Blue Moon (Book One in The Blue Crystal Trilogy) (29 page)

“He’s very poorly,” said my
mum, “and he’s not going to get better, you have to understand
that. Until we talk to the consultant I don’t know what the
prognosis is. It’s going to be tough, Emily, but we have to be
strong. For his sake.”

And that only made me cry all
the harder. Because I had a solution within my grasp and I couldn’t
use it.

The next morning, we went back
to the hospital. Granddad was sitting up in bed and had eaten
breakfast. He’d had a good night and was on antibiotics. He still
had on the oxygen mask, but seemed much brighter.

“Hi Granddad,” I said, kissing
his forehead. “You gave us all a scare last night.”

“I told you, Emily,” he said
with a smile, “I’m made of strong stuff. Tough as old boots me.
I’ll go on forever.”

But it was obvious his
breathing was unnaturally shallow and fast, and when we saw the
consultant, he spelled it out for us. The prognosis wasn’t good. My
Granddad couldn’t go on for much longer. In the consultant’s words,
he could go out like a light bulb at any time. There would come a
point when his lungs wouldn’t take in enough oxygen and he would
quickly lose consciousness. At that point, there wasn’t much
anybody could do.

“But some light bulbs go on for
years,” I pointed out hopefully.

“Not this one, I’m afraid,” he
said, which was when I knew it wouldn’t be long.

I left my mum sitting with
Granddad and on the pretext of finding a drinks machine, went for a
walk in the hospital grounds. They weren’t particularly pretty,
just a few sparse areas of grass and some planted beds here and
there, in between the car parks, with the odd tree dotted around.
But at least I could get some fresh air and try to come to terms
with the car crash my life had become.

I found a seat overlooking a
small courtyard and sat contemplating the world. I hated Theo with
a vengeance and was glad I’d lost my cell phone. At least he
couldn’t contact me and I couldn’t see if he was trying to. Why
wouldn’t he help? He knew how much this meant to me. He had the
means. He had the power. He just didn’t have the inclination. He
wanted me but he didn’t want my Granddad. Well, I was clear about
one thing. I didn’t want him. Or his strange world. Or eternal
youth. I just wanted plain, simple normality back in my life. And
what was that story about The Lunari? Surely by now they would have
found my phone, discovered the evidence against me and closed in
for the kill. That is, if Theo could be believed. I seriously
doubted there was any truth to his stories. He was probably the
ultimate fantasist and I’d been the gullible fool that just
happened to come along. Proof of that was the fact I was still
alive. I hadn’t seen a single Lunari, Reptilia or any other
creature he’d said was stalking me.

I’d had enough of fantasy.
Stark, cold reality was staring me in the face in the form of my
Granddad’s illness, and that was all I was capable of focusing on.
I went back in and sat with Granddad for a while and I couldn’t
help it, I had to ask.

“Gramps, if a magical power
existed to make you well, but you had to stay this age for ever,
would you use it?”

“Where did that come from?” he
asked. “Have you been watching too many science fiction films?”

“No,” I laughed, “I just
wondered, that’s all.”

He thought for a moment before
speaking. “Emily, I’ve had a good life and a long life, and as much
as I don’t want to leave you and your mum, I don’t want to go on
forever. Can you imagine being stuck in this old body for eternity?
Why would I want that? It would be purgatory. There’s a natural
order, a time for birth and a time for death. When my time comes, I
will accept it with grace. You know why? Because I’m going to see
your grandma again. I want you to remember that. Will you do
that?”

I stared at him with tears
running down my cheeks.

“I’ll try, Gramps, but you
always said ‘when you’re dead, you’re dead’. I thought you didn’t
believe in an after-life.”

“Truth is, Emily, I don’t know.
I only know I’m coming to the end of my allotted time, and I feel
very strongly your Grandma calling for me. That’s all I can tell
you.” He smiled at me. “I’m not frightened. This is how things are
meant to be. The natural order. I want you to look after your mum
for me, make sure she’s all right. And Emily?”

“Yes, Granddad.”

“I like Theo. You go together
well.”

“Oh Gramps,” I sobbed, my voice
choking, my cheeks wet with tears. “Don’t go, please don’t go.
Don’t leave me.”

