16 ~ 20th of March, 1921

Mary Blue was waking up very slowly.

Her body felt unusually weak and painful. Everything felt sore and it was difficult to breathe. Her lungs were numb.

She couldn’t see anything but a blurry glow yet. The cold sensations against some parts of her body were disturbing. She couldn’t feel much more than this coldness below her wait. She felt like a crushed ghost for a few seconds, which sadden and scared her.

Someone was speaking right next to her. She couldn’t yet understand what she was saying, but she seemed to be sobbing at times, quite close to her.

Her lungs painfully began to breathe a little more deeply. Her body was reacting to her awakening. She could heel now her heavy eyelids, and struggled to open her eyes again. Some senses of touch came back to her skin.

R - Blue... Don’t leave me... Please...

That voice echoed through her head, and through her body. It made her shiver.

She could feel one of her hands being held tightly. Her fingers twitched there. Her opening eyes suffered from the light. The light blinding her wasn’t that strong but a sudden change.

The blur slowly settled down. She could see her shape beside her now.

Something very sore and dry came through her throat, opening barely her numb lips.

B - Mary... Rose...

She felt her jolt through her hands, and Rose looked at her, repeating her name over with a tearful voice.

Her sight was slowly coming back.

She felt exhausted beyond anything she ever knew. She had a taste of ashes and dust stuck in her throat and mouth. She didn’t have the strength to move. She was still scared, even though she began to guess where she was.

R - Mary... Or Blue?

Who was she again? A few things were still hazy inside. But now that she was finally waking up, some aspects became finally clearer. Her second name more commonly used was Blue.

B - I’m Blue... Esther is...

Her first name had been Mary, but Esther wasn’t her.

She never had been her... Blue lost a tear, as she realised what had happened to her.

B - Esther... is gone.

~

The next day, in a park.

Blue was sitting in a wheelchair. Rosemary was sitting on the edge of a bench next to her.

They were behind the hospital, sheltered from the ruckus of the city.

It was relatively quiet. The air was still cold. Blue kept listening cautiously to the soft wind. It felt so different being there again and at last...

She had thought from time to time of being Esther herself. She had been losing memories all the time, that wasn’t new. She had lost track of her own identity repeatedly, before.

Then something too painful to recall occurred. And then another... Two blows putting her down for good.

But when she appeared to be forever lost, Esther came to save her...

It went as a shock, facing her at the last moment... It brought an end to her long lasting confusion, pulling her back to herself. Just being Blue Mary Herson. Never Esther.

Now a dear friend who did everything for her was suddenly gone, and Blue was sobbing for her.

~

From time to time since her awakening in the hospital, Blue had the impression that she could hear the train rolling, far in the distance. The ghost was slowly going away, but always lingered.

Next to her, Rose was looking quietly at her, smiling gently and waiting patiently for ever.

Rosemary respected that she needed more time to gather her thoughts back properly, furthermore as she’d always been troubled with that regard of memories.

Though something had changed for good, she indeed needed some more time to let these remaining whispers to pass away in peace.

Blue was feeling awful in her weakened body, wounded badly by the accident and almost dry from starvation in her slumber.

Having spent some time so close to death was another difficult experience to swallow. And now that she was learning of her medical situation, she realised how very close that had been. Even though she never faced doom as if it was an entity, she realised she had been around it for some time...

Only now that it was going she could fully realise how close it had been.

She found herself trembling again, getting away from that reality, and just as far away from Esther...

She also remembered most clearly that last instant, looking at the terrified imitation of herself, just below her.

Esther had looked the same as her physically, but alas also in troubled memories and mind. The shock of realisation their roots weren’t in one same or the other’s, it had been greater and more painful for Esther.

Both of them had grown valuing an identity beyond what they could be; until they found themselves lost. Until they were now finally split apart from each other for good.

Because Esther couldn’t do anything but save Blue, even if it had meant for her to meet her fate.

Blue was now feeling such sadness toward her lost friend she found herself crying again. She sobbed on that quiet morning, Rose staying next to her.

Rose felt sorry for her. Her poor sister almost died after that train accident, and coming back to life was certainly as much painful... Rose held her hand, and they waited for the rain to pass.

~

B - Mary, what happened to me? To us?

Rose looked aside and lowered her gaze before answering.

R - Do you remember the time after dad’s passing? When I picked up his works in town and around?

B - I don’t recall that much... Is that when you gave me Gülnihal?

R - Oh... Yes. It wasn’t long after you thought of naming it Esther. I’m surprised you remember that previous name... Dad had been sick for a long time. Mom gave me the doll and...

B - You gave it to me to help cope with the loneliness when you were away... Dad was gone, and you were leaving too. Elise & Scarlett were jealous of me...

R - Not really... They were in pain. They were worried and scared. For a long time none of us knew what to do for all of us to move on.

Moving on had been difficult for the family once the central figure had left. Rose had to take over his work duties. Scarlett grew quieter and harsher. Elise grew distant and gradually looking to leave them. Blue was still getting regularly lost and confused. Their mother’s love and patience wasn’t sufficient to hold them together.

Rose grew worryingly, unable to do more to keep them as happily as before, and worried for Blue most of all.

The doll helped Rose and Blue feeling better, but not their sisters.

Then after years oscillating between uneasy and living on, something terrible happened Rose now could retell to Blue.

An explosion occurred in the mine between town and them. Some fires started in town and in their home.

While Rosemary was away for the time, the house unexpectedly burnt down one night, along with some neighbourhoods in town.

B - I don’t really remember...

R - On the 1st of February. A little more than a month ago... But maybe it’s better if you don’t. Mother, Elise and Scarlett... They... They died that night. And at first when I returned, I thought you did as well.

