Welcome back. The journey between two worlds continues.
Chapter 11 – Clarity
Sarah was sitting in front of him, her hand lifted as if she were about to knock again, stronger. She would have hit his nose if she hadn’t stopped in time.
“Hi…” she said shyly for a split second. “Ellie is here, right, love?”
Nathan stared at her as if he were seeing an alien, unfocused and unable to process.
“Nathan?” she added softly. “Oh…I see…” she smiled faintly, gently pushed past him without any resistance from him, and went inside.
“It is true! Mama Ellie! Manny,” and, as she noticed Ellie looking over her shoulder, “Oh… He’s coming. I guess he just needs a bit of time.”
She went straight to Ellie and hugged her.
“My dear girl, look at you! You are utterly stunning,” Ellie said, stroking her hair.
“Sarah, you… are you like them?” Nathan asked, following her as she moved to hug Manny.
“Them?” she said, turning toward him. “Really, Nat? Why not us? What’s the missing ingredient?”
“Me,” he said quietly. “Alone. Broken. In the dark for so long.”
“How could you be in the dark, dear?” Ellie replied gently. “You just found out there is another light. We are here to help you toward it.”
“How much does he know?” Sarah asked, looking alternately at Ellie and Manny.
“A bit of history, dear. A bit of us. Enough to ask what’s wrong with him,” Ellie replied with a subtle hint. “We leave the rest to you. You know, there is little time left for me. I think Manny needs me too. And he has you. OK, dear?”
Sarah nodded, confirming. That was the signal for Manny to take Ellie’s hand and leave for the sunlit terrace. The opportunity wasn’t missed by the old cat, who followed them outside.
“O… K… Where… should… I… start…” Sarah said softly, avoiding direct eye contact as she poured tea into the last cup that was waiting for her.
“Sarah, look at me,” Nathan finally said, stopping her pacing hugged her. “Why was there no awakening when I was ten? Does this have anything to do with me being forced to say goodbye to Mom? Forced to be alone for so many years? Just to be dragged, at twenty‑six, into a strange new world, into… into this dimensional intrigue, unprepared and unaware?”
“Slow down. I’ll tell you, I’ am. So, Nat, I guess Ellie told you that you had some time in the hospital.”
“She did. Three days with fever or something.”
“Well… she tried to spare you, I see. It was a tiny bit more than three days. It was… well… more like six months. You caught really, really bad pneumonia while being treated in the hospital for encephalitis. Bad coincidence. The Earth’s treatment was… OK, but not enough for your evolving constitution, preparing for ascendancy. So, you fell into a coma.
Those were dark times for our families. They tried everything but, without the care and tech from Othearth, your prognosis was dire. Your parents had no choice but to force your transition and take you for treatment. Knowing that by doing so it will come with a high price to pay.”
“Price?” Nathan asked, even though he could feel that he was not ready for the answer.
“You must understand that the transit at the age of ten comes naturally, is seamless, and guided by the kids’ guardians. Your energy, already weak, would have ripped you apart if forced crossing. So, Ellie did what no one thought was possible. She created a link with you to redirect all your pain to her. To take over from you all crossing strain.”
“Only her, right? Where was Dad? He was absent again. He wasn’t present,” he said while intensely watching him on the terrace happily caressing Ellie’s hand.
“Because he couldn’t. He’s local. Earth local. You know that!”
“Yes… but… no… he was there. I met him there. Wasn’t he?”
“Yes. But not by choice, Nat.”
Silence filled the room. His look softened and seeing Ellie arranging a few stray strands of hair from Manny’s face, no longer irritated him.
“Tell me… more” he finally said, looking directly into Sarah’s eyes.
“First, Ellie tried to traverse you, … but the pain was too much. For her and for you. She was not strong enough. You see, love, Manny was there. He was the one who took both of you in his arms and pleaded, ‘Share your pain with me. Even if I have to die to save you both, I’ will do it gladly.’ Do you know that, to this day, his request and your parents’ effort and sacrifice are like a mantra in our world? It was more than parents’ sacrifice to save their child. It proved that Earth and Othearth can sail the same ocean, face the same waves.”
“He…he did that?”
“Yes, he did. Without him, even if you had made it on Othearth, you would have arrived alone, and Ellie would have vanished between worlds. Anyway, your treatment was working, but…” she stopped as she tried to find the right words.
“But what now?” he said, arranging her hair to stay behind her ear hoping not to have her flushed face seen.
“Nat, look… the better you got, the stranger things started to happen around you. It started with a nurse’s pen disappearing into thin air. Then some toiletries from your bedside table. By then it was clear that the better you felt, the stronger and stranger things became. The final straw was when half of the equipment monitoring you simply vanished. The Council had to act before ruptures began to appear. And they helped get the three of you back to Earth.
