My Sister's Keeper: Chapter seven [NaNoWriMo]

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This is the fourth installment in my NaNoWriMo challenge: My Sister's Keeper. Thank you to those who have been reading along, voting, and especially leaving comments - I greatly appreciate them. With this upload the story now totals approximately 8800 words. I have written more than that, but trying to upload it in easier to handle chunks!

Chapters One and Two (Part One)
Chapters Three and Four (Part Two)
Chapters Five and Six (Part Three)

CHAPTER SEVEN

Jelena sat and stared at the piece of paper in front her. So many names, she thought. So many abandoned children. What future could there possibly be for all these children without adults to love and guide them? Yet what hope for humanity, she thought, if we have created a generation of lost and lonely children. She read through the names to herself quietly. How many of these would get chosen, she wondered.

She turned her chair to look out the window. Five floors up, her office was overlooking the vast sprawl of the refugee camp that stretched out to the horizon. New people had been arriving for days now, the survivors from the recent battles for control of the vast interior. They all made their way here. To the camps, to the coast. Some braved the oceans out past these lands, to seek for greener pastures elsewhere. But most people knew the truth now – there were no greener pastures elsewhere. The apocalypse it seems had been visited upon the Earth and all her peoples were being punished. Every single soul on this planet suffers, she thought. Even I here in my office tower, in the comfort of a government job in this protected enclave, have been asked to carry my share of life's burdens. No one escapes.

Jelena needed to organise a visit with all the children named on the list. Each of them would need to be spoken with. Who were they? Where were they from? Did they have any surviving relatives? Heartbreak had become a regular part of Jelena's job. But it had become a part of everyone's life now that the war had spread to all parts of the world. Where does one find peace, in a peace-less land? She wished she knew the answer. How does one share peace when there is none left to give? Jelena feared for the future, and sat despondently wondering if she had anything left to live for.

There was a knock on her office door. “Come in, it's unlocked.”

Kieran, one of her fellow Psychologists entered. “I wasn't sure if you'd be in today. How are you coping?”

Jelena and Kieran had worked together at the refugee camp for almost twelve months now. It seemed like such a long time ago she thought. So much had taken place since those early days. There was only a small settlement starting to be cobbled together then; the early refugees who had feared the worse when the fighting first started. They got out when they could. The trip to the coast wasn't such a treacherous one back then. Now so many taking that same route don't survive it. The brutality of it upset Jelena. But that was why she was here, to help these people heal. To help erase the results of that brutality. But it wasn't working, and Jelena felt her apathy growing by the day.

“I'll be okay. I didn't want to be alone with my thoughts. I felt that work was the best place for me,” Jelena replied.

“Perhaps that's so. Or perhaps you'll just find your thoughts follow you here.” Kieran watched Jelena. He knew she was trying to bury her pain in a mountain of work. To hide it behind other people's pain. And where could you find more pain and misery than in a refugee camp. But Jelena's ordeal was important too, after all she has just been through, he thought.

“Don't try your psych voodoo on me now,” she replied, in jest, hoping to change the subject. She appreciated Kieran and his concern, but she just couldn't talk about what she had been through over the last few days. Not yet. She hoped she could heal the hurt - the empty feeling inside – but it just wasn't happening. She felt the grief rise up within her, and suppressed it with all the strength she had. Don't let him see you cry she told herself.

Kieran looked at her intensely. Like he was looking through her. Into her soul. He does that when he doesn't want to verbally express his disagreement, she thought. I know he doesn't approve of me being here. I should be at home, cooped up and feeling sorry for myself. But I can't, it just wont help she reminded herself. Life gave me a gift and life took it away. And now life needs me to accept it. But can I accept it, she wondered.

“Will you be seeing any of the children today?” Kieran asked her.

“I was hoping to talk to a few of them, if I can organise for them to be moved into the meeting room. I'll have to see if it's ready or not. Perhaps I'll take a wander down there shortly.” The camp organisers had all the unaccompanied children housed close to the main office facilities. That made it easier to locate them when necessary. But Jelena still found it a logistical nightmare. There were over three hundred children listed on her form. And there were other's working alongside her. And this is just one day in one week in one long endless march of time, she thought. Just like the long endless march of refugees hoping to find sanctuary.

“Well don't push yourself too hard. There's still time. Next shuttle isn't due to leave for three weeks.” Kieran reminded her. “How long do you think it will take you to process your list?”

Jelena took a quick look at her paperwork, more out of habit than for any other reason. “About a week,” she said.

