Carpe Diem Mortis

Chapter 1: From Great Loss She Raised

"Undo it, take it back, make every day the previous one until I am returned to the day before the one that made you gone. Or set me on an airplane traveling west, crossing the dateline again and again, losing this day, then that, until the day of loss still lies ahead, and you are here instead of sorrow." -Nessa Rapoport

In this moment I didn't think about anything but my family. I thought about moments that brought me joy. I thought about all of the reasons why I wouldn't forget them.I wouldn't allow myself to forget the day in the park with my father, mother and sister Willow. I wouldn't be able to live myself if I forgot the way her eyes always showed what she was feeling. Though her, my twin sister, had the very same eyes as I hers were always so much more expressive, happy and full of life. I had to live on emulating her. I had to prove that everything wasn't as doomed as everyone else believed. That didn't mean I was as chipper as the newlings.

I remember the day my father went missing very clearly. Willow and I were six years and four months old. That day mom didn't eat dinner, we just listen to our mother sobbing in her room. I understood that mom needed time alone to face the truth. I, unlike Willow, always had a very clear understanding as to what was happening in our world. I always just knew that outside was inherently bad and that there was nothing we knew to do to fix it. But I also always have believed that it can be fixed. I believed that at the age of six.

When I was twelve years and nine months my sister went missing. She had stayed after school to get help from a teacher. But it was almost an hour before curfew and I knew that she had to be taken by one of them. Willow had just cut off her long black locks, she wanted to find her identity outside of being the Moore Twins. As much as I was hurt I understood, up until this point the parents had taken our identical looks and took every advantage to dress us in the same outfits but different colors. I loved her and could never be mad at her. When mom came home from her work assignment to find only me on the couch alone she just held me and cried. I didn't cry in front of Mom, not because of weakness but, because mom needed me to be strong for her. I held her back as she wept for another lost love. I whispered how much I loved her and told her that everything would be okay. Even though it wasn't not even close. When Mom had calmed down and was able to contain herself again I went upstairs where I myself cried for hours. I didn't go to school the next day. I sat in her room and just looked around and found myself in varying states of crying.

Right now I hold my mother in my arms. Her final breaths are drawing very close. She both looks so scared and ready to go. There was blood everywhere and it seemed to all be coming from somewhere on her abdomen but I wasn't entirely sure. She spoke to me but all I could here was the pain I felt in my heart. My mother was dying in my arms.

"Liez, Darling I need you to hear me." She croaked out in a weakening voice.

"I am all ears Mom." She smiled before speaking again.

"My Liez you have this great understanding of our world that I have never seen in anyone but you. I also know what my demise will do to you but you must stay strong. I know you are bound to be so great, I feel it in my soul." She cried the words out to me.

I just cried. I tried to find the source of the bleeding to stop it but I just found my hands covered in more of her blood. I cried knowing that these moments right now are what I will remember her by. I wouldn't be able to forget my mother's suddenly fragile body in my arms as I cradle her in the end. I cried because after this moment I am an orphan.

I made sure to remember that in her final minutes she was the strongest I have ever seen her. As I cried for the loss of my only surviving family member she wiped away my tears. She told me non-stop how much she loved me and how proud of me she was. I didn't understand how in the face of death itself she set aside how afraid she was to make me better. This is why I loved her. She knew that after this there was nothing more for her. She was one of the few Adults to have maintained their soul throughout their whole life. She had nothing to fear after death. She would be free from all of the horror that happens to someone who dies before they pay off their debt.