December, 2017

Cillian had already settled in and was sitting down for dinner with his family and Priyanka when Ingrid and Murphy returned from the gym.

"Look who's here!" Cait called out, coming to meet them in the front hall.

Cillian trailed timidly behind his sister.

"Hey!" Ingrid managed a wide, excited smile, which he reciprocated with a blush. "Welcome to our humble abode. Well – your dad's not-so-humble abode." She pulled him into a hug and he squeezed her tight. "How are you, how was the flight?"

Cillian rolled his eyes and sighed. Ingrid snickered.

"Tiring, huh?" With an arm around his shoulders, she started towards the kitchen. "How many times did you watch Mean Girls?"

"Actually, I caught up on Jessica Jones."

"Ooh." Ingrid wiggled her eyebrows. "Thrilling. Inspiration for your new comic, perhaps?"

His cheeks went beetroot red, his eyes grew rounder. "How do you know about that?"

Ingrid winked. "A little bird told me. You'll have to tell me all about it yourself, though, yeah?"

Cillian gave a reluctant nod. Edgar caught her eye and smiled complicitly.

"Right, well, whatever you lot are having for dinner smells divine," Ingrid said, sniffing the savoury aroma wafting around the kitchen, "so you'd better save me some while I pop in for a shower."

She gave Pri and Cait each a kiss on the cheek, then, for the sake of fairness, smooched Edgar and Cillian, too. Murphy respectfully declined and everybody laughed.

*

"I'm calling it The Jetsetter," Cillian began, his feet propped on the wall above Ingrid's headboard. She lay on her front beside him, with Cait pillowed on her lower back.

"I'm thinking, like... a Batman and Robin kind of duo, in a Victorian steampunk setting."

"Wow!" Ingrid's awe rang genuine and made Cillian's face flush. "That's a really cool concept, mate. Why The Jetsetter, though?"

"Well, she's the main character. This really cool, rich, mysterious lady, with a dark past, who takes in this doe-eyed boy, too gay to function," giggles all around at the reference – Cait had caught up with Mean Girls in the meantime. "And they travel... the universe."

He held his hands out, drawing a wide arch with his palms as if it was supposed to contain this universe he spoke of.

"I'm still not very clear on the world-building," he elaborated, "I've got all sorts of extravagant locations in mind, vintage sci-fi sort of stuff, star travel, but by steam engine... you know?"

The enthusiasm brightened his voice and made his broody mien bloom.

"I can totally visualise it," Ingrid said. "It's gonna be so awesome."

"It's beautiful, Cillian," Cait put in.

"Thanks," the boy murmured. He tilted his head to look at Ingrid. "I made a few sketches. Would you like to see them?"

"Of course!" Ingrid made a move to sit up and Cait rose to let her.

Cillian clambered out of bed. "I'm hardly any good," he said, "but until I find a decent artist, these will have to do."

"What do you mean?" Cait frowned as he rummaged through his backpack. "What happened to Emilia?"

His shoulders sagged as he sat back on the bed, holding his sketchbook. "We had the ugliest fight. When I presented the concept to her, she was like... where did you get the idea for the gay sidekick from? Well... I'm gay, I told her. And she just... she lost it. Bloody hell. She was convinced we were dating."

That made Cait cackle. "No way! How in the world?"

Cillian shrugged. "I blame mum for giving the poor girl false hopes."

Ingrid took the sketchbook and leafed through it. She liked what she saw. "I happen to know some artists," she said. "I could hook you up."

"Oh, right, you're friends with 'rosette,' aren't you?" Cillian replied. "I saw you in their pictures."

"You've been to their exhibition? How was it?"

His features contorted into a dreamy expression. "I've been a fan since like... forever. Amazing. I loved it. Absolutely brilliant, so much love, and confidence, and courage – they are so, so inspiring. I couldn't quite believe my eyes when I recognised you in some of the photos but of course you were there. Agata and Sienna too. Simply the best."

"Now you've made me curious," Cait said.

"Yeah, me too." Ingrid slammed the sketchbook shut. "I trust you took a ton of pictures?"

"Uh – of course I did. How are you not following me on Instagram? Gurrrl!"

He slurred the last word playfully and Ingrid rolled her eyes, laughing. They all then huddled around Cillian's smartphone to study samples from the art show.

*

October, 2011

The corporate zombie crowd trickled out of the train, up the steps towards the surface, rising from the communal metropolitan grave to retreat into their high-rise tombs for the night. Ingrid was but a small, anonymous fleck in the horde and the thought of crawling back into her shithole studio flat made her shudder.

Her whole body ached. Her two-piece office suit clung to her skin, sticky with sweat, cigarette smoke and car exhaust. She sorely needed a shower, to cleanse herself of New York.

But first, a pint.

Ingrid ducked into the shabby pub just around the corner from her apartment building. Remington, the barkeep there, was the only thing close to a friend that she'd managed to make in the city. Well, there was also Jack, but that situation was... tricky, to say the least.

"Look what the cat dragged in!" the bartender greeted her as she made her way towards the counter and hopped onto the stool.

"Hey, Remington."

"Girl, please." He raised an eyebrow at her. "How many times do I have to tell you? It's Remi, not the full fucking shotgun."

"Alright, alright." Ingrid chuckled. "Remi."

Remi winked. "That achievement gets you a bourbon on the house."

He grabbed a glass, filled it. Ingrid knocked it back. Another.

"Tough day at the office?"

She slammed her forehead on the countertop, groaning. "Shit week," she said, "just because I'm the new temp, everybody's pulling my chain in every single fucking direction."

"TGIF, right?"

"Oh." She straightened up, suddenly calmer. "I didn't even realise it's already Friday. I'd better get drunk, then."

Ingrid tapped her hands on the countertop, requesting tequila shots. Before she knew it, she'd ended up wasted on an unknown sofa somewhere. Was straining to get up on her elbows.

"Easy there, sunshine," a familiar voice warned her.

That triggered a bloody pounding headache.

"Here."

Remi came into view, a blurry outline at first, then a dark, solid shape. He knelt by the sofa and held a transparent glass up to her mouth. She dipped her lips in, then craned her neck to drink, water trickling down her chin.

"What happened?" she managed to croak. "Where, uh... where am I?"

"You got shitfaced," Remi told her. "I've brought you to my humble abode above the bar."

"Right."

Ingrid fell back on the sofa and closed her tired eyes.

"Take me home, please?" she muttered. "It's not far from here. I need a shower. And a change of clothes."

"Why don't you have another nap?" His thumb soothingly rubbed the back of her hand. "Some more water. Then we'll talk."

When Ingrid woke up again, bright morning sunlight filtered into the dingy living room and her throat felt parched and bitter. She dragged herself into an upright position, pushing herself to her feet. She went looking for a bathroom, to wash her face and relieve her throbbing bladder.

She trudged back out, somewhat more relaxed. The smell of frying bacon drifted into her nostrils, leading her towards the kitchen.

"Morning, sleeping beauty." Remi scraped thin slices of bacon around the pan. "How did you sleep?"

"Like a log," she yawned. "Thanks for letting me crash."

"No problem. Sit down for a bite and then we'll take you home, yeah?"

She took a seat at the scratched-up wooden table. "You wanna drown me in debt or something?"

Remi grinned, half-shrugging. "Not necessarily. But you never know when a favor from a smart girl like you might come in handy."

"How do you know I'm smart?"

"Well, let's see." He piled the bacon onto a plate, then cracked a few eggs in the sizzling frying pan. "You started blabbering in like three or four languages while drunk. I thought it was just gibberish, but some Austrian guy at the bar said you were speaking perfect German, muttering words in Dutch and then there was another language he couldn't understand. You went on in it for some time, sounded really fluent, too."

Ingrid winced. "That was probably my native Romanian."

"Romania! Where is that?"

"Europe."

"No shit, Sherlock. Where in Europe?"

"Uh... east of Hungary, south of Ukraine, north of Bulgaria."

"So... that's like, what, eastern Europe?"

"Pretty much. Bit on the central side. Depends on who you're asking."

"So what's Romanian like? As a language, I mean. Is it similar to Russian?"

"Uh, no. It's a hodgepodge of influences, really, with a Latin base, like Spanish and Italian. But historically, you know, there's been lots of movement in the region, so the language borrowed bits and pieces from various others."

Remi brought the plates of eggs and bacon to the table. "See, what did I say? Smart. Keep talkin', baby."

"Well... did you know New York was actually New Amsterdam first?"

