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There’s something very strange about embalming somebody that you know. Used to know? Knew? I don’t know. I’m not enough of a philosopher to know where you draw the line between the past tense and the present.
Certainly when you’re elbows-deep inside of someone removing their internal organs, it doesn’t feel like they’re the person whose face they wear. After all, embalming is the process of presenting a shell to the world – a shell that looks as lifelike and pleasant as possible, but a shell, hollowed of everything that might decay. It was… good, I suppose, that Zumini’s wounds could all be hidden by his armor. Casimir’s case was nowhere near so easy. I wonder if anyone would have bothered for him if I didn’t?
A few months ago I wrote how summer is a time of disaster, and for once, I was right. My peace and happiness, weak things that they are, were crushed easily under the weight of mistakes – both mine and others’. I am saner now than I was in the immediate aftermath of it all, able to keep going, but I am looking forward to this trip out of town with a painful degree of anticipation. Some time away from all of this, some time to simply enjoy myself… some time to rediscover that happiness and sense of self I had finally managed to grasp after so long.
I do feel guilty for leaving so soon, given the fact Shaylei will inevitably need support. But I think she understands, and I will be a great deal more helpful to her upon my return than I can be now, walking around like a… I hardly even know the metaphor. Like a great pile of daggers inside a bag of skin, waiting for a single misstep? Scratched up in a hundred tiny ways, and fearing the misstep that ends it all.
The misstep that ends it all. I should have made more time for Zumini. I knew how alone and isolated he was after the separation from his family. I should have reached out, ensured he knew he had a friend in me. Granted, in the last few weeks it wouldn’t have been possible, but… before that, I could have done… something. If he had felt less alone, maybe he would have been more careful, more considered, waited for help… but then again, maybe not. Perhaps nothing would have changed this outcome. (You’d like to think that, wouldn’t you!)
All I can do is regret and try to live up to my promises – to make sure Shaylei and the children are safe, to be a good and true Knight.
This trip… so much rests on this trip.
