The Grimlock Files

Prologue

Prologue

The bleak, dismal stone protruded from the ground, a distinct contrast to the beautiful greenery surrounding it. It was a textured gray color, shaded by the immense oak tree that stretched out above it. A small scatter of leaves silently fluttered toward the ground, blown away from their home atop the trees by the blustering wind. As Jack knelt before the stone, one of these leaves landed gently on it, as if beckoning her to read the words engraved on it.

But Jack already knew what she was going to read even before her eyes fell down upon the blunt words.

Here lies Evangeline H. Blake

Sister and Mother

2/14/1977 - 8/21/2013

A tear ran down Jack's cheek. It had only been a week since her mother's death. Just yesterday, it had felt as if her mother were only on one of her trips and would be back shortly. But today, it felt to Jack as if she had not seen her mother for more than a year. Already, the memories of her mother's smile grew foggy in her mind.

Jack had been visiting her friend, Lucinda Grace, when she had heard the news of her mother's car crash. A police officer had arrived just after dinner, asking if anyone knew anything about "a woman named Evangeline Blake." When he had learned that Jack was the daughter of the woman he spoke of, a saddened expression spread across the officer's face and he reported to them the bad news. At first, Jack had felt that it was only a terrible dream. That she would wake up to the sound of her mother's singing as she flipped pancakes for breakfast. But when she had not awoken in bed, it had struck her that her mother really was gone.

The police officer had reported that as Jack's mother had been traveling south into Des Moines, a semi had mysteriously careened across the ditch separating south-bound traffic from north-bound traffic and had collided right into Evangeline Blake's car, head-on. To add to that impact, an SUV had rear-ended her. By the time he had arrived on the scene, the police officer recounted sorrowfully, Evangeline Blake had been dead and the semi truck driver's body had been unable to be found.

"The driver of the SUV and his three children were all scratched and bruised, but they lived," the police officer had then said, as if desperate to deliver some good news. But Jack had not been listening. She had been sitting at the dining room table like a zombie, staring straight ahead, trying to make sense of what she was hearing.

As Jack reached out to touch the letters engraved on her mother's tombstone, she thought about the past week. Her great aunt, Beatrice, had come almost immediately after hearing the news. She had immediately taken control of the house, cleaning and cooking and ordering Jack about. Jack had hardly had the will to care. She had no room in her wounded heart to care.

No one ever seems to know how much someone means to them until that person is gone. Jack had realized this the moment she had learned of her mother's death. Her mother had been everything to her. She had been one of the only people Jack cared about for a majority of her life. She had always seemed to know exactly how Jack was feeling, and she had always seemed to know exactly what to say or do to make her feel better. Whenever Jack had felt sad, her mother had brought her a mug of hot cocoa, overflowing with whipped cream. Whenever Jack was angry, her mother had cracked her up with a joke. Whenever Jack had been feeling disappointed or let down, her mother had pulled out one of her many scrapbooks that she had made when Jack had been a mischievous little girl, and they would break out with laughter.

But those days were gone. They were buried beneath the ground along with her mother.

Slowly, Jack arose from the ground. She wiped away a tear or two with the sleeve of her sweater. With a light sniff and a deep breath, she turned around and headed toward the country road where Aunt Beatrice had parked.

As she walked down the hill toward where her aunt stood in wait for her, an inexplainable feeling flooded over her.

She knew that from this moment on, things were never going to be the same for her. Her life had already become alien to her when she had learned of her mother's death; but now, Jack realized that the past week had only been a bridge-- a bridge inviting her to her new life. Just as she was leaving behind her mother's tombstone and walking toward her aunt, she was also departing from her old, care-free past and was heading toward a new, unpredictable, concealed future.

But as she climbed into the passenger seat of her aunt's car, Jack was not afraid.