Dear Tressi [✓]

27

"H-how did you get that?" Tressi asked, shocked, her eyes fixed on the silver jewellery.

"This? From in here obviously," he said, pointing to Edda's wardrobe. "I was trying not to freak out about you being gone. So I thought I'd be productive and find something for you to wear to the party. We didn't exactly pack with a party in mind, so I thought maybe you could wear one of Edda's stuff. And I found this. Looks amazing, doesn't it? The dress matches the locket perfectly." He dangled it in front of her.

"I'm not wearing that, Des. Put it back where you found it. PUT IT BACK!" she screamed and ran up the stairs. She rushed into the room banging the door shut, and lay on the bed shaking.

Within seconds, Des was by her side. "What was that?" he asked, bewildered.

She didn't answer.

"Tress, come on. Why are you acting like this? It's just a dress."

Get it together, she told herself angrily. Hadn't she just resolved to not break down? This wasn't going to work if she broke apart every ten seconds.

She finally sat up and looked at her long suffering husband. He really was an angel. Not many men would've been so patient.

"I'm sorry," she said in a low voice. "I'm a complete mess. I don't know what I'd do without you, Des. But I'm gonna do better." She threw her arms around him, pulling him closer.

He hugged her back tightly and whispered, "It's gonna be okay."

In the spirit of her newfound resolve, she decided that she wasn't going to overlook anything. Yesterday, she'd wanted to see her mother just to antagonise her, but now petty revenge didn't motivate her anymore. It was all about Edda.

They spent the morning brainstorming what they should do first. And Des's idea of searching the house for clues seemed the easiest and the most obvious. Seemed being the key word. Not knowing what they were looking for, put a heavy damper on the progress.

After spending the entire afternoon combing through Edda's and Dala's room—the two places they'd left untouched—they didn't find anything suspicious. Finally, they gave up for the day, for it was time to get ready. Both of them settled on plain T-shirts and jeans.

Now much more desperate than she'd been that morning, Tressi was frantic that they learn something useful at the party.

*

Lapec was an odd little town.

Never had Tressi felt that more than when its habitants were gathered in a social setting. In this instance, a party.

Tressi and Des pulled in their scarlet rented Hyundai, to see the Rothan's usually empty parking lot filled with cars. This didn't seem like a good sign to Tressi, who had a good reason to hate Lapec gatherings. Mainly because, anything that happened here tonight—even the most mundane—would spread like wildfire the next morning. The news of Dala Sakit's sudden engagement and it's subsequent cancellation, had made its way through the entire town in less than a week.

Trying very hard not to think about that, Tressi walked, hand-in-hand with her husband. They walked past the guests gathered in small groups in the lawn and headed for Igna's office.

Igna was swamped with work. She was talking on two phones simultaneously and motioned for them to sit down as she continued arguing.

"No. That is not what I said. I said six o' clock, not nine. It should be right there on your register. I saw your assistant make a note of it. I'm cancelling the order," she spoke into the phone on the left ear, but then immediately switched to the one on the right and said, "No! Not you! I wasn't talking to you, it's another line. I'm not cancelling the cake order. I called to ask when it'll be here."

It didn't look like she was going to be able to talk to Tressi and Des anytime soon. They wondered if they should just go up to Dala's room themselves. They silently got up, and gestured Igna to, 'Please continue.'

As they were about to exit the office, Patty came in carrying a huge mug of tea that she set on Igna's table. Spotting the couple, she cheerfully waved and made her way over to them. "Nice of you to be here for the old lady. Shame she has to go to a loony bin, but when you lose bladder control—"

"Patty!" Igna shrieked, momentarily distracted from her phone calls to stare daggers at her infuriating assistant. Patty didn't know what exactly she'd said wrong, but could see that her boss was pissed. She tried to make her face look contrite and apologetic (but failed miserably) and left the office.

Tressi and Des followed after her. "Um... Patty?" Tressi called, not knowing her last name.

The woman turned to look at her curiously. Patty was always curious. "Yeah?"

"Has my mother returned? From Minty?"

"Dala? No. She'll be here later though. Around eight."

The husband and wife looked at each other. "Shall we join the festivities then?" Des asked dryly, pointing towards the lawn. Tressi shrugged. There wasn't anything else to do.

The sprawling lawns of the Rothan's institution saw around fifty-odd people gathered (quite a remarkable number for Lapec) to celebrate Mrs. Waldam. The official reason was that this celebration would be in honour of her birthday next week. But those gathered knew that it was an opportunity to say goodbye. Nothing like this had ever been done before in the history of Rothan's, but Igna was determined to bring about a few changes. And she'd done her best.

The plastic chairs were covered with white satin sheets in a hasty attempt to class it up. The stained portions of the rented satin were carefully hidden and pinned away. They'd also tied bright blue ribbons to some of the chairs before realising they didn't have nearly enough to do it for all of them, so the ones with the bow on them had been left interspersed with the ones that didn't.

This created exclusivity (because satin bows on chairs clearly made a huge difference) leading the guests to sneakily fight for one. Or, in case of one Mrs. Methro—who'd once been Mrs. Waldam's classmate—quite openly.

Mrs. Methro tapped Patty on the shoulder and asked loudly, what she meant by sitting on the chair that she'd specifically reserved by placing her handbag on it. Patty, not to be outdone, opened her mouth perhaps to say just what she meant by it, but quailed under Igna's stare and gave up the seat meekly.

"That assistant sure is a piece of work, huh?" said a voice from behind. Tressi turned around to see Dax walking towards her with his mother. Mrs. Lepoci hugged Tressi as Des and Dax greeted each other.

"Did you get a chance to see Mrs. Waldam?" Dax asked Tressi.

"Not yet, she should be down soon. Why does it say 'Happy birthday'?" Tressi pointed to the plastic letters that hung across two trees. Beneath it, a makeshift stage of sorts had been arranged with a raised wooden platform.

Dax explained, "It's her birthday next week. So we thought it'd be a good idea to celebrate it now. It'll give everyone a chance to see her, you know? I think this is what Lila would've wanted," he said, smiling sadly as he looked around the place. Tressi didn't reply. There was a lump in her throat.

Mrs. Lepoci patted her arm. "Cheer up, dear. This is a celebration. Let's make sure it is one. Go on. Help yourselves to some food. It is a party after all."

Before they could leave however, Mrs. Waldam walked towards them, assisted by Igna. And around her neck, was the silver locket that was horribly familiar to Tressi.