They used an experimental device, still far from being tested on humans. But the only other alternative was … your death, to preserve both worlds. With the device, the risk of never returning to Othearth or being scattered across worlds still showed hope.”
“And I guess it worked.”
“Yes, it did. Then, everybody forgot that your father is not from our world. And that took a huge toll on him.”
She stopped for a bit to give him time to breathe, to register the scale of the events. She went to sit on his lap and hugged him.
“Not long after that, they moved here,” she continued softly. “The Council already warned them what was to come and helped them prepare. Moving into this neighborhood was part of the preparation.”
“Here? Why? I don’t see anything so special about this place. Or maybe I spent too much time alone here… Am I blind to what it truly is?”
“Think a little, Nat. You know every house in this place, every person. Right?”
Nathan shook his head. Maybe he should have known, but he had always been a bit antisocial.
“I… do, most. Except the green house on the east side. I know nothing. I don’t think I ever saw anyone leaving there. I even jumped the fence once, but I couldn’t get into the house.”
“OK. Your illness and the forced travel between worlds affected you. Your ascension never came. Some scientists said there was a chance it might come one day, but without a precedent, nothing was certain. Except hope. So, your family became residents here. One of the first families, actually.”
“This neighborhood is a mirror of the one from Othearth, isn’t it?”
“You start to catch up now. Knowing this, tell me, which family has been here since then?”
“Well…” he started, then stopped as he searched for the answer. “Maybe… no… hm… or the…”
“None, Nat. You are the resident who has lived here the longest. Because every other resident just comes here to have a baby. No one stayed longer than ten years. I’m sure that, if you dig through your memories of newcomers, you will also see that every time the ladies were already in late pregnancy.”
Nathan felt the revelation of her words.
“This… this, Sarah, feels so unreal. It feels like I’m in a Truman Show. Oblivious. Driven by anger with wrong roots. An unintended subject for an unintended experiment…”
“No, Nat. Not at all. You are extremely lucky, with the most powerful story to tell. You are the symbol of the most powerful story.”
“Dad… my dad… how come I found him in Othearth,” he said, walking up and down.
“This is… have some tea first…”
“Sarah, please. We are too deep and too far for tiptoeing. Don’t you think?”
She came and took him in her arms, with her head leaning on his chest.
“I’m here, Nat. Remember that I’ve always been with you and I always will be.” She gently stroked his cheek and then guided him to sit down. She sat near him, holding his hand.
“OK… Your recovery went pretty smooth on Earth. No events, nothing. And for a short while everything looked back to normal. Except that you started to have weird dreams. Disturbingly weird and intense. This was expected, but it manifested stronger than predicted. Later, I understood that my drawings were the trigger.
“The two‑headed melted bodies ones?”
“Yes. Even though it helped to keep your Othearth link alive, it was colliding with your reality somehow. So, they decided to control your exposure to my drawings. To place a little seed in your mind without force. My dad is from Earth too, and I think he was the happiest to have more time with me.’”
“You… you stayed for me?”
“I was not ten. I had no choice, you know,” she said mischievously, making Nathan kiss her rapidly all over her face.
“Kidding…” Sarah said, laughing.
“What’s next?”
“You know, we’ve met many times after that. I came here, to this very house, so many times and played together in the garden. And all seemed OK. But… I was too young. Traveling so often came with a risk that was too high for my parents to ignore. A couple of years passed, and the prognosis was that you might never find your way back to us. The Council’s decision was to stop any direct visits. They could have regular updates from your dad or one of the neighbors. I was so sad. For weeks. Weekes changed to years. I could never accept their decision.
“From Dad too? Have I misunderstood him all this time?…”
“You have no idea.”
“You said… you said that my parents paid a price…”
“Indeed… Are you…”
“I am. I want to know everything, to understand everything.”
Sarah knew that he wanted to and needed to know, but was he ready?
“Ellie was the most affected. Enough to be forced to leave Earth for good if she wanted to live a few more years. I didn’t know then, but they had, for you, to stage her death and bring her to Othearth. There she had enough time to say goodbye, put her things in order. Most importantly, with the Council’s help, to arrange this meeting. Do you know how much she fought to convince the Council? I found when we were announced of her passing, again, and my mom told me what really happened.”
Nathan was watching Ellie coming in with a few flowers gathered from the garden. She went into the kitchen and returned with the flowers in a vase.
“Aren’t these happy? I love them,” she said and looked at Sarah, then at Nathan, smiled, and left. Sarah knew what she wanted to know and confirmed with a soft head movement, “It’s OK.”
“And Dad?”
“Think of this: you were lucky Manny is from Earth. Because of that, he could stay with you a little longer. After a while, the pain started to become too strong to ignore. He was torn apart on an atomic level, bit by bit. The only solution for him was the treatment on Othearth. But, once started, he coul no longer be transported to this world.”
