Mirror Shards

Chapter 2| Fifth part

Henry Jekyll's journal entry.

09 / September / 1874. It wasn't a good month, although I should be used to this by now. What did change was that Josephine was by my side, waiting for me to feel better to play with her; no pressure, no questions, just ... Waiting.

I don't know if I can get used to this. Have someone to support you? It sounds too good to be true. Above all, for someone who is aware that he's not "normal," (My family made it very clear to me.) Therefore, no matter how much I would like to get used to her, I am afraid of doing it and losing her one day due to my "strange" way of acting.

Journal entry of Josephine Utterson.

September 11, 1874. Today was... A strange day. I won't say it was good or bad, just that it was weird.

The morning started out as exhausting as it always is on Saturdays, but with Mrs. Miracle's extra workload, because she got sick and had to stay home for the rest of the day; leaving me ALONE to prepare breakfast and lunch for our guests. And do you know how much food that was?! Well, I didn't count it... But I can assure that it was way too much!

Fortunately, this time, Henry was there with me ...

Henry Jekyll's journal entry.

September 11, 1874. She noticed! How could I have been so careless?! She now knows... She knows that I am weak She may even think that I am useless!

Journal entry of Josephine Utterson.

September 11, 1874. During a moment of his break, he came to visit me in the kitchen, I took a few glances around and, as if he were really a knight of fantasy tales, he began to help me make the fire while I cut the vegetables.

It was an easy job to do, but I think I was so stressed from all the load of activities (or I was nervous about having Henry so close to me) that I accidentally cut my hand while slicing a tomato.

The wound wasn't that deep, but that didn't stop a lot of blood from coming out of it.

Henry Jekyll's journal entry.

September 11, 1874. It was all very unexpected. I was distracted by the fire when I heard her little cry of pain, and of course I didn't know what had happened, I just knew that I wanted to help her.

I turned my head to see her, everything seemed to be going well until I saw her hand. The blood on her, on her dress, and even on the knife she was holding.

Journal entry of Josephine Utterson.

September 11, 1874. I didn't think that everything that already happened was going to happen, I swear I didn't want to bother him or make him sad, I just did the first thing that had occurred to me at that moment and that was to take a cloth from the kitchen to ask Henry to bandage my hand for me...

He wanted to be a surgeon, so I hadn't seen any problems with my request. (Besides that ... Well I wanted to feel cared for by someone like him, someone special like him.)

Henry Jekyll's journal entry.

September 11, 1874. She asked me, "Can you bandage it, please? I think you will do it better than me. "

A simple question, which still caused me to feel again a fear that I had not felt again in a long time. I didn't want to do it, I didn't want to touch her hand, but I didn't want to disappoint her either ... I was about to enter medical school, I should be able to deal with something as simple as a cut, I should be able to do it!

I tried, however, despite my best attempts when I touched her hand to bandage it! Her rough and now bloody hand... I could not do it! Again, I was failing myself again, failing her and being a coward who just wanted to run away from the place along with his problems.

Journal entry of Josephine Utterson.

September 11, 1874, I noticed him nervous when he took my hand, and well, I thought that was normal because I was also a little nervous. I will not deny it! But... I quickly changed my mind when I saw that he was even shivering as he carefully held the cloth, I had given him.

He looked scared for some reason and when he tried to cover my hand... As the moment when, obviously, some of my blood fell on his hands.

He released me just then, taking a few unbalanced steps back. He didn't look good at all; He looked very agitated, he breathed more heavily and he didn't stop looking away from the red stain between his hands.

I was going to ask him if everything was okay, but before I even uttered the first word, he ran out the back of the kitchen to the barn ... where I heard him throw up.

I was silent for a moment since the truth was that I had no idea what had just happened, I just knew that he was my friend and he needed help.

When I went to see him outside, he was crying, desperately trying to erase the stains with his sleeve, avoiding at all costs to make eye contact with it.

He wasn't having much of a success with it so I hastily blind up my hand and held my skirt with the other, which I doused with a little water, to help Henry clean the stains on his hand.

"W-Why are you helping me? I'm not worth it, I'm a nobody compared to others, I have nothing of value to offer you, not even the path I want to follow is clear! Why are you doing this?!"

Those were the sad things that he began to repeat to me when I approached his hands. He was looking at me, with tears still in his eyes ... "No one should say such sad things to oneself." That's what I was thinking, that's why, at that moment, while hiding my bandaged hand, I hugged him and said:

"YOU are important to me. I don't care if you have a lot or if you have nothing, for me ... You are very valuable. You are the smartest and most interesting person I know! Even more so than my brother, and let me tell you that doing that is difficult. " There I laughed a little when he said that.

"So please... Don't torture yourself with this, I don't know what happened to you, but from now on you're not going to be alone with this. Let's try to work it out together, okay? "

Finally, I looked him in the eye and smiled at him.

Henry Jekyll's journal entry.

September 11, 1874. She smiled at me, and I hugged her tighter. At that moment I didn't want to let her go, I was afraid that, by letting her go, she would move away to abandon me as my family had done. I didn't want to go through that again, because, no matter when he sometimes tried to convince me otherwise, I really miss my true home.

I miss my father and I would have loved to be next to my younger brother to see him grow up; We weren't very close, but it was something I could call "family," I had something I could call "home."

When I got here, I didn't want to socialize with anyone, I was afraid of having something and then losing it again... But this day, and despite what happened, this morning that Josephine found out about everything; she is still here with me.

Today was... A strange day, better than bad in my opinion, because after a long time, I felt like a weight, that I didn't even know I was carrying, disappear from my shoulders. And because at the end of the day, I found someone I can call "friend."