Arianna: love beyond life

03. The Meeting

Miranda had absolutely forgotten about Arianna in the party. She left early with jack, but she should have known that Arianna wasn’t the kind of person who partied a lot.

When she returned back to her dorm room the next day she couldn’t spot Arianna anywhere. That wasn’t anything serious for her, and the reality was she didn’t care. She hardly knew this girl. Miranda thought maybe Arianna was the wild type and she must have stormed off with some guy at the party. But little did she know, Arianna would never have left that place without her newly found friend. At least she wasn’t the kind of friend who ditch.

When Miranda realized that two days had gone and there was no clue of Arianna she sensed the intensity of the situation. She told the college authorities about the missing girl.

Finally, the things got so much out of hand that the authorities had to tell everything to Samantha. This startled her to her core. She felt jolts of pain in her body when she realized how far away her daughter had gone.

After three days the police came to Samantha’s house to tell her about Arianna’s where-about.  Samantha was thrilled when she came to know that the police had tracked Arianna. But the news that came along with this was a million times more heart jittering.

“Officer, will you please tell me where my daughter is?” Samantha asked emphasizing on each and every word she said. She was loosing her patience. She was a mother and mothers aren’t very cooperative when it’s their children at stake.

The officer took off his hat and bowed his head. “I am sorry Miss Rogers. We believe it’s a case of suicide.” This left Samantha in a state of partial paralysis. Her firm grip on the door beside which she was standing loosened and she fell down. When her body collapsed with the floor she realized the pain she was feeling inside her chest cavity. Her hue filled the house.

Next day she had to go to identify the body herself. Otherwise she wasn’t willing to accept the truth. Lilly had to hold herself up for her daughter and her mother. She went along with Samantha though she always knew it was of no use.

Amy’s condition got even worse. From couple of days she had started talking to herself with her sign language. She had stopped eating food or playing with her dolls.

Lilly was tensed about Amy’s behavior. Lilly felt so caged that she cried behind the closed doors of her room. She would break down.

“It’s her” it was Lilly who spoke. Samantha was not in condition to speak when she saw the corpse in front of her in the morgue room.

They had a funeral to arrange.

Samantha was already tight on her savings. She had invested her every single penny to send Arianna for higher education. But it was the duty which she never wanted to fulfill in her entire life.

It was Lilly who stood by Samantha when she felt the loneliest.

Ethan knew his life had changed forever. After two weeks of constant monitoring, he was finally released from the hospital. But it didn’t stop there. He was frequently called and sometimes he felt severe pain drumming in his entire body.

He hated to be a burden. That wheel chair suffocated him. He moved back to his old house to live with his parents. He spent days sitting on his wheel chair in his room, in retrospection. Everyday, his depression strengthened with this realization.  George and Amanda couldn’t do anything more to help Ethan with his internal discontent.

“Ethan, your friends have come to meet you.” Amanda stood at the door. Ethan was sitting on his wheelchair, facing the wall, just like the past few days. “Ethan. Honey, why don’t you meet them? You’ll feel better.”

“Mom, can you please close the door when you leave?” he turned his head a bit to speak over his shoulder then went back to his meditation.

Amanda was feeling helpless about Ethan’s deteriorating mental and physical condition. She swallowed to set down the hurt. “Sure, honey. Call me if you need anything.” She closed the door and leaned on her back beside the wall outside his room. The composure she had maintained in front of Ethan broke down. Tears started to running down her cheeks.

George couldn’t see his wife and son like that. He could feel Amanda's agony. He extended his arm to her shoulder to console her. “We will get through this. Trust me.” but his words had no immunity against uncertainty and Amanda knew that.

Ethan somehow wanted to travel back in time and fix everything. But the memory of that night was itself very vague. He blankly stared at the empty wall in front of him trying to recollect the incident.

‘What had happened that night? I was looking for Jack. It was very crowded and the music was really loud. Royce offered me to join him. I went along with him somewhere, maybe a beach. He introduced me to few people. Then I-I saw ‘her’, sitting by the fire, by herself. Who was she?’

Ethan knew he had seen her somewhere, but where? He tried to think. He thought too hard to cause him pain starting from his front lobe to his entire head. The pain was intensifying with every thought.

The thought of that girl sitting forlorn by fire..

The thought of those brown eyes..

The pain had reached its intolerable point. Ethan’s control over his body was fading in shades and he fell from his wheel chair struggling with the pain. He called for his mother for help.

He was lying on the floor, loosing his consciousness. “Mom! “ His hands pressing his forehead seemed to give no relief.  His eyes were fluttering in and out of oblivion. Darkness and reality were alternately coming in front of him.

A vivid figure appeared in front of him. He saw ‘her’. Her hair falling down freely, her brown eyes with intact hue, the same pale skin but looking livelier, more concerned.

With every blink her faced became more and more focused. The darkness drew on the periphery. Then her soft voice that he had never heard before echoed his ears. “Ethan.”

The curtain of reality separated them again.