The Book of Volunteers

Kit Snicket

At least an hour of conversation passed before the topic of my mother surfaced amid our rapport. Once I had gathered the courage to speak, and my uncle had regained it, we each flew into a frenzy of respective curiosity. I mainly inquired about his relationship to my namesake and by proxy, her children, my guardians. He was at first hesitant to divulge, and following a brief period of gentle weeping, muttered a Maya Angelou quote in some kind of bid to assure himself, and proceeded with the torrid and lengthy tale. I remained fairly engaged throughout, considering I am no romantic and merely attempting to gather a cohesive and truthful account of my guardians' history.

My uncle seemed moved at the prospect of meeting his long-estranged niece, and I suppose I was excited as well, at the prospect of meeting my uncle, though, if I'm honest, I began to find the whole thing more strange than anything. Here I was, face to face, with Lemony Snicket. I found the dejected figure before me difficult to reckon with. When my turn came and I detailed my upbringing, comparing my parents' account of their travels to my uncle's research, he seemed to lighten up. Still, he didn't feel like family. We looked nothing alike. Again, a cloud of grief loomed over our table. This time, it felt different. It felt shared. In nearing the end of my account of my guardians' account, after having corrected my uncle on the nature of several episodes of my guardians' lives (for instance, the underemphasized tragedy of Josephine Antwhistle's death, or Sunny having been misattributed as the Baudelaire sibling exposed to Medusoid Mycelium aboard the Queequeg, or a brief but passionate kiss shared between two lumber mill owners in a hotel sauna, witnessed by Klaus, but not recorded in my uncle's account) it came time for Lemony Snicket to learn what came of the Baudelaires following their daring escape from the burning Hotel Denouement. As well, what came of his sister, my mother, Kit Snicket.

As I recalled tell of my guardians' first meeting with island despot and VFD founder Ishmael, I noticed that my uncle's face had settled into a satisfied smile. The kind of smile you can't resist, preceded only by a good story told well. It killed me. This was not a good story. My guardians' always made a worthy attempt to emphasize the positive. If not for the hardships, and the hell they endured, I would not have found my way to them. This is true. It doesn't change the fact, however, that my mother is dead. I danced around the topic. I considered, for a moment, omitting my mother's death from the story altogether, declaring it, and my discovery by the Baudelaires a mystery long unsolved. Soon enough, reason triumphed. Lying would be even crueller.

"Excuse me, Beatrice. Pardon my eagerness, but I'm-" Lemony paused, as if he anticipated the devastating answer to come, as if he were only waiting for his tragic suspicions to be confirmed.

"What do you know about what came of your mother?"

"Oh."

That was all he needed to hear. My uncle sighed, and two tears rolled down his tired, leathery cheek. It seemed as if he had cried all he could cry, having held back just the two, for the moment of confirmation. Stan knew to refill our mugs without asking. A long moment passed, of which we both felt every second. The door swung open and closed multiple times as patrons began to enter. Neither of us flinched or averted our gaze from our tear-soaked laps. Eventually, my uncle spoke up.

"How grateful we ought to be to have each other, young Beatrice. And how dismayed we must be, not to have anyone else."

There it was again, that pang of feeling. Family.