CHAPTER 2: MENTAL RETRIEVAL
“Let me go!” She screamed as she leaned over the balcony. Someone held her just in time. The girl was saved by her dad. She was in love with a neighbour boy who had just told her that he's moving far away.
The exploit was imminent. Regina had a mental breakdown. Being a teenager, she had no control over her emotions. After being struck by Simon's words that they were moving away and then meeting him again within a week in the hospital struck her mind with an outburst of all negativities and sadness she could never confine and possess. They hauled her away into a prison of imaginative freedom. She had only one thought in mind before jumping off. It was to meet Simon again and forever. His face was painted red in her mind when she saw him being taken away in the hospital as his toe held a label, "expired". When Simon was moving away, the only hope Regina had was from the future. It was a dark one now.
"This is going to be a long series of such activities. This was the probably the first one." Sighed Grandpa. "I hope we do not leave anyone behind because most of us are going through things, things we never thought of that would happen, things that are still happening inside us and they will continue to happen if we do not make people believe".
"That is truly a hard one to figure out", said John, half-asleep, locking the gate as they moved back inside after the melancholic feat was over and Regina was made to sleep with her parents.
The next morning was anomalous. Everyone stayed quiet at the breakfast table. Everyone lingered around at home and whimpered with an undead fear. It was the fear of Andrew and his family. Nobody was alright. The stillness inside was haunting and the noise outside was too great a nuisance.
John looked eagerly at his mum's door which stayed silent. Mum had not opened it since last night. He steered away to see his children. Their incognizance was thought provoking. John felt jealous. He wanted to unlearn whatever had happened. He too wanted to be a jovial goofball and play around. Comprehension was hard to learn when it was childhood. Trying not to comprehend was harder when it was adulthood. It had become automatic. It felt like life was a downhill road after an age. It only had perplexity and misery ahead.
He went outside for a walk in the afternoon. The sun was choosing for a mountain to hide behind. The atmosphere had started losing away its fever as the wind began to bring along moisture from a little lake nearby. It was where John wanted to go. He needed a plunge away from reality. He dawdled around the trees, throwing rocks into the lake seeing how many pebble jumps could he score. He sat on a rock and let his feet to lax inside the water.
The still movement of the lake drew many thoughts on his mind. Why did Dad have to leave so early? If he were here, he would probably know what to do. How would he console mum now? Andrew is most probably ...missing, Mum is still not comprehending ahead, Alice has her own journey of recovery, nobody can be contacted after the signal tower slammed on the ground. How do I control this situation. How do I become as worthy a son to father as Andrew was. But all I have been going through is just a series of unreal episodes. I can barely feel this as much as a dream. Ever since Dad left this world, I have been staying stuck in an order of glimpses. How do I make myself feel this scenario subjectively. I do not even know if I am even a part of it. Do my children feel this? Does everyone else feel the same? Probably not. Everyone is going through stuff, like Grandpa said. I hope I can think of a way to be resourceful.
Water gathered in his eyes as it saw the lake it had longed to meet. The drops could not wait any longer, for they desperately wanted to meet their kin and feel their warmth. Similar was the exhausting drainage John had been feeling everyday after Richard Vince was killed in Naraba.
His hazy vision saw a figure appear out of the woods at a distant edge of the lake. He rubbed his eyes to see Regina had draped a shawl on her shoulders and looked at the water in an utter dismay. John's intuition showed him his own state of oblivion inside her. He got up to talk to her.

The cracking of dry leaves behind her startled Regina. It was John.
“What are you doing here?”, inquired John.
“Listening”, began Regina "I have been hearing strange voices lately", ending it ironically.
This unexpected answer had John thinking and before he could say anything, Regina resumed, "Do not worry. I am not here to drown myself". She was displaying a facade but John knew how...