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milanitalia44 · 7 months

Text

The last time I saw Toby

part three.

A severe allergy to chamomile.

How strange.

Luckily there were no chamomile flowers in our garden, greenhouse or anywhere near our estate.

After the incident.

After the initial shock, followed by the weeklong rot in my bedroom where my body was weighed down with the

gravitational

pull of

Jupiter,

my sadness turned to suspicion.

My father, a man shrouded in secrets, harbored a vehement disapproval of my mingling with townsfolk. It was not a surprise when I discovered his locked office and the drawers of his oak desk, doubly secured.

One could say secrets ran in the family.

At dinner one night the three of us sat around the dining room table,

a rare occasion.

Mummy and daddy drank white wine out of tall Italian glasses,

a not so rare occasion.

I slipped out momentarily to powder my nose.

Rather,

to sprint to the master bedroom where he surely kept a set of keys.

I was right.

The keys slid into my back pocket.

The next day, Daddy chauffeured the Rolls Royce into town for business.

I clutched the keys tightly.

It took four tries to open the office doors and two for the desk.

16 minutes to sort through the files and 5 to read the documents.

Tears traced a path down my cheeks onto the damning papers.

Disgust, anger, rage.

But was I truly surprised?

What was a paperboy to him really, in the grand scheme of things.

I was to marry a duke or a prince.

The paperboy of my past threatened to unravel our so-called family reputation,

splashing scandal across the pages of the daily mail.

A receipt.

500 ml of chamomile extract. $12.00.

A document.

Toby William Alexander

Brown Eyes

173 cm

Date of Birth February 3, 2001

A birth certificate, meticulously scanned, resided in a crimson folder in my father's drawer.

My father, who had no way of knowing who Toby was and certainly no right to contain such personal information.

The local news reported Toby's demise as an accidental allergic reaction during an evening walk.

He died on January 7th.

Hilarious as chamomile only grows in the spring.

Another document,

addressed to the Criminal Investigation Department.

I am writing on behalf of the Alexander family concerning the tragic passing of our son, Toby. He passed away due to a severe allergic reaction to chamomile root, and we believe that his death warrants further investigation.

Toby was admitted to Johnson Hospital. Unfortunately, we were not provided with an autopsy report, nor were we informed of any efforts taken to ascertain the cause of his demise.

It is our intention to seek legal recourse if evidence of negligence or malpractice is discovered during the course of the investigation.

As I read the document that clearly never made it to the Department of Criminal Justice, I became acutely aware that my father, with his myriad connections, would obliterate this murder into a distant memory.

He had swept it under the rug in a wave of his Rolex-clad, blood-stained hand.

But not if I can help it.

Enclosed within this correspondence are the critical documents that substantiate the disconcerting actions of my father. It is my sincere hope that these records will serve as compelling evidence of my fathers criminal actions. Please consider this communication as a sincere effort to contribute to the pursuit of justice.

Sincerely, Margot Carmen Victoria of Wales

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milanitalia44 · 7 months

Text

The last time I saw Toby

part two.

Toby's favourite song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r8BsuT0PWdI

Dear diary,

The whole town attended the funeral. