At last ‘A life’
By Julie D Cole
Chapter 33 Revisit the Memory Book

I turned the pages slowly looking at black and white photos of mum and Aunt Judith as small children with Aunt Judith in Grans arms and Granddad holding mums hand. It was a nice family photo and then there were some professional photos taken in a studio with some photos of Aunt Judith as a small girl. She was very pretty with long dark hair.

As I turned more pages most photos were of Aunt Judith as she was growing up with different hair styles and at times she looked quite boyish. She seemed to wear trousers a lot and I could recall some school photos of mine where we could easily be mistaken for brother and sister or even for each other.

By the time she was at sixth form college her hairstyle became darker in colour and longer to her shoulders. She sometimes wore it straight and sometimes it was curled.
Then I found the most beautiful close up photograph of her with hardly any make up at all and with her hair tied in a pony tail.

She had no blemishes and was smiling and her teeth were so perfect and her lips full that I wanted to kiss her. I wished that I’d met her and tears started to roll down my cheeks. I had to take care not to let them fall onto the page.

I wanted a copy of the photo so that I could have it enlarged and professionally mounted. I wondered if there was a copy in her bedroom so I hoped that we could take a look.
There were lots of cuttings from local newspaper showing that Aunt Judith had won prizes and played hockey for the school team. Also school reports and awards for good work.
She’d been a bridesmaid and stole the photograph.

Then pages with records of her success at University and photos of her graduation day.
Towards the back was a letter from Gran.

‘To My Darling Judy
I awoke so early at the dawn of this sad new day,
Hoping the nightmare would just go away,
But my tears started flowing, as they did the night before,
Why did I argue and upset you? What was this for?
I Don’t think I can face another broken day,
I hate the reality that you were taken away,
It's just not fair that this has happened to us,
And I’m sorry we argued and you lost my trust,
So I look to the heavens and I asked God "Why"?
Why in the world would a child have to die?
I didn't get an answer that day or the next,
And, I guess looking back; the reason is too complex,
I can never accept that you’ve really gone,
As long as I’m breathing your spirit will live on,
I’m sorry I rejected you I should have accepted you both,
Two souls inside one body, two spirits and one host.’

I turned to the next page but some photos had been removed and then after that were some family photos with mum and Granddad and a photo of mum and I.

Mum came into the room and I flicked back to the poem and asked her what it meant.
She stroked my hair and said that Gran and mum had argued the day that Aunt Judith was killed in the crash and Aunt Judith had stormed out of the house to meet me.

‘But mum what does this mean? ‘Two souls inside one body, two spirits and one host’.

‘Chrissy dear your Aunt Judith had an affair with someone and was 6 months pregnant and had returned home to tell Gran and Granddad. They’d argued with her and said that she’d ruined her life.’.

‘But mum if Aunt Judith was killed did the baby die too?’

‘No Chrissy Aunt Judith died on the operating table but the surgeons managed to save the baby’s life. He was a beautiful little boy who was sadly rejected by Gran and Granddad tried his best to get Gran to accept him but she seemed to blank out everything from her mind and just couldn’t accept that Judith had an affair and came home pregnant.’

‘But mum what happened to the little boy?’

‘His father took him’

To be continued …………