“Okay well I have some people I need to see shortly. I just wanted to see how you were – I knew you wouldn't be able to stay away.” Kieran exited Jelena's office, closing the door behind him. She sat silently staring out the window. Observing the sky; the intense blue sky that had been locked in place for months now. The intense blue sky that overlooked the Earth, and it's mindless, destructive inhabitants. In her mind she went to places beyond the sky, beyond this world. I wonder if I should finally accept the position on Mars, she asked herself. Now that I have nothing left on Earth to stay for.

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“Is there any chance I can speak to any of these children?” Jelena handed her list to Peter, one of the supervisors for the unaccompanied children. “There's a lot of names on the list and I was hoping to make a start today.”

Peter scanned over the list. “I can organise for a few of these to be with you shortly. While you are speaking with them I will see about arranging a time for the rest of these children. Let me copy this form, I'll be right back.”

Whilst Peter copied the list Jelena looked around, and realised she could see so many new faces. Frightened, confused faces. There was some laughter, some child like play, but not like how it should be. It was all so stifled. They tried to keep things from being overwhelming for them. For all the refugees, but especially the children. But that was near impossible. Even Jelena felt overwhelmed and she at least had the comfort of her apartment to return to each night. She had the possibility of a brighter future, courtesy of her potential job promotion to Mars.

Peter returned with her paperwork and lead her to a spare office to use. “Just wait here, I'll be back in a few minutes,” he informed Jelena, as he went off to find some of the children listed on Jelena's form.

She looked at the form again. She had doodled some notes on it previously, whilst half day dreaming and half organising. One hundred and seventy four girls and one hundred and thirty three boys. And how many of these will they take, she asked herself. The shuttle can carry several thousand. Everyone involved considered the children a priority. They would eventually be adopted out to childless families on Mars. Perhaps it was a chance for happy endings for so many different people. But what about the sad endings? The ones who get left behind. The ones who don't even make it this far. Was this all just down to luck, or was this natural selection at work? she wondered. Is that the force that determined everyone's fate - natural selection? Is that not just another name for God? A God who hides behind the brutal acts of a human race who have lost their way. Jelena remembered as a child when she read that we are “made in the image of God.” Do we also act like him? she wondered.

Peter entered the office, “I could only locate three of the children. I will need some more time to organise some more. Could we organise a time for tomorrow?”

“Of course, let me know what time, and I'll come back then.”

“Make it around eleven,” he told her.

“How many do you think you could organise for me to speak with,” she asked him.

“Hard to say. Perhaps about fourty. Should get through that list in about a week.”

“Thanks Peter. I'll see you tomorrow.” Jelena turned to the three children Peter had left her with. Once she had them all seated she turned to them and asked, “do you all know why you are here?”

They collectively looked apprehensive, although they had started to expect such new and unexpected ordeals as a regular occurrence. One by one they shook their heads.

“It's okay, you have nothing to be frightened of. I'm here to see if I can help you. To see if we can find you a better place to live. A safe place to live. I have to ask you some questions, all you have to do is answer them as best as you can, okay?” The children all nodded to show their understanding. “But first, let me introduce myself. My name is Jelena. I have a form with a lot of names on it here. If you tell me your names, then I can tick you off the list. Why don't we start with you first,” she said, pointing to the little boy seated closest to her.

“My name is Alex,” he told Jelena.

She ran her finger down the list, scanning the names. She reached the end of the list. Did I miss it, she asked herself.

“Do you go by any other names?” she asked him. “Do people also call you any thing else?”

“My real name is Alexander,” he replied. “But I like Alex better.”

“Yes, of course, Alex is a wonderful name.” She did like the name Alex. But she also liked the name Alexander. She checked the list again, and saw it. I must have blanked it out, she thought. Obviously still too raw, despite what I tell myself to the contrary. She looked at Alex, seated in front of her. What was he, perhaps four or five years old? One day my son would have been his age, she thought. May have even looked like him. And he would have been an Alexander. That is the name I had chosen for him. And he would have been born so soon from now; someone for me to love and cherish in this dark world. She thought through the events of the previous week. She had been through her own personal hell, and everywhere it seemed there were reminders of it all. The past confronts us every step we take. It wont let us forget. And she knew that she was never going to be able to forget. Not the love and expectations she felt at the thought of welcoming her son into this world. Nor the shame and loss when he passed away before she ever had the chance to hold him.

“Welcome,” she told Alex, as she wiped a tear away from her cheek. The past won't let us forget, she reminded herself.

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This fiction is my own work, written for Steemit
Image Credit: Pixabay.com and Unsplash.com

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