Reflections of the Past | Ghost and Pals fanfic

30# Mission 5

A thick photo album was opened on Christopher's lap. Most of the pictures were simply baby photos of Magnolia, but whenever it was a family picture, the face of the mother was blacked out, as if the head of a burning cigarette had been pressed on there.

With every page he flipped, he always had a story to tell behind each black and white image. "Don't you remember?" he'd ask over and over.

Flower shook her head. No, she couldn't. Not that she could recall any memories that were never hers anyway.

"You don't even remember the boat trip?" he asked again.

In the picture collection of the boat trip, Magnolia was smiling in every single one of them. She wore a small sunhat with a bow on it, and for some reason, she could imagine it being pink or light green.

"What a shame." He sighed, his grey scribbly eyes lingering on the page. "You used to love that lake so much. It was always, 'Papa, can we go swim, Papa, can we go boat?'" He smiled, but not wide enough to conceal his pain. "Do you still visit that place, at least?"

Flower's eyes narrowed at the image, recognizing the trees in the background of it. "No... I think that lake dried out five years ago."

"Is that so?" Christopher pressed his lips together as that smile fully diminished. "It's almost as if we're two completely different people now," he spoke quietly.

He'd guessed it, they were two different people. A daughterless father and an orphan daughter. More damage could be caused if he had only known just how much time had actually passed, that Magnolia had daughters that birthed even more daughters, that the fourth generation happened to look just like her.

But really, is it worse to serve him a sweet lie or to shove the bitter truth down his throat?

"...I'm sorry, I—"

"But that's alright," Christopher cut Flower off before she could confess. He slightly tilted his head to the side as he attempted to smile again. "All that matters is that... just as you'd told, you knew where to find me."

He turned to look at the photos again, then suddenly screeched at the sight of a humanoid moth on the page. He quickly shut the thick photo album, out of which a bit of blood was now oozing.

"...what was that?"

Reopening it, he revealed the now flat, dead fairy of some sort, its wings twitching. He physically cringed at the sight of it and closed it again. "Pesky mothku," he muttered under his breath as he put the photo album aside on the table. "Doesn't matter... What does matter is your place in this new community."

He stood up from the leather couch and offered Flower a hand. "Since you won't remember your past and hadn't been with me in the present, the best i can do for you is build a future for you."

Standing up, Flower looked down at Christopher's hand, not taking it. He then awkwardly pulled it back, fixing his bow tie instead. "Anywho... our beloved distortions have prepared a surprise for you, apparently — whatever it is."

He approached the door and opened it for her.

~~~

Nana stood in front of the gates, her feet rooted to the ground as she watched years worth of work getting burnt right in front of her eyes. Large crowds of people were running out of the amusement park, carrying their screaming children to safety. The heat radiating from the flames nearly burnt her face, and even evaporated the tears that were trickling down her painted face. Hyperventilating, she breathed the air that was filled with the smell of smoke and gunpowder.