[FLASHBACK…]
Cassandra was a little eight year old girl. She was coming back from school on her own when her mother meets her at her workplace. Her studio was only a few buildings away, on the third floor.
“Mama!” Jumping on Ravine’s lap, Cassandra wiggles and plays with her mother. She wanted attention, all of her mother’s attention, on her and nothing else.
It was around 2 pm, Cassandra was being fed by the woman as her colleagues then took photos of Ravine playing the role of the mother.
“I am so going to blackmail her with these. She looks so cute, her daughter!”
“I agree, Jason. She’s very cute. And the mother too. If Mrs. Ravine was a little less harsh on us regarding work like she always has been… then I would marry her right away.”
“Shush! Don’t let her hear your filthy words. Do you know what she’s been going through?” With sad eyes, the man looks at the old woman who plays with Cassandra, smiling for the first time in front of her colleagues.
In the evening, Cassandra and her mother walk back to their home. Cassandra fell asleep instantly, Ravine was awake, smoking a blunt.
After completing her house chores and things related, Ravine wanted to call it a day.
A sharp sound of the window breaking was heard to Ravine.
She immediately went to hold the bat, the sound had come from the kitchen.
“Who is it!?” Her hands were trembling with fear. Her baby girl was right next to the kitchen, sleeping soundly without a care in this world. She was only eight.
“Who- ah!!” Ravine screams when the man tries to choke her, not knowing the weapon she possessed in her hold. She swings the bat in the air, it collides with the man’s face as he groans in shock.
The man falls unconscious instantly.
Ravine switches the lights and finds a knife in his hold. What was going to happen to her daughter? What was going to happen to her if she didn’t defend herself?
The very thought makes moves her to tears as she collapses on the floor.
Cassandra who heard the noise from outside runs towards her mother. Cassandra was possessed by an older soul, she knew better than to act like a 17 year old in that moment.
“Mama… mama…! What happened?” Cassandra was trembling as well. She subtly ignores the leg of the person who had collapsed in the kitchen.
She sees her mother bring her shaky hands to her face. The blunt and the lighter were on the table in front of her as she reaches for it.
Cassandra began crying when Ravine let the tears roll down her face as well. She was horrified of this world.
“Nothing happened, baby. Did mama scare you? I- I just fell off. That’s it, haha… haha…” Ravine was trying to keep it all together.
But she was bound to break apart, fall to pieces the next moment.
Cassandra purses her lips and decides to act dumb, like a child would.
“I am here mama…” she says to Ravine, climbing on her lap as she smoked the tobacco.
“Thank you, darling. Mama is alright, I promise.” Mama wasn’t alright. She wasn’t even close to being alright.
As she smoked for the rest of the night until police finally decided to collect the body, Ravine and Cassandra were sitting in the same position, in the same spot until 4 am.
The police was weak and never listened to a woman’s plea. They would often brush off cases like this, thinking it was a drunk woman’s prank.
Ravine prayed for the entire night in the station that they wouldn’t be charged for harming a person. It was self defense. The criminal was identified as an antisocial as well, a burglar who was let loose.
She broke down the next morning when she was dropped back home.
‘Where are you when I need you the most, Eugene? Why did you leave me? Why didn’t you take me with you…?’
Her last thought seemed a little too selfish.
She was holding onto hope, and that hope was named Cassandra. She was a token of their love, unfortunately the only token left. She was devastated when she lost her son three years ago. If something ever happened to Cassandra… Ravine wasn’t ready to forgive herself anymore.
She would curse the gods for her fate.
It was already so worse.
[FLASHBACK ENDS…]
“Uncle Alex. Don’t feel bad that my mother smokes around the house. Now you know why she’s attached to blunts.
I… I remember my dad. He often smelled like cigarettes and books from his library. He was a very loving man. And Louis… he was the best brother I ever had in my life.” In all three lives that she’s lived, the person named Louis was her best friend and her best brother.
There was something too mystical to his soul. It shined like white and gold when everyone’s shined a dark blue or purple.
He was what we call the pure soul, an angel in disguise.
“I understand, darling.” Alex says. Somehow, the words reminds Cassandra about her life with Framton Johnson.
She was surprised, almost too happy to learn that the Johnson siblings have grown up to be just like their father. Framton taught them well. He was an excellent teacher.
“But, Cassandra. Could you please call me dad? I- I know I have a son but… I always wanted a daughter who was as fair and kind as you.” Cassandra widens her eyes in surprise at the man’s words.
She viewed herself as a cunning mastermind who never wavered through any tsunami. She couldn’t say the same about the late Cassandra Johnson, her reincarnation.
Cassandra Johnson was timid and didn’t know how to protect herself.
Maybe because Cassandra Sympsons was a fighter cock and had an extremely fragile person as her best friend to protect. Nothing would make her change her mind, except for a reason stated.
That’s how strong Cassandra Sympsons was.
Or… she may owe her personality to her late brother Louis Sympsons for his vigor and eccentricity. He was one in a million, always launched himself forward in the mouth of danger.
“I know how you feel, dad. And… thank you for allowing me to call you ‘dad’. It’s been a really long time since that word came out of me.”
“Can I give you a hug, darling?” Cassandra shyly nods at the old man sat beside her on the guestroom bed.
“Thank you…” he softly utters, parting from the hug.
The woman was standing right there, against the wall while she hid her smoke trails behind the wall.
She was listening to their conversation.
She couldn’t believe that her daughter craved care and nurturing from an external person because she needed a male figure in her life.
For Cassandra, she didn’t think anyone else could take the place of her father; Eugene D’Angelo.
But Alex Johnson seemed like a perfect investment.
He who loved Ravine a long time ago is the most deserving candidate to win Ravine’s heart again.