Later that evening, my Granddad
died. The infection had taken too strong a hold and he couldn’t
fight it. He went out like a light. No struggle, no breathlessness,
no pain. One minute he was talking to us, for a second he seemed to
have difficulty catching his breath and then he slumped forward
unconscious. They tried long and hard to resuscitate him but to no
avail. He’d gone.

The next few days were spent
sorting out details. I had no idea there were so many things to do
when someone died. We had to get the death certificate from the
registry office, tell friends and relatives, notify banks and
building societies, talk to the tax office, appoint a solicitor
and, of course, arrange a funeral. Theo called the house a couple
of times and spoke to my mum, but I refused to talk to him. He knew
now that my Granddad had died and I hoped he was feeling guilty. I
still felt he should have interceded.

On the day of the funeral, a
cold wind blew and small white clouds scuttled across the sky. The
sun shone, but the easterly wind was strong and my lasting
impression, once we’d endured the church service, was of a cold,
bright graveyard and a small crowd of people standing round the
grave side, holding their coats around them, looking pinched and
frozen.

I watched the pallbearers carry
Granddad’s coffin out of the church, the wind tugging at their
black suits. A large hole had already been dug in the ground and I
watched as the coffin was lowered slowly down. I’d thought the
words ‘ashes to ashes’ and ‘dust to dust’ were only used in films,
but the Father James spoke them, picking up some earth and letting
it fall through his fingers onto the coffin.

I threw a red rose in after
it.

There weren’t many mourners,
just my mum and me, a few relatives that I didn’t see very often,
some neighbours and others from the village that Granddad had
known. It was a small, low-key affair, which is just what he would
have wanted. A big, grand affair would have been wrong. My Granddad
had been a quiet, private person, with a small circle of friends,
and I was glad his funeral reflected that. We’d played jazz music
in the church, Stranger on the Shore by Acker Bilk, and I could
still hear the beautiful, lilting melody in my head. The cold
weather and dazzling sun suited my mood perfectly, a biting
reminder of the harshness of reality. This was what happened. You
were born, you aged and you died. It was the natural order and
there was no other way. I’d been a fool to think otherwise and let
my head be turned, albeit momentarily, by fantasist nonsense.

After I’d thrown my rose onto
the coffin and the vicar had finished his words, I looked over to
the far side of the churchyard, where the pathway led to Hartswell
Hall, remembering my flight of the other night. How ridiculous it
all seemed now. How juvenile and meaningless. I felt I’d aged a
million years in the last few days. I’d looked through the doorway
of death and seen the truth for myself. And the truth was not a
blue crystal, eternal youth or a long lost love, it was an open
grave in a cold, windswept graveyard, where decaying flowers marked
the passing of others who had gone before.

My eyes scanned the trees and
the pathway beneath, the wind teasing the branches pale green with
new growth, and then I saw him. I saw Theo standing on the newly
cleared pathway, watching me closely. For a second our eyes met and
such a yearning passed through my body, I felt as if I’d been riven
apart. I hadn’t thought the pain could get any worse, but I was
wrong. It hit me afresh. As I looked at his beautiful face, with
his clear blue eyes and translucent skin, utter desolation and
emptiness struck me with the force of cold concrete. If I’d
experienced love just a few days earlier, now I felt jagged,
twisted agony tearing me apart.

I turned away, unable to look
at him any longer, and slowly walked back down the ancient church
pathway to the Lych Gate, tears in my eyes and the words of John
Donne forming in my mind:

“
He ruin’d mee, and I am
re-begot of absence, darkness, death; things

which are not.”

Never had I felt more alone or
unhappy.

26.
Reconciliation

The next day I decided I might
as well go to college as stay at home. It all seemed pretty
meaningless, but I needed to see my friends. I’d hardly been out
since my Granddad died, there’d been so much to do and I hadn’t
felt up to it. I’d sat in my room night after night, crying and
listening to Lenka singing ‘Like a Song’, until I had no more tears
left. Granddad was gone and I couldn’t bring him back. Theo had
broken my heart and filled my head with mumbo jumbo. What I really
needed was to see Tash and Seth, to laugh and joke with them, talk
about last night’s TV programmes, compare assignments, hang out in
the café and do all the stuff we always used to do.

