Page 10 of Drenched

The creak of the lab door opening pulled me from my thoughts, and I looked up to see Tanya entering. Just like yesterday, she was the picture of calm composure. But her face was hard, her eyes assessing me with an intensity that made my skin crawl.

“Pearl,” she said in a steady tone. “I need a word. Outside.”

I hesitated, sensing that this was no mere request. Pulling off my gloves, I followed her into the crisp morning air. The village was quiet, the stillness broken only by the distant crash of waves.

“What happened last night,” she began, as we walked past the inn. “I want to clarify. Amanda has... episodes. She's unwell. Mentally unstable. She has, what do you call it.. Ahh.. schizophrenia.”

I frowned at how easily she declared Amanda’s whole episode as ‘schizophrenia’. “That didn't look like schizophrenia. That looked like something else entirely.”

Tanya stopped walking and turned to face me. Suddenly her eyes narrowed and her jaw tightened, clearly she didn’t like what I just said. “I'm telling you what you need to know. Amanda is sick. She's been this way for years. She isn't dangerous. She just needs care.”

I stared at her, I knew in my gut that there was more to this story. Something about the way her gaze pressed on me and the tightness in her mouth - it all felt wrong. Before I could press her further, she nodded toward the path ahead. “I want to show you something.”

We walked in silence, side by side. The path wound past the village and toward the cliffs, where the ground was rocky and uneven. At the top of a small rise, Tanya stopped. Ahead of us was a graveyard, tucked into the hillside - a simple collection of weathered stones, some marked with carvings, others bare.

Tanya walked forward, her boots crunching on the frost-covered grass, and stopped at two side-by-side graves. My breath caught in my throat as I saw the names etched into the stones.

DIANA HART and PETER HART.

“What is this?” I whispered, more to myself than her.

Tanya turned to me, her face softened by something I couldn't quite place - perhaps sympathy, or maybe regret. “You look like your mother,” she said. “I recognized you the moment you told me your name.”

I blinked, my throat tightening. “My parents?”

She nodded. “They came here years ago. For the algae, just like you.” She gestured to the graves. “But they couldn't survive the waters. It took weeks for their bodies to come ashore.”

It was too much. I thought they were never found. That’s what we were told. If their bodies were found, why weren’t they sent to us? I could’ve seen them one last time. I wanted to ask Tanya, but I didn’t have the courage. Something inside me was breaking, like I was finally getting closure.

Tears stung my eyes as I knelt by the graves, my trembling hands tracing the grooves of my mother's name. “I'm sorry,” I muttered, not sure who the apology was for,them, myself, or the impossible weight of the choices ahead.

Tanya stood a few steps away and when I looked back at her, her eyes softened, but only slightly.

“I've shown you their resting place,” she spoke as she turned to leave. “Now find it in your heart to let us rest. Take your team and leave, Pearl.”

She left me there, alone between two stones that now felt heavier than I could bear.

The walk back from the graveyard was colder than I remembered, or perhaps it was just me, feeling the kind of chill that doesn't come from the weather. My parents. Here. Buried in a place I barely knew, their names carved into stones older than my memories of them.

By the time I reached the inn, my throat felt tight, and my chest ached like it was carrying too much. Instead of going to my room, I found myself standing outside Kim's door, staring at the light seeping out from under it. I needed someone to talk to, so I knocked softly.

The door opened a crack, and Kim's face appeared, framed by loose strands of hair that had slipped from her ponytail. Her inquisitive eyes softened as she saw me. “Pearl? What's wrong?”

I stepped inside without a word. The warmth of her room hit me immediately, the faint scent of eucalyptus tea lingering in the air. For a moment, I just stood there, trying to figure out how to say it.

“I found their graves,” I finally blurted out. My voice wavered, and the words felt like jagged glass in my throat.

Kim's brow furrowed as she stepped closer. “Whose graves?”

“My parents,” I whispered. “Tanya showed me... she said they came here for the algae too. And that the ocean... the ocean took them.” The words tumbled out faster now, as if saying it quickly would hurt less. It didn't.

Kim's mouth opened slightly, but no words came out. Her expression shifted from confusion to shock, then to something softer. Her arms wrapped around me, pulling me into a tight hug before I could fall apart completely.

“Oh, Pearl,” she murmured into my hair. “I'm so sorry.”

The warmth of her embrace broke something loose in me, and a choked sob escaped my throat. “I didn't even know what to say,” I admitted, clutching the fabric of her shirt. “I didn't know how to feel. They died here, Kim. They died because of this place, and now I'm here, doing the same thing they were.”

Kim pulled back just enough to look at me, her hands gripping my shoulders. Her eyes were glassy now, her lips pressed into a thin line. “You're not doing the same thing,” she said firmly.“You're not. You're here to figure this out. To make sense of all of it.”

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