Poor Aurelius. He was so very weary. He hardly seemed to notice as I slipped my arm through his. But theuro face me fully. 「Perhaps it』s better not to have a story at all, rather than have ohat keeps ging. I have spent my whole life chasing after my story and never quite catg it. Running after my story when I had Mrs. Love all along. She loved me, you know.」
『I never doubted it.「 She had been a good mother to him. Better thaher of the twins could have been. 」Perhaps it』s better not to know,「 I suggested.
He looked from the gravestoo the white sky. 「Do you think so?」
『No.「
『Then why suggest it?「
I slid my arm from his and tucked my cold hands uhe arms of my coat. 「It』s what my mother would say. She thinks a weightless story is better thahat』s too heavy.」
『So. My story is a heavy one.「
I said nothing, and when the silence grew long, I told him not his story but my own.
『I had a sister,「 I began. 」A twin.「
He turo face me. His shoulders were solid and wide against the sky and he listened gravely to the story I poured out to him.
『We were joined. Here—「 and I brushed my hand down my left side. 」She couldn』t live without me. She needed my heart to beat for her. But I couldn』t live with her. She was draining my strength. They separated us, and she died.「
My other hand joihe first over my scar, and I pressed hard.
『My mother old me. She thought it was better for me not to know.「
『A weightless story.「
『Yes.「
『But you do know.「
I pressed harder. 「I found out by act.」
『I am sorry,「 he said.
I felt my hands taken by his, and he enclosed both of them into one great fist. Then, with his other arm, he drew me to him. Through layers of coats I felt the softness of his belly, and a rush of noise came to my ear. It is the beating of his heart, I thought. A huma. By my side. So this is what it』s like. I listened.
Then we dreart.
『And is it better to know?「 he asked me.
『I 』t tell you. But once you know, it』s impossible to go back.「
『And you know my story.「
『Yes.「
『My true story.「
『Yes.「
He barely hesitated. Just took a breath and seemed to grow a little bigger.
『You had better tell me, then,「 he said.
I told. And while I told we walked, and when I fielling we were standing at the place where the snowdrops were pointing through he whiteness of the snow.
With the casket in his hands, Aurelius hesitated. 「I have a feeling this is against the rules.」
I thought it was, too. 「But what else we do?」
『The rules don』t work for this case, do they?「
『Nothing else would be right.「
『e on, then.「
We used the cake ko gouge a hollow in the frozeh above the coffin of the woman I knew as Emmeline. Aurelius tipped the ashes on it, and we replaced the earth to cover them. Aurelius pressed down with all his weight, and then we rearrahe flowers to hide the disturbance.
『It will level out with the melting of the snow,「 he said. And he brushed the snow from his trs.
『Aurelius, there is more to your story.「
I led him to another part of the churchyard. 「You know about your mother now. But you had a father, too.」 I indicated Ambrose』s gravestone.
The A and the S on the piece of paper you showed me. It was his name. His bag, too. It was used for carrying game. That explains the feather.「
I paused. It was a lot for Aurelius to take in. When after a