Meridian Chronicles: Keepers & The Soul Key (#4)

Chapter 3 Pt. 1

Talon drifted away from everyone, for quiet time, finding his way to the only place that kept the memory of his son alive. Back at Aiden's home, his grandparents had barely made it back home and into the house where they remained quietly seated in their favorite chairs. Talon made his way to Aiden's room, where he sat on his bed looking around. Posters of Aiden's rock bands covering every square inch of the walls and the room was a mess, from when Aiden hurried to catch a ride with Tallulah to Salem. Clothes were strewn across the floor and his backpack from school was set next to his door.

He strolled over to Aiden's desk where he had a picture of Meridian. She stood with Tallulah at Esmra's house, with her arms around Tallulah. Meridian looked happy to have been reunited with both Aiden and Tallulah. Talon's thoughts, while he looked at the happy picture, was interrupted with audible footsteps coming from the old wooden staircase. Suddenly, Aiden's grandmother appeared, teary-eyed and hesitant to enter his room from the doorway she stood within. After her long pause, she took small shuffling steps across Aiden's wood floors as she stared at the space in front of each footstep. Sad eyes, swollen from a thousand tears shed, twinkled under the sadness. Her thin lips and wrinkled face seemed to rise and brighten with her inner monologue. She made it to his bed where Aiden left his dirty shirts for the laundry. Picking up the favorite black T-shirt, she brought it to her nose with both hands. She immersed her face into the shirt, taking a breath in.

Grandpa's heavy and slow footsteps interrupted her, she brought the t-shirt away from her face, turning around to face her husband as he now stood within Aiden's doorway. He glanced down at Aiden's backpack before drawing a large breath in. He still had his old brown slacks on, his nice button-up shirt untucked, and his tie loosened. His arm up leaned on the doorway and brought his tired eyes to his wife, barely blinking as though he would miss something.

Aiden's grandmother still held the shirt in her hand, and she looked back down at the wooden floor and said, "Maybe we should, you know, have the floors redone."

Grandpa jerked his head back in surprise. "What would make you say a thing like that?"

"Before Aiden left to go back to school after Christmas break was over, when I was doing my normal digging, he did a rapid change of subject and asked when we were to work on the old floors in the house." Grandmother said, bringing her eyes back to the shirt still laying across her lap. She took her left hand and brushed the shirt across her lap as if to straighten it. A tear fell into the shirt, darkening a small spot in the fabric. She lifted her head back and stared at the ceiling fighting away the emotion. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes.

"Everything smells of him. He is everywhere. There isn't a room in this house I can't stopseeing him in. He won't be here anymore,to be sassy or demand I make another cobbler where I have to tell him to notspeak with his mouth full. He won't everhave the chance to marry a woman he is in love with, or father a child I knowwould be lucky to have Aiden as a father. We will never see him accept his diploma when he graduates. I'll never hear his truck blaring down thedirt road where I will have to remind him to get mufflers. Oh my god, I just can't take this." She broke down, her shoulders moved up anddown with every uncontrollable thrust of her convulsing body. She buried her face back into the shirt, hervoice muffled she hollered into her hands and through her tears, in between theconvulsions, she said, "Make it stop! Make it go away! Why! Why did this have to happen to him! He didn't deserve this; he was a wonderful person."

Her body continued to convulse, as her husband moved to sit beside her. Grandpa wrapped his long arms around his wife and squeezed her as hard as she could stand it. She collapsed into his embrace, burying her face into his chest.

"I love you. I wished I could answer your questions; I feel the same way. No one knows when their time has come or where the wind will take them. Life is a mystery and one I do not believe we were all meant to understand. I know that when I am flat on my back, I hope to feel I lived. That I truly lived for something in this world that was bigger than me. To live for you, to have lived for Aiden." A tiny tear left Grandpa's eye as he continued to hold his wife. "I know in my heart that Aiden lived. Even in his short life, he lived, and he lived loving his family and friends. Doing anything he could to help another and standing for what he believed. That boy so tenacious." He pulled away and looked at grandmother in the face. "Do you remember that time when he was seven years old, we told him he couldn't drive the tractor because he was too small? Remember?" Grandpa snickered under his sadness. "We found him crawling up on the tractor. He even had the keys. He said if he was big enough to get on it and get the keys, he could do it himself."

They both laughed at the funny memory. "Aiden, he lived. He stood for what he believed in but was humble enough to admit when he was wrong. Few his age or any age can do that. Wherever Aiden is, just like he was here, he will be okay. Remember, this isn't the end. We will see Aiden again. I promise."

Grandma's face turned serious. "What do you mean?"

"I do not know what happens when we die. I wished I knew for sure. But I believe that whatever happens, Aiden will be there." He said with confidence and shimmer in his tired but hopeful eyes.

Talon maintained his distance while he watched the suffering pair together get up to leave Aiden's room, struggling to hold his emotion in. His red face and yellow eyes seemed to bulge as though within his body, he contained a dam of tears and pain from which he could not hold any further. As the unfortunate couple left Aiden's room, there Talon perched himself on Aiden's old desk, where he to let out his tears as he studied the picture of Meridian on the desk.

Aiden's grandmother left Aiden's bed, with hesitance taking her husband by the hand. While Aiden's grandfather helped his wife walk away, she couldn't help but turn and look over her shoulder and stare at Aiden's old t-shirt. Her face solemn, she carried a look of abandonment in leaving his room.

After Talon had his moment of silence to remember his son and watched the couple's sadness, it was all he could stand to remain in Aiden's room. He went back to the barn where he was greeted by another being. One that would be the last one he would want to see at a time like this. There he sat casually on top of a solitary hay bale, pretending not to be interested to be there.

"Well, well, well. Now how did I know you would be here Talon? Missing someone are you? Is your mind full of unanswered questions? Must be quite a state you are in."

Talon's face, full of disgust and with a venomous tone said, "Lahash. What do you want? Why are you even here?"