Discreetly Rooted In Concrete

Family will always be there for you.

Until they are no longer able.

Inevitable miseries; as their body disables.

Sienna stepped out of the lecture hall after her class at University. She was finished Sociology for the day. The muggy heat of summer made school awful.

‘Ugghh... If I don’t catch up now, I won’t graduate this year.’ She lamented. Sienna was already on her fourth year of a three-year science bachelor degree. She started digging out her cell phone as she moved through the hall. One missed call from her dad’s nurse. ‘Oh no, shit!’ She dialled the nurse back immediately. No answer. Next she tried her dad. Same result.

“Damn it…..” She muttered to herself as panic started to swell in her belly.

Sienna hurried outside, calling again just to reach voicemail.

Her dad has been in a wheelchair ever since he fell a few months prior. Unable to walk, the nurse came every day during the week to change the bandages from the infection in his legs. It had just been the two of them since her mom died. He stopped eating right, his body thinning out caused him to fall in the first place. Frustration swirled in Sienna’s head as her calls continued to fail. Just as she reached her car and put the key in the ignition the nurse finally called. Her stomach churned as she answered.

After what seemed like forever, he finally spoke hesitantly.

“Your father is gone.” The tone of his voice spoke volumes.

“What do you mean gone?!” I panicked.

“He passed away this morning. The police are coming. I am so sorry, so very sorry.”

“What do you mean? He was fine last night, he seemed as normal as he’s been lately.” Sienna asked.

“I don’t know everything yet. I’ll stay until you get here.”

She put down the phone, unsure if she said another word. That car came to life. So much left unsaid, unfinished. The thoughts blurred into a loop of him being all she had. Before she knew it, she was home. Uncertain of how she even got there. Sienna pulled into the driveway behind her dad‘s red van. A zombie-like stagger brought her to the door. Everything in her vision encompassed by a surreal haze.

Her dad’s nurse Patrick and the police officers stood just inside the kitchen. Not far from them was her dad in his wheelchair where he always sat at the table, slumped over as if he drifted off to sleep. The radiance of his soul no longer present, he was already gone. She hugged him anyway, her heart feeling nothing but incredibly empty. The police asked questions about his state of mind in regards to his illness. Their questions droned on for a few minutes, leaving Sienna not completely sure of everything the women asked.

“Is it okay for the mortician to come take him away?”

‘Why would that be okay?’ She reluctantly agreed, snuffing out her inner voice.

Sienna watched as they took pictures of his medication. The morticians eventually came too. Her world went blurry and her body numbed as she saw them wheeling him out. They couldn’t get him perfectly flat on a stretcher because of the position he died in. ‘I’m alone. What do I do now?’ The thoughts ripped into her intensely without mercy. She sat in a mortified heap of uninhibited emotion for what felt like hours.

When there was nobody left in the house but her, Sienna began to absentmindedly sort through her father’s remaining possessions. Each photo she didn’t know he still had ripped into her heart. She went through his wallet and found a folded note with the Futhark rune Dagaz ᛞ on it. Not entirely unusual as their family had an extensive norse pagan history. A key she had never seen on his keychain however, was. There was small print on the key identifying it as belonging to a local transit station. The letters DGZ were crudely carved into the centre.

‘He couldn’t walk… He never left home… When did he have time to do this?’ Similar questions riddled her senses endlessly. The budding mystery momentarily stifling the pain inside her. Sienna needed to investigate, she pushed everything else aside. When she got to the transit station lockers it took her a moment to realize she had no idea which locker it could be. ‘No, wait.’ She looked to the key again. DGZ. Dagaz. The paper she grabbed earlier. She looked at the rune again and turned it over. It felt like her dad was mocking her by leaving such a corny clue. Embarrassing.

Sienna opened locker 8 with the key she found on her father’s ring. Inside was a neatly wrapped small rectangular gift. She unwrapped it without hesitation to find a little black book underneath the paper. Her hands trembled over its intricately marked leather. The book’s presence was hauntingly alluring in a way she couldn’t comprehend.

The hair on her neck stood firm. She wasn’t alone.

“Stay quiet,” A low gruff voice murmured from behind, digging an object into her lower back. He grasped her arm with his free hand “Follow my instructions and you won’t be hurt. Pocket the book and start walking.”

She complied, her nerves swallowed by fear. Each echoing step to the entrance exploded in her chest. She could feel his death glare burning a hole in the back of her head. Every instruction for the abduction was met without resistance. They left her conscious and unrestrained in the back of a black SUV with dark tinted windows. She was seated between two guards. They placed a bag over her head; darkness being Sienna’s only true companion for the long drive.

“Get out.” One of the men demanded menacingly as the SUV came to a halt. He removed the bag from her head and she took in her surroundings. The SUV was parked inside a dirty garage. Several men in black masks were waiting for her. Sienna had no concept of how far she had travelled or where could possibly be. She expected if she was lucky enough to leave alive that it would be that way for the trip home too. They brought her to a dirty room with two chairs and a table in the centre. Sienna’s nerves were on fire. She was roughly forced into one of the chairs and told to put the book on the table in front of her. Two men stayed behind to talk to her.

One of the masked men sat opposite her at the table. The other stood in front of the only door. “Scream if you want, this room is sound proof.”

“What do you want from me?” Sienna asked with an uneasy tone, tears welling in her eyes. What had her dad gotten her into?

“How much do you know about this book?” He was straight to the point.

“I don’t.”

“We’re the only ones who can protect you, but we have to know everything.”

“I already told you I don’t know anything!” Sienna tried to fight the urge to raise her voice, but she failed as her panic intensified.

“Is that so?” Her interrogator looked to the man at the door and then back at her. He pulled out a padded envelope.“For your troubles -“ She reached for the envelope, only to have him pull back on it. “After you say the words ‘I entrust this book to you.’”

“I…” She paused for a moment before mumbling out the desired phrase “…Entrust this book to you.” Without a clue why they needed her to say that, she pushed the book toward the strange man as if it were muscle memory. Everything in her body wanted her to run.The darkness in her heart faded upon relinquishing the object. The padded envelope slipped neatly into her pocket.

“You did the right thing.” He tried to reassure her as he escorted her back to the SUV. “Never mention this or the book to anyone. I guess it really does pay to know the right people. Personally, I would have preferred to just shoot you.” The aloofness in his voice made her belly lurch.

She said nothing at first. More gruffly he said, “Use your words. Do you understand?”

“Yes, I do.” Sienna replied as she climbed into the back of the SUV without a second glance.

The darkness of the bag once again slipping over her head was somehow comforting for her to return to her home. what just happened… she thought.. The questions circled through her head.

She unlocked her front door and fell onto the couch dizzy from the turn of events. She reached into her pocket to see what was in the envelope… Her eyes widened as she started to count the money… $20,000 dollars!

Sienna supposed as she reflected on her own.

In order to preserve the roots we leave behind.

Protection for our home.

Motions we make before the end intwine.

To build a foundation firmer than stone.