*

December, 2017

The Brennan siblings slept in late, so Edgar and Ingrid slipped out quietly by themselves to go to the pool. They took the car, with Edgar driving. It gave Ingrid some serious road-trip vibes, which made her tingle all over from the intensity of the Amsterdam reminiscences.

She found it quite hard to believe that nearly half a year had passed and summer had turned into winter. It felt like it had all happened forever ago. Her canal-side breakdown and little dip in the water paled in comparison to what she'd been through since.

"See you in a bit," Edgar said as they went their separate ways towards the changing rooms.

They reunited poolside, Ingrid decked out in a full-body swimsuit and Edgar donning a pair of knee-long swimming trunks.

"There's a free lane over there." He pointed to the other side of the pool. "Shall we?"

"Sure."

They walked together to the lane in question. Did some stretching before they plunged in. She let Edgar go ahead and when he reached the middle of the pool, she took a deep breath and dived in headfirst.

The chlorinated water was lukewarm. It swallowed her senses, suspending her body as if in a timeless womb. She floated, even though she wasn't high. The liquid felt dense and heavy as her arms and legs sliced through it.

Water.

To her, it meant death.

As a child, an angry, overflown river had almost claimed the secret shame and disgrace she'd had to live with after her lewd grandfather had first touched her in places no one else ever had and made her feel things she hadn't known what to make of.

As a teenager in Amsterdam, after a monster had ripped her autonomy from her, stolen her confidence and control, shame had crept back up alongside the much-wonted humiliation and nearly pushed her into a muddied canal.

As a wife in her early twenties, the Hudson had taken her cruel husband away, setting her onto a tentative course of wobbly freedom, which, to this day, she was still learning how to navigate.

Wherever she went, death seemed to be following closely behind. Had she thought she'd outrun it? Maybe she'd avoided it too long. Maybe thirty was too late, maybe now was the perfect fucking time.

Ingrid suddenly forgot how to breathe. She clutched at straws underwater, unable to resurface or swim ashore. The light dwindled through the ripples above her. Bubbles escaped from her clogged throat. Her vision faded around the corners...

Then a powerful arm hooked around her waist and her head came up for air again. She sucked in big gulps, as if oxygen could dry out at any second. Then her senses came tumbling back and she had solid ground under her body again.

"Ingrid!"

A familiar voice flowed distorted into her ears.

"Ingrid!"

She gasped for breath, feeling her lungs burn with every inhale and exhale. She blinked until her view cleared. Edgar's worried face hovered above her eyes.

"Thank God... Are you okay? What just happened?"

He helped her up in a sitting position. Ingrid hugged herself, shivering uncontrollably. He draped a towel over her shoulders as he rubbed her arms to get her blood running warm again.

Death had gripped her heart and its touch froze her veins, spreading the cold into her very bones.

*

They settled in the living room for a film after lunch, with Ingrid lying between Cait and Cillian and Edgar stretched beside his daughter at one end of the sofa. Each cradled a mug of spiced mulled wine, watching Die Hard, one of the few Christmas movies Ingrid tolerated.

"Why are we letting you drink and watch R-rated movies?" she jokingly asked Cillian.

He rolled his eyes and they exchanged a complicit look, memories from that Barcelona weekend vivid on both their minds.

"I'm sixteen now, okay?" he retorted.

"Really? When did that happen?"

"Just last month. Jeez, Ingrid, won't you turn on your birthday notifications?"

"Sorry, pal, I was swamped. And like hell am I gonna do that. I'd get senseless clutter on my screen every damn day. Ain't nobody got time for that."

"When's your birthday?"

"July seventh. Why," she wiggled her eyebrows, "are you gonna get me a present?"

He typed something on his phone that Ingrid couldn't see.

"Maybe," he said cryptically.

"Hey, pipe down over there, will you?" Edgar called out. "Some of us are trying to watch the movie."

"Oh, shut up," Ingrid bit back, "haven't you seen this at the cinema already?"

Brother and sister snickered simultaneously.

"Watch your math, young lady. I'm not that old."

Ingrid allowed herself to relax. The wine was working wonders and she felt safe, surrounded by people who cared about her. Death and darkness couldn't reach her here. Instead, comfortable warmth enveloped her, like the heat of a fire radiating from a hearth. She tuned out the noises of the graphic violence unfolding onscreen, heard them clatter in the distance as she eventually drifted off into a dreamless slumber.

*

song of the chapter: formula apei by carla's dreams

https://youtu.be/od3GE_TO9Cs