Deep Roots (Iris' Atlantis 2)

For the start of July, the world felt surprisingly cold. I pressed my head back onto the pillow and drew the blanket closer. I knew I should have gotten up. I knew I should have at least gotten a glass of water.

I didn't want to dream. But I needed to rest my head on the pillow for just a moment more.

My bare feet touched lightly the polished floorboards in my parents house. The basement door was open. I didn't want to go there.

"You don't need to."

I looked up to my father, framed in the kitchen door frame. From behind him and my mother light spilled onto the corridor floor, inviting. Soft smells of freshly baked loaf.

"It is just the neighbour's son."

Just the neighbour's son.

"I'll just look," I said. "Just a peek."

I gripped my phone, it had a flashlight.

With my light in my hand, I turned my back to my parents and descended into the dark steps.

My hand brushed spiderwebs that had collected dust and turned into sticky cotton candy. Dust swirled in the light. Cold gathered around my bare ankles.

The cellar was silent. All sounds were left in the outside world.

I searched my neck for the weight of the cross I carried, but I had forgotten it upstairs.

The flashlight passed the dark shape of winter tires, slid over closets of old albums, and lingered on piles of tools. I was alone in the musty universe of forgotten and rarely used objects that were left here, out of the way.

There was an open box of cardboard hosting the winter mittens and caps. A black pair of woollen gloves rested on top. I let my fingers touch the fabric. One vividly orange maple leaf had stuck to them.

Against a plastic christmas tree rested a huge umbrella everyone in the household felt was simply impractical.

Aunt Chime's cookies had been stacked in see-through plastic boxes on top of one shelf. They easily stuck to the roof of your mouth and had a syrupy aftertaste filled with cinnamon.

And there, behind a box of christmas decorations, hidden in the same corner with colourful balls and the top hat meant for a snowman, was left a wooden crate. Big enough to host a small man.

I knelt in the undisturbed dust by it.

On the cover was painted a chinese character, a kanji. I traced the strokes with my index finger and brushed aside some errand glitter dust from the Christmas box.

I had had my time of manga enthusiasm. I had studied japanese. A long long time ago.

"Sumi," I said aloud, finding the right word for Ink.

Carefully I pried open the wooden lid of the coffin.

Dust clouds sprang into the air where the wooden board thudded onto the concrete floor.

I showed the flashlight inside to better see the silk -lined interior and the beautiful porcelain model of a young man whose overgrown brown hair descended in its wavy lustre around his shoulders. The simple black hoodie and jeans only highlighted the balanced painted features of the youngster. He was absolutely beardless which made him seem more a boy than grown man. He seemed fragile. Small.

Little.

I reach a hand to stroke the long waves of his brown hair.

He opened two orange eyes that gleamed in the flashlight's beam.

The porcelain doll took hold of my wrist.

Then, in one efficient, horrible twist he threw me off balance and wrapped himself around my torso. Two needlepoints sank into my neck.

I shrieked.

The world spun.

I was still screaming when Rosemary Scale Tongue stormed into my room. With her came a tall man with a ginger beard.

And it was he who knelt by my bed and held a glass of water for me to drink. And his worried eyes were the last I saw, before the fever dream swept me under again.