are because nobody taught me. My grandmother didn’t teach me. My mother didn’t teach me.”
“You have the power here, Eden.”
“You say that, but I’m sitting here, not at all sure how to get back to that same level of normalcy I had just a few weeks ago.”
“I’m not sure you ever had it,” he clarified. “And I get it. Right now you’re in a state of shock, and everything is either pissing you off or upsetting you to the point that you don’t even know if you’re coming or going.”
She stared down at her phone. “You make it sound so simplistic.” It was impossible to keep the sarcasm out of her tone. Right now she just wanted him to go away. She wanted it all to go away.
“And I get that, but, having opened that door, I don’t think you can close it again.”
“If it was closed once before,” she declared in a determined voice. “I will close it again.” Dead silence came from the other end. She added, “I am not in the mood to talk to you or to deal with any of this. I’m going to lie down and try to get some sleep.”
“Safety, remember? Are you alone?”
“Yes, I’m alone,” she snapped. “What difference does it make?”
He hesitated and then replied, “I don’t like the idea of you lying down alone.”
She blew out her breath in a big gust and snapped, “That’s where I’m at. I’m alone in my room, and I’ll lie down alone here because I live alone. That’s my world. What difference does it make if I’m alone or not?”
“The difference,” Stefan explained, “is that you have opened the door to Origin, and opening that door and them getting your energy signature means that now you are susceptible to whatever they are up to.” He took a deep breath.
“So sleeping gives them access to your subconscious, if you don’t have protection in place. ”
She pinched the bridge of her nose. “Damn. I vaguely remember my grandmother telling me stuff like that.”
“But you were too young, and she probably moved through it far too quickly,” he noted, “so you didn’t get the proper training.”
“Yeah, ya think?” she muttered. “I didn’t get any damn training. Although I’m not sure what training there was to get. It was more a case of go and sit there beside your mother because time is running out.”
His voice gentled. “I know it’s frustrating for you, but your grandmother did what she had to do.” When Eden started to protest, he manifested in front of her, as the shimmering wisp she recognized.
I’m not saying she was right, but nothing you can do about it now. She was running against the clock, hoping you could extend your mother’s life. But, in this case, your mother didn’t want it. Your mother wanted to pass with more peace than your grandmother would let her have.
“Sometimes it’s hard to let go of the people we love, and Mother was incredibly upset that it was taking her so long to pass,” Eden shared. “I didn’t know what I was supposed to do for her.” She looked up, expecting to see Stefan’s glowing ethereal form, but he was gone.
“Sorry. Can’t hold that image for long, so I’m back on the phone. Just remember that you did what was needed for your mother. Whether you recognize it or not, you did it.”
“What did I do?” she asked, followed by a snort. “I mean, I did everything I could to avoid my grandmother’s tantrums. But that’s not exactly the way I wanted to see my own mother die.”
“I don’t think there’s any way to see your own mother pass that’s good,” he murmured.
The soothing quality of his voice helped to calm something down within Eden.
“And I understand how trapped you’re feeling.”
“Trapped works,” she grumbled. “Absolutely that fits. I am feeling trapped to the point that I don’t even want to be around people anymore. Not you, not Eric. I went through this once, and I didn’t think I would ever have to face it again. And yet here it is.”
“Maybe there’s a reason why you have to face it again,” Stefan suggested, his voice raising ever-so-slightly.
Eden could almost sense him bracing for an argument. Her shoulders sagged. “Look. I’m too tired for this conversation. I’m exhausted on the inside from something I don’t even know or understand.”
“You’re exhausted because of the mental blocks you’ve been using.
You’ve been fighting the blocks, trying to keep them in place, even though the time for them has long passed.
You’re tired because you’ve been fighting against your nature, your energy-working nature, but it’s already coming through at odd times. You must let go and move on.”
“I don’t want to get past anything—”