A Confrontation with the Past
In the dream, Ivy Mae found herself back in the old house where she had raised Liam and Luke, only it was different. The walls were worn and faded, the furniture broken and covered with dust. The sound of a creaking door echoed through the empty house. She felt a chill in the air, the kind of chill that settled deep into her bones.
“Mom,” a voice called, familiar and full of pain.
Ivy Mae turned and saw her son, Luke. He stood in the doorway, his eyes hollow and tired, his face lined with an age that didn’t belong to him. He was still a child, yet there was a profound sadness in his eyes, as though the weight of all his suffering was too much to bear.
“Luke,” Ivy Mae whispered, reaching out to him. “I’m so sorry. I never knew how bad it was. I didn’t know how to help you.”
Luke’s face crumpled with the weight of those words, and he stepped back. “You couldn’t, Mom. I was already lost by the time you found out.”
Ivy Mae took a step forward, her heart breaking. “But I should’ve seen it. I should’ve known.”
Before she could reach him, the dream shifted, and Ivy Mae was no longer in the house. She was standing at the edge of a cliff, overlooking a vast, turbulent sea. The wind whipped her hair, and the waves crashed violently against the rocks below.
She turned, and there, standing in the distance, was Liam. He was older now, his face gaunt and hollowed, the remnants of his addiction still evident in the lines of his face.
“Liam,” Ivy Mae cried, her voice cracking. “Why didn’t you come to me? Why didn’t you let me help you?”
Liam’s eyes flickered with the pain of his own guilt. “I couldn’t, Mom. I couldn’t face you. I couldn’t face myself.”
The sea behind them began to rise, and a great flood surged toward them. It was as if everything was being washed away. Ivy Mae reached out, desperate to hold on to him, but before she could touch him, Liam was swallowed by the waves.
Then, the dream shifted again. Ivy Mae was in a dark, cold street, standing beneath the harsh lights of a streetlamp. She looked up and saw Crystal standing at the end of the road, looking back at her. But the woman before her was not the Crystal she had known. She was a shadow, a figure that seemed to flicker in and out of existence.
“Crystal, where are you?” Ivy Mae cried out, her voice strained. “Why did you leave? What happened to you?”
But Crystal did not answer. She only stared, her face blank, as the wind howled louder.
Then, Ivy Mae heard Jas’s voice, sharp and clear, cutting through the storm.
“Mom, don’t forget about me!”
Ivy Mae turned to see Jas standing beside her, looking older, more distant, and more lost than she had ever seen him before. The world seemed to shift again, and Ivy Mae felt herself falling into a vast emptiness, the ground beneath her feet disappearing.
The scene blurred, and suddenly, she was alone in the darkness. She could hear her sons' voices—Luke’s, Liam’s, even Crystal’s—echoing in her mind, and she was left with nothing but the suffocating weight of their absence.