She left with the jar.
When she came back, she handed me and Cora what looked like transparent glass rocks—one for each of us. Encased within each were two long twisted hairs.
Paloma said, “My gift to both of you: relics to mark the connection between your generation and future generations.” To me, she said, “Two hairs from your sister’s head.” To Cora, she said, “Two hairs from your deceased twin’s head. Does she have a name?”
Cora said, “I had been torn between two names for Jade: Jade or Sapphire. I had a twin sister named Crystal whose death was extremely traumatic for me. I wanted to give my child a gem name, like hers. In memory of my sister. Jade’s twin should be named Sapphire.”
I thought of Max Davenport, my hoarder client. Death and loss devastate us all. We’re all hoarders deep down, tucking away artifacts to remind us of the people we’ve been close to and the people we’ve loved. My biological mother had named me after the twin sister she’d lost. I was in a way a walking, talking, breathing artifact from an earlier time in her life. I clutched the relic in my hand. Sapphire was a bridge between my past and my future. She was a bridge between the past and future of the entire human race.
I pictured a long line of people waiting to see the glass rock in my hand, long after I had died and left it behind. All the people had green skin. A metal plaque on the front of a clear box containing the stone said:
Relic of Sapphire Frost. To Cora Frost and her twin daughters, Sapphire and Jade, we owe the continued survival of the human race.
I learned something that day. You never know where you’ll find family. Sometimes it’s in the strangest place.
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Copyright
The Other
© Copyright, 2017, Marilyn Peake
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the author.
Book Cover Art by Tom Edwards:
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About the Author
USA TODAY Bestselling Author Marilyn Peake writes in a variety of genres, mostly Science Fiction and Fantasy. She’s one of the contributing authors in Book: The Sequel, published by The Perseus Books Group, with one of her entries included in serialization at The Daily Beast. In addition, Marilyn has served as Editor of a number of anthologies. Her short stories have been published in seven anthologies and on the literary blog, Glass Cases.
AWARDS: Silver Award, two Honorable Mentions and eight Finalist placements in the ForeWord Magazine Book of the Year Awards, two Winner and two Finalist placements in the EPPIE Awards, Winner of the Dream Realm Awards, Finalist placement in the 2015 National Indie Excellence Book Awards, and Winner of “Best Horror” in the eFestival of Words Best of the Independent eBook Awards.
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