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He threw his umbrella on the ground, rested his hands on her arms, and ducked down to be closer to her face. He leaned in and pecked her lips softly, then looked at her with disappointment. "I don't know how you can doubt my love."
Her eyebrows furrowed involuntarily. "I'm not doubting your love. I'm just saying that—"
He straightened, placed a kiss on her head, and said, "Have you visited the graveyard yet?"
She sighed, a thousand words stifled inside her brain at the abrupt end of the conversation. "No."
"Want me to take you?" he said against her hair.
She wondered whether she'd be comfortable with that but didn't have the strength to argue. "Sure."
Her words drowned with the roars of the clouds, as rain drummed a beat. Xavier picked up his umbrella, and opened it, sheltering them both under it. She slipped her footwear on. He held her hand and led her to sit on one of the rocks, waiting for the rain to halt so they could go to the graveyard.
Giselle didn't let herself think too much about Rais or what he had insinuated. Maybe they worked together. Maybe Ashley was a co-worker as well.
"Where do you work?" she asked as the rain slowed down into a drizzle.
He licked his lips. "Oh, uh, well, um..."
"You said you did social work for a living," she said to jog his memory, his hesitation starting to annoy her.
"Yeah. Um, at Amara Orphanage. It's near where I live." He looked at her and gave her a small smile—the first one of the day.
She paused. Did she know anything about him at all? All their conversations over text messages were random. She would talk about the silliest things. He'd sometimes send "hahaha" when she'd mention the city culture or everyone's focus on keeping a good front in society because he considered it shallow. That used to unsettle her. But mostly, it was all laughter and silly talk.
There had been toxic moments, too. One thing similar between him and Chris was that neither liked the other. Whenever she'd talk to Xavier about how her day went, and Chris was there with her most of the time, he'd either steer the conversation in another direction or shut down completely, replying with one-word answers.
She never told him that it hurt. She would've preferred clearer communication.
"Where do you live?" she asked, ignoring her negative thoughts.
A slight disappointment was all it took for her mind to start overthinking. Sometimes this made her wonder if she had Borderline Personality Disorder, but then every Psychology major inexpertly self-diagnoses at one point or another.
He squeezed her hand then let it go, folding the umbrella as the rain stopped, and he said, "Nearby."
Right. It was funny how someone could differ so much from your idea of them. She wondered what it was about their text messages that encouraged smooth and endless conversations. In reality, although he was the same person, it felt like she didn't know him at all.
"Shall we?" he asked softly.
She nodded. He took her hand in his again and, together, they headed toward the cemetery where her mother's grave awaited her.
A cold wind blew as an aftermath of the ten minutes of rain. She shivered, and her feet got stuck in the mud as she made her way to the tombstone.
Goosebumps formed all over her body when she spotted the grave among the hundreds that dotted the uneven landscape. Unable to decide whether she wanted to leave or stay, she stopped walking. Xavier stood behind her patiently.
After a few moments, Giselle took a deep breath and walked forward again. Her legs wobbled slightly. The backside of her head hurt due to the sobs she was trying to keep in.
Upon reaching the grave adorned with a beautiful assortment of red roses, Giselle dropped to her knees for her mother.
The scent of the flowers enveloped the headstone like a blanket, bringing back the memories of her parents' room. Whenever her father could, he'd bring his wife a few roses, for she used to love them. Little Giselle would steal the flowers, then she'd stick them wherever she could in her room to mimic a jungle. Giselle remembered her mother standing against the doorframe to watch her five-year-old become a tigress and roar.
Giselle wanted to call her. She wanted to say the word "mom" and not have silence be the only reply. Words weren't needed to tell her how much she missed her warmth, so she slowly laid her head on the surface and closed her eyes. When she was a kid, she'd be in the same position on her mother's bosom and listen to her heartbeat. But all that greeted her now was the hard surface pressed against her cheek.
Nothing could replace the warmth of a mother except, perhaps, the cold surface of her own grave.
Nauseated, she got up abruptly and let Xavier hold her for a while. Her tears fell, and she wondered if it was ever going to get easier.
"Please take me somewhere else," she whispered to him.
