Tea

In the aftermath of the confrontation between Gika and her mother, I made the decision to give them some space. It had been an emotional day for both of them, and the thing they would need least was someone with no understanding of what those two went through together and listening in or, worse, butting in with their own opinion. Also, the story Gika's mother told had given me quite a bit to chew on. For one, the fact that Gika's spirit had apparently destroyed or ousted Julia's, functionally killing her, was a scary thought. Did that mean I also…?

I did have memories from my early childhood, fuzzy ones, sure, like all early memories, but memories nonetheless. Still, it was not unthinkable, in fact even likely, that my soul has essentially destroyed the consciousness of a small child, perhaps even a baby, to allow me to have this second chance at life. It made me feel sick. Is this the life that they would've wanted? Would they have done a better job than I did? Would they have made father cry, and would they have truly loved him?

I knew for sure that I would not like the answers to these questions, yet they seeped into my brain.

Was it my fault this happened? Did I do something wrong?

Surely I wasn't… conscious when I took away that child's soul, right? I'm not the selfish kind of person who would… It must've happened automatically, an inevitably of the circumstances.

It had to be, yet doubt began to creep into my mind. I remember up to my late thirties of my past life, and roughly from being four years old in this life, with no real memories of what happened in between, just a weird fuzziness. I don't even know how I died. I fastened my pace homeward and slammed the front door open.

"Welcome back-" my father began, but I walked right past him, too entrenched in thought to pay him any mind. I sat down at my desk, placed my elbows on it then placed my fingers on my temples while holding my eyes closed.

Think, think, think… Any memories are okay, I'd be happy with anything, something to work from. Yet, my head remained blank, safe for my own frustration. I had to calm down, a mind filled with emotion can't work properly, nor can a mind racing focus. I took a few deep breaths, walked out of my room, filled a kettle with water, put it above a fire, then sat down across my father, waiting for the water to boil.

"Welcome back." He repeated.

"Thank you." I replied.

An awkward silence fell between us. The kettle began to whistle. I walked over, took it from the fire, poured it into a cup, then put in a few tea-leaves and waited for the flavor to spread.

"I wanted to ask you something." I said.

"Go ahead." He replied.

I put the cup up to my mouth, took a small sip to see if the flavor had set in, then burned the tip of my tongue and quickly put down the cup.

"Was there any point when I was younger where I suddenly began to act strange?"

"Not that I can remember. You've always been strange."

I softly blew on my tea to cool it.

"I think I may have told you this when I was young, even though you probably didn't believe me, but I'm from another world. Gika is as well."

"I find that hard to believe."

"Mother knows, about Gika at least."

My father fell silent for a moment.

"Can you keep a secret from your mother?" He asked.

"Of course."

"She told me you might say something like that. She said I should keep rejecting your claims as delusions and never play along. I don't know why. I trusted she'd know better than me what the right thing to do was."

"Then why are you telling me this?"

He sighed.

"Because I don't actually like your mother, Gavino. I'm… not the brightest. Unlike you and your siblings I'm not gifted. I married your mother because she was the most likely candidate to become an Uomo Universale, and she married me because your grandparents, and by extension me, had a lot of wealth. So don't tell her I told you this, okay?"

"I won't."

"Good."

I took a sip from my tea. Warm, but not too hot. Perfect, for me at least.

"I want to regain some memories from my past life, including some from when my soul entered this body, if I even have any memories of that."

"Okay."

I took another sip.

"Do you also want some?" I asked.

"No, but thank you for asking." He replied.

"Anyways, do you have any ideas on how I could do such a thing? I'm all out."

"As I said, I'm not the brightest, I'm not sure what I could come up with to help you."

"If you were in my situation, what would you do?"

"Your situation is so alien to me that I don't really have an answer to that."

"Even so, you could try to empathize with me, to get a better understanding of my headspace."

"Ever since I was a young child, I've been told I'm a very unempathetic person."

"I didn't know that."

I took another sip. It was a little too cool for my taste, but still enjoyable.

"'If the only thing you are good at is using a hammer, then you better make sure to turn all your problems into nails.', that's what my father used to say." My father said.

"I'm pretty sure grandfather got the proverb wrong." I replied.

"No, it isn't. It means that instead of using the obvious solution that is outside your skillset, you instead think about how you can apply your skills to solve whatever problem you're faced with. You start with a solution, then work your way to the problem. I would have failed miserably had I attempted the tests to become Uomo Universale, so instead I used my greatest skill, my ability to romance people, to my advantage. You can't be good at everything, after all."

I drank the last of my tea. It was cold now, so I decided that I'd finish it in one go. My father really was much more human than I'd ever thought possible.

"So what skills do I have that could be useful here?"

"You tell me."

Painting. Whenever I painted, vague memories of my past lives became more clear, the physical act of using the brush preceding my rational thoughts. It could work. It was certainly worth a try. I stood up…

"Thank you for the advice."

… and ran to my room.