Blue closed her eyes, feeling dizzy. Her last memories of them were not at home but inside that train.

She mostly recalled their anger.

And still that wasn’t the end of her story.

B - What happened to me? Why was I in a train?

R - Because of the strangest thing you did back then, probably not quite feeling like yourself... And the worse of luck as well maybe.

Blue left the house that night, in time not to asphyxiate herself while her mother and sisters passed.

The young girl wandered in a daze through the night and toward the city.

On the next morning, a couple found her passed out in a backyard. They took care of her for a few days, not knowing who she was, and neither did Blue probably telling them her name was Mary or Esther.

This were the names she mostly used when she was unclear with her own.

B - I think I do remember a couple being kind to me for a while... They moved away and I went with them. As if I were the adopted daughter...

Blue was feeling awful. Rose didn’t blame her, only feeling sympathy for her forgetful sister.

Unfortunately that train had been a fateful choice as well.

She was found hurt and unconscious again, but she survived. She was brought alive to this city hospital.

Blue rarely woke up to be able to answer questions about her.

Blue felt guilty and shameful, hearing this tale connecting some dots she had in the back of her head. It was still too different from what she had been through in her dream...

And she realised a little that someone must have suffered too, while being the missing one from this entire bad dream.

B - And you... What happened to you?

Rosemary tried to smile but looked awfully weak and exhausted too. She had strained eyes and was pale. She looked too thin and skinny for her own good.

R - I came back home the day after... I found the state of town, and then the house burnt down...

She found most of her family’s bodies still in the ruins, but not Blue’s. She found leftovers of Esther’s along a hallway making her think maybe Blue had left it behind.

Rosemary began to hypothesize, and hope, that she had found help somewhere in town. Perhaps Blue had lost herself again, but perhaps she was still alive.

R - I never stopped looking for you... I heard a few things, and I followed your trail... It took me more days to reach you, and my trail went through the train accident outside of town. It pulled you away from me again...

Rose was a few days behind, terribly worried, following her trail with dimming hopes. But she could never have stopped before reaching the end. She had been desperate and restless. She had to look for her only remaining family with every breath she could have.

Blue was trembling, beginning to realise what Rose might have felt during all these lonely days, alone for weeks, days and night in worries.

Rose’s voice was trembling as well.

R - About one week ago, I finally found you. I found you... You were getting weaker here with each passing day since, but you were still breathing. You were here but still so far away from me... I couldn’t do anything more to help. You’ve always been elusive Blue, but... I couldn’t show you the way back this time. All I could do was pray. I prayed for you to survive, and for you to wake up...

B - For me to remember the blue rose...

Rosemary had an emotional smile.

R - Yes, that’s one good way to put it... I prayed for my blue bird to come back to me... And after a painful week, you kept your promise. You came back to me...

Rose was smiling softly. Her face shown exhaustion, a sickly complexion and sleep deprivation behind that smile.

Blue didn’t want to judge her appearance, realising hers wasn’t much charming either currently. Even her skull had been fractured behind her head and partially shaved, and tightly wrapped like other broken parts of her injured body.

Blue could barely recognise her appearance because of how much she had changed in this separated time, but there was still no mistaking her... All Rose showed on her face now was relief. She was so relieved now... She wasn’t letting go of her hand. And there was no mistaking it for Blue as well. She was her beloved person.

The relief was share. Blue felt somehow free at last, from a very long lasting dim dream.

Where everything had been waiting in shades and warm oppressing tones.

Her new freedom felt a little too fresh, but so dreadfully light next to that. It really felt like a nightmare had been lasting for ages. She could now see the lights of day for the first time in all their complexity, with a feeling of infinite relief.

Blue examined Rose again with the same disbelief as before.

Rose, just there, so close and real that it almost looked like an impossible fantasy. Blue lifted her trembling hand toward Rose’s face. She wanted to make sure this was not a dream nor a ghostly feel.

She still had such blended memories from the departure of the train. She had mixed something from hers and Esther all along every one of her traumas. She was now afraid to find out she wasn’t truly free yet again, that there would still be more to feel lost about...

Her fingers reached a relatively warm cheek, and then some chestnut hair. Her trembling fingers could barely move as her heart fluttered.

B - You are real, right? Mary?

She was imploring her in a remnant of despair. She wished with all her heart for the blue rose to be true.

Rose showed her melancholic smile once more to her, once she had a grasp of the extent of the question’s meaning.

R - Of course I am, my sweet Blue.

Blue felt her heart hurt from the sudden relief again. Her hand fell as she began to sob and tear up. It was far more than relief. She couldn’t really name yet everything she had lost along the way, however there was an even more important feeling finally released.

B - Rose... I missed you so much...

All this time, she had tainted everything with that feeling. It had been everywhere, stronger than her memories.

Rose softly hugged Blue closer, trying not to hurt her tired frame.

She had felt the same. Now Blue was relieving some of her sorrow in tears trickling down the neck and shoulder of her beloved Rose.

Her sister’s voice came out shaken by the same mixture of emotions where sorrow and fright could finally float away.

R - We’re finally together now, my sweet Blue... We won’t have to miss each other like that again... I missed you so much Blue...

They were slowly getting out from difficult times. They shared relief, comfort and a spring of hope.

They shared the same feelings in that gentle and clumsy embrace, finding some promise of peace at last. Their pain was quietly flowing away, drying among the tears and evaporating in the air, to vanish under the new sunlight.

They had a time of mourning ahead, burying their caring mother and sisters whom passed away.

All of them who wanted to help a blue rose to appear. Along now with Esther.

Thanks to them all, Blue and Rose would live again, together hereafter.

~