Winter Bakery

23. Cousin

Jigi locked up the apartment and began to walk down the corridor. Fumiko had earlier rushed off to her lectures.

Jigi was in a sorrowful state. She practically dragged herself out of bed. She woke up with a headache worse than a hangover. She barely had any sleep with all the anticipation.

"My oh my. What do we have here? Are you alright, dear? Where are you of to?" A voice came from behind. Jigi turned her neck in that direction. She noticed Miss Mary-Lou coming from the other end of the corridor.

She was not in the mood for Miss Mary-Lou's antics. She sighed and placed a pretentious smile on her face, trying to be polite.

"I'm alright. I have somewhere to be." Jigi proclaimed and began to walk away. She did not wait around for a response and resumed her path.

She noticed the Dachshund run past her towards her owner but Jigi looked onwards.
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Fifteen years ago

Jigi skipped on the lawns. Her mother had no clue what going through the head of her child. She puffed out a smoke from her husband's cigarette. The thought of him made her hollow. She didn't know how to feel. She was simply emotionless. She huffed the last smoke and threw the bud onto the floor.

"Jigi, entre à l'intérieur" Her mother called out to her. It was never a good thing when she called her that way, She thought.

"Maman, Où est papa? He was supposed to come back Hier." Jigi stated. It was in the early hours of the morning. Jigi and her mother had driven the entire morning. Now, they were at her uncle's house. Jigi was perplexed about that fact.

"Maman! Maman!" Jigi tried to grab her mom's attention as she grabbed her away. Jigi felt a sharp pain in her wrist and she shrieked.

"Maman, tu me fais mal." Jigi released her mistake and become quite.

"Claudine, my condolences." Jigi had a raspy yet familiar voice, her uncle Divine. He stood there tall and regal, he always had a regal and arrogant aura.

"I should be saying the same to you." She smiled but her eyes didn't. Jigi felt like there was something off. Her mother never spoke to her uncle neither did her father. She imagined what was happening. Jigi mentally shrugged. Her line of sight landed on someone and a grin appeared on her face.

She hurried towards him, and he stared at her as if she had two heads. "Jigi, why are you grinning like a Cheshire Cat?" He asked. Jigi just continued to grin whilst their parents ushered them in a car.

"I'm happy to see you. Je ne le fais pas d'habitude." Jigi responded.

"I feel the same way, but I was expecting to see you in a hot mess of tears." He told her.

"Do you always like to see me miserable?" Jigi playfully responded. Jigi had always adored her cousin Cole. He was an exact replica of her yet her opposite. One of the them was a nuisance and a endeavour but the both of them were a force to reckon with. The ultimate nuisance.

"Donc tu n'es pas du tout triste?" He probed. The look on his face was that of utter confusion that even Jigi began to wonder whether there were both talking about the same thing.

They parked near a convenient store, then proceed to walk.

"Of course. Je suis excité. My father is coming back and you're here. What's the occasion? You're not the one for riddles. " She said with a massive grin.

"You don't know do you." He said with pity.

"I don't know what." She asked from frustration of being left in the dark.

" Ton père, il-il-il est mort."  He announced.

Jigi stop died in her tracks. She burst out laughing.

"That's the worst joke you even told." Cole was pitiful watching her. He did not utter a word. He did not know how to respond or how to spell the truth, to make her realise her reality.

Two minutes after Jigi's laughter died down, she wiped the tears in the corners of her eyes. A product of her extensive laughter.

"That was so good. Come on." Jigi gestured.

"That wasn't a joke, petite fleur." He responded and in guffawed Jigi in a hug. Jigi stood there as he hugged her tightly, she was paralysed by the thought of it being true. She was not returning Cole's hug.

Cole took her hand but Jigi stood there. She observed her mother, her uncle, her cousin, her surroundings, the attire and she finally saw it a coffin.

Jigi took off in a sprint. Cole, her mother and her uncle called out her name, yelling for her to come back. She was suffocating. She was hyperventilating of the mere thought of her father dying. He could not die, at least not yet. She refused to believe so.

She run until she available at her favourite swing. The place her father brought her to every weekend. She sat on one of the swings and began to sway herself bringing the movement to a swing.

She didn't remember how long she sat there nor does she remember how long it took for her mother to find her. She stared at her bruised wrist. She tried pinching it to feel anything at least pain but she felt nothing. Nothing at all.

Her mother was too worried to push her of her 'little stunt'. Cole tried to speak with her get her to say a word, but she said nothing. The funeral to place on a windy Saturday afternoon, a week after  Jigi's 'stunt'. The thought of her father's brown coffin being lowered caused her to hyperventilate, she soon found a bit of solace in reciting the alphabet song.

That was the last time Jigi saw Cole. He was like her big brother, and he still is. Months after that, Jigi still wondered around like a empty shell. She saw the coffin being lowered yet still refused to accept her father's death. Jigi and her mother, Claudine, moved to the United States six months later, and she was eight.

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