Innocence by Liezl Bustillos (freenovel24 txt) 📖

“Did you know that people live because they have to know their purpose?”

Dmitry sat next to me under the old Acacia tree. It was one of those trees at the back of the orphanage. There were no spectacles to see, but it was the shadiest.  “This is my spot.” Although there was sadness in his eyes, still he smiled. “Sister Cecilia has guests. He’s back, and he brought his son with him. I heard from Anthony that the old man is a detective. He looks kind and weak, but his body says otherwise. He could be a good father.” He looked at the eleven year old me with his green eyes that almost resembled mine and said, “When I was your age, I’ve always wanted to be a detective. I wanted to prove my father’s innocence and take him out of the prison. He was the only one I have, but they took him. I was hungry for truth and that hunger molded my mind into a dream. Soon I realized that dreams can change due to circumstances and needs. Oh, how quickly life could change and living here for decades made me accept things I never did before. It changed my mind.” He touched my head like how Father Emmanuel always did. His hand was as warm as steaming milk during those very cold winter nights. “For the first time since I came here, I was wrong to think our orphanage would never have visitors. Give yourself a second chance. I think if Father Em’s here, he’d tell you the same.”

“I never thought you can give quite a preach.” Helen chuckled as she butted in, clutching the side of the tree. “Tell me what happens if you never learned your purpose?”

“Helen! I didn’t see you coming.” He gave a sigh as he continued. “Well, it means two things. One, may be because you keep changing the path towards that purpose. You were not contented, and chose the longer process. Or maybe you keep denying yourself to that purpose thinking it is not what you wanted.”

She looked dazed, but uninterested. ”What about the other reason?”

He cleared his throat and paused for a while. “May be you are not destined to know it from the beginning. You were close, but there was interference.”

Helen gaped. “Destined?”

“Accident. Murder. Suicide.”

“Okay, that’s creepy for a deacon to say. I didn’t know you believe in destiny or something. Anyways, Sister Cecilia wants to see you.”

He looked at his watch and cackled. He took a deep breath and said as he stood up, “The ball is in your court, Sammy.” I had no idea why he said those things; his past and his dream. Destiny. Innocence.

Helen looked at me in aversion. “I’m sure they’ll love to have you in their family, Helen.” I said in all tenderness I could. It was her who always wanted to have a new family, dreaming good life full of trinket and maybe hunky-dories. This could be her chance.

“Who would want a grand mal?” her voice cracked. “Stop adding an insult to an injury.” Her voice suddenly tensed, giving an obvious unexpected surge of disagreement. “Follow your greed, and let the people see your swinishness. Let them see the rotten bottled up inside you. I’ll be glad to see your back. Nobody needs loose cannon here.”

Sharp tongue, harsh words. I was the only one she treated that way. I didn’t know what made a chip in her shoulder that must have caused her growing hate of me. I was thinking about what she said, until I realized Akito was standing right in front of me. Reaching for my hand.

A dream. A loud whack woke me. The curtain danced as cold air swept into the room. Jitters crept at the thought of last night. Was it a dream too? I started to think seeing those had become a ritual. There was a man. I ran to him and I couldn’t remember anything after that. Akira? Before I realized it, I was looking at my supposedly lost eyeglass near the corner of the table.

I jumped and ran towards the door calling Akira’s name, thinking he must be home. He was sitting on stairs, hands on his head as if he was having a headache.

“I thought you’ll sleep at the office. You… you scared me last night. Did you forget the keys?”

“What are you talking about?” he said in a monotone.

Akito’s room was open. Papers and folders flooded the bed and the floor. For someone as organized as him, it was the first time I saw his room jumbled.

“You went in from my room. I can’t believe you could climb those walls. I mean, you’re like--”

“I just got home.”

That left me speechless, I froze. Seeing things I couldn’t explain made me believe in ghosts. My fingers trembled, adrenaline rush fading as my pulse throbbed in my skull. I felt it-- that person’s warmth, his breathing, and his strong arms that encircled me. Was that a dream then? What about my glasses? Why is that in my room? I thought I lost that in Tasuki’s place…

Akira was not moving from his position. There must be something wrong. He would usually tease me, flick my head or wag my hair. “What’s wrong? What happened?” I asked.

He took a deep breath and exhaled miserably, then silence. Every sound was resonating; the ticking of clock, the beating of my chest. What he said next was even more… more… I couldn’t find the right words.

“Dad’s dead.”

I couldn’t respond to that that my mouth remained open. My body just died. I didn’t know what to do. Is this the right feeling? The right response when you lost someone? A bullet through the heart. I stared at Akira’s broad back. Suddenly, he was very far, I couldn’t reach him. Like we’re oceans apart. His loneliness, I couldn’t imagine its depth.