I took my new Hollister
sweatshirt, skinny jeans and wedge boots out of the wardrobe,
feeling strangely comforted by the routine and safety they
represented.

I didn’t want to make adult
decisions, I just wanted to focus on the trivial side of life: what
outfit to wear, which eye-shadow to choose, latest music, designer
labels, fad diets, college gossip, all the commonplace strands that
held my life together. Once I was back at college, others could
take responsibility. All I had to do was attend lectures, go to
tutorials, write essays and catch the bus every day, things I felt
capable of achieving.

Suddenly, I was back in my
comfort zone and it felt all the more secure for having stepped out
of it for a while. This was where I belonged and the big wide world
could go take a hike.

I sat at my dressing table and
decided for once I’d follow a beauty routine. Using my mum’s
Forever Youthful cleanser and toner, I cleansed and toned, then
liberally applied her Forever Youthful Day-Glow Moisturiser.

For a moment, I looked into the
mirror, staring at my sad expression and thinking about all that
had happened. I’d seen enough of the ageing process to last a
lifetime. My eyes had been opened to the inevitability of ageing
and death and I knew that I had to enjoy youth while it was still
mine. My clear, smooth skin would be gone all too soon, as life and
experience left their indelible mark and the passing years took
their toll. I wondered how long it would be before tiny wrinkles
started to criss-cross around my eyes and lines began to etch
themselves into my face.

Unless ….

I hardly dared let the thought
form in my mind. There was an alternative if I chose to believe
Theo.

I thought about his flawless
skin, translucent glow, mesmerising eyes and effortless beauty,
then smiled ruefully. Whether I believed him or not, it was all
academic. The opportunity had gone. As had my future with Theo.
What faced me now was a long, slow decline into old age. Alone.
Whoever else I met could never match up to Theo and would always be
a poor imitation of love. I’d encountered perfection and lost it.
There would be no one else.

I forced myself to concentrate
on the here and now. What Theo had offered was an illusion, not
based on reality. Had he really found a means of cheating death?
And was my life really in such terrible danger? Now I saw it in the
cold light of day, I realised how ridiculous it all was and berated
myself for believing him.

I picked up my new Hollister
top, wondering if life would ever get back to what it had been. I
might not look old, but I felt it. Naivety and innocence were
things of the past and I realised there was no way back to the
world I’d once known. I’d walked through the doorway of awareness
and it had slammed shut behind me.

Like it or not, I was in
unchartered territory, and I had to face it on my own.

As I pulled on my top, I
noticed the blue velvet cloak I’d borrowed from Hartswell Hall,
lying folded at the bottom of my wardrobe. I’d pushed it to the
back, trying to hide all proof of its existence, but now my eyes
were drawn to it and I pulled it out, letting my fingers run across
its smooth velvety surface. As I did, I felt a hard object
concealed within its folds. Intrigued, I shook out the cloak and
realised something was in one of the deep pockets. Putting my hand
inside, my fingers closed around a hard, oblong shape. I pulled it
out. It was my cell phone. I gasped. I’d been so sure I’d dropped
it at Hartswell Hall on the night of the Blue Moon Ball, its
presence in my hand was something of a shock.

“So The Lunari didn’t have it,”
I found myself saying. “That's why they haven’t come looking for
me. They didn't know I was there.”

As soon as I uttered the words,
I realised I’d crossed another line. I’d just acknowledged that the
reason I was safe was not that they didn’t exist, but rather that
they didn’t know about me.

As I looked at the cloak, a
flicker of doubt went through my mind.

Could Theo have been telling
the truth? I’d certainly witnessed a very strange phenomenon that
night when dozens of very old people had apparently been
rejuvenated. But were they even the same people who came back out
of the room? I’d assumed they were the same because they were
wearing similar clothes. But what if the old people had gone out by
one door and a different set of young people had come in via
another? I knew there was another entrance at the bottom of the
Clock Tower. Joseph had said the wood was too warped for it to
open, but he’d said he was going to replace it. If he had, it would
be easy for people to get in and out of the upper Clock Tower room
without having to go through the house. But why pull off such an
elaborate hoax? And for whose benefit? Then I thought about Theo
and his family. They’d been looking old and tired, yet when they
came out of the Clock Tower room they were radiant and
youthful.