“So… this is what happened,” Nathan muttered in remorse.
“He’s the one insisting not to have you witness another death, even if he had to leave with your hatred. This was the only hope to meet you again. So, he left with a heavy heart. He knew that if he had to return, it would be ripped apart. And he had no assurance that, in the end, you will …reawaken.”
“But… I was in the dark… He could, somehow, let me know… ”
“He was not allowed to. It was too risky. Your state was unstable, remember?”
“And… how about you?”
“Me? I could only wait. Until I reached the age of sixteen, when traveling between worlds no longer required a guardian. After that, I visited you whenever I could. Watching you… from a distance. Sometimes I sneaked a small gifts for you, or even a sandwich, when I saw you leave for school without food.”
Nathan put his hand in his pocket and pulled out a set of keys. There were two keychains, both with small crystal balls. In one there was a crimson pansy, and on the edge of a petal was written “Sarah.” In the other, a lime blossom, and on the leaf written “Nathan.”
“These… are from you? I always wondered… They never left my side, you know?” he said as a tear slowly fell down his cheek.
“I know, Nathan, and I’m sorry I couldn’t be with you…you. But I tried. Once, I came too close, and we even talked. More precisely, I slapped you first and then we talked. Twice, actually…”
“Slaps?”
“In your defense, it happened six years after we saw each other last. But still… you forgot me. So that physical encounter was a bit… you know.”
“We did? No… no, no. I would have remembered. No way, unless you had erased my memory or something. Did you?”
Sarah smiled and shook her head.
“My first memory of you, excluding childhood, is in your office, on the first day back to the other world. When you came so strong at me that for me it felt that I was the sane one.”
“That was memorable indeed. It was the first time we… you know. But no. That’s not the one I’m talking about. The first time… I was seventeen or eighteen. I was watching you with your crazy friends while enjoying a chat in your usual spot. And what else can hormonal teenage boys play? Truth or dare. For truth, as expected, to say if you were a virgin or not. You thought accepting dare couldn’t be more embarrassing. But the dare was to… well… kiss me. The bystander.”
“And so, the slap,” said Nathan, remembering, and instinctively put his hand over his cheek. “Sorry, Sarah, I…”
“Don’t worry. I was wondering for a while how it would be to kiss you. But I could’ve shown you that, right? Anyway, my first kiss was not at all what I imagined so I wanted to run. Even if I thought of kissing you, I was still surprised and felt …used. But I tripped and injured my head and my elbow. You were so scared, but sweet. You picked me up like I was nothing and ran, and you didn’t stop until we reached the infirmary.”
“Right… I remember now. But wait… you said your name is Maria. Yeah, Maria! I stayed with you for a while. We played the ‘guess what’ game and we chatted for a while. I see… I understand now how you could easily guess what I like and what I don’t. But you know, in spite of your freaky precision, I believed you. I’m pretty sure I was falling for you right there. I remember your smile and your curled… blonde hair… Wig?”
Sarah confirmed, smiling.
“Obviously. It was good you stayed. In the end, I felt happy. Indeed, hormones fogs one’s mind,” said laughing
“And was another time after that? How come I haven’t recognized you?”
“Because you couldn’t. The second time was at your company’s Christmas party. The theme was Venetian Carnival, so everybody was wearing a mask. I could not miss the opportunity to see you. So…”
“No… Elsa?” Nathan said with obvious surprise.
Sarah confirmed again.
“I remember. I even told you that you were the first Elsa I met after the Frozen cartoon craze. We had such a good time. And you… yeah, you initiated the kiss. To pay off the refusal to lose the mask. Do you have any idea how much I blamed myself for losing you and leaving without a word? And how much I tried to find you but… obviously, I couldn’t? Some thought they remembered you at the party, but no one had a clue who you were.”
“I couldn’t show you my face yet. Don’t you think?”
“I know… I know…”
Ellie and Manny returned hand in hand, happy. A sweet image that he knew and loved, but it started to fade away. Seeing them again like this brought him sheer joy.
“Dad,” Nathan said and hugged him. “I’m sorry, Dad. I didn’t know.”
“It’s OK, son. It’s OK.”
“Dears, I know you missed each other, but I’m afraid time has come. You’ll have your time for it,” Ellie said, and a sudden silence filled the room.
“Already?” whispered Manny, but it felt like thunder.
“Look…” Ellie said, trying to keep her emotions at bay. “…today was a wonderful day. A good day. Today we could properly say goodbye, reconcile, reignite lost love. We are lucky. Never forget it.”
Ellie picked up the necklace from the table, put it together with the one from her neck, and slowly vanished.
“Be well…” echoed deeply in their ears
The room was deafening with silence. Their heartbeats thundered in their ears.
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