Akira left that morning.

It was the first time the house felt empty. The person who gave me my second chance, he’s gone. Forever.

Akira must be planning to burn the documents in Akito’s room. Newspaper articles about his mother and sister’s death, clippings, pictures, and lots of pages with ‘Top Secret’ stamped on it. Was he looking for something? If yes, then what was he trying to find in a bunch of papers with words that seemed all Greek to me? I would never know. He did not mention anything about his work life before. Even Akito never did.

I sat on the floor gathering my thoughts. Until I cried for the first time. 

I remembered the last time I saw Akito, he was asking me to call him ‘dad’. Whenever I did, there was a tingling feeling, a feeling of longing for someone to call ‘dad’ and the feeling of finally having one. It was a nice feeling and embarrassing at the same time. Akito would tease how my face would become so red. His voice on the phone, calm and lively as usual last night, I never thought that would be the last time.

There was a blinking red light below the escritoire that you wouldn’t notice unless you are lying on the floor. Tears blurred my vision, so I stared at it for almost a minute and finally went to it. It was an old phone, almost low in battery. No calls, no messages. And an envelope with a note saying ‘Friday, 5pm Ground Zero’.

Inside the envelope were unclear green and black pictures, may be captured from an old CCTV, with red markers encircling a man’s face. All Friday but different times and dates stamped on the photos.

Friday. Not sure if the note was weeks or days old. Or if it was referring to this coming Friday. I started researching on Ground Zero but found nothing noteworthy. I didn’t know what this was to Akito. Or if he already met the person who wrote this, or if he even knew the person in flesh.

The funeral was all tears and black. Friends and colleagues of Akito came, it was just heartbreaking. I was waiting for grandma and Uncle Natsume but they didn’t come. Maybe Akira didn’t tell them? I just sat there with Akira as he struggled to fight grief. I felt the emptiness in him as he stared quietly to his father’s picture. A picture so lively and a frozen smile. There were exhaling sobs and jerking gasps on the background. The lump in my throat kept growing. My nose ran and tears trickled down my cheeks. I tasted salt. I held Akira’s hand and felt the cold. I squeezed him and he squeezed back. He inhaled and a heavy sigh got out from his lips as he closed his eyes hoping it was all just a dream.

***

Detective George Yan took a sip in his coffee as he walked towards us in the café nearby our neighborhood. He was a long time friend and partner in crime of Akito. It was almost a year since I last saw him in Akira’s mother and sister’s death anniversary. There were rumors that he was actually ‘in to hiding’. Akira said he had been taking the cases Akito thought as nonsensical and laughable. He was a very nice and humorous person. Akira usually called him Uncle Gin.

Seven years ago, on the day when he learned Akito resigned as a police officer, he seceded the next day. They were like brothers.

“Do you drink coffee, Sammy?” I shook my head. “Your father must be somewhere dribbling right now. He loved coffee so much; he wanted it dark and bitter. T’was like water to him. Like those cases he loved handling- the darker and vicious it is the better. ”

“What about you, uncle? I’ve never seen you in forever. Some said you were running away from something. Women? Debts?” I joked.

He hee-hawed. “You two must’ve missed me. I was with your father for months tackling something in that region.” He dropped his voice to a whisper. “Region 56.” Akira’s head fell from sleeping; he was exhausted considering the funeral and at the same time his work. Uncle asked him to go home first and so he left. “Rumors are spread like wildfire, but it doesn’t carry much of everything.” He continued. “Just a part of that ‘everything’.”

“Uncle,” I said. Uncle George looked up as he turned a page of his newspaper. His eye bags appeared darker and heftier; it was like looking at a forty-six years old man in his sixties. “I didn’t know you two were going out of the country. And why at 56? Did you see Father Gab and the others?” He shook his head and cleared his throat. “What happened? How did father--”

“Your brother has a good reason for not telling you anything about it.”

“He’s being unreasonable. I need to know too.” I admonished.

He took a few long sighs, running a hand over his cinereal streaked scruffy beard. “You have a point and I know that. Of course he knows that too. Sad stories are meant to be told slowly, not in haste. You know that better than any of us.”

“Is it accident, really?” I asked, trying to connect it to the dream (yes, a memory) I had with Dmitry, and what he said about purpose and that second reason. After all, it was untimely. “Just what ifs.”  

“It is.” He remarked without hesitation. He seemed sure. “They were talking about it in the office. It was raining that day, and on the way here the car slipped.” Scratching his temple wistfully. “He was careless. He was a very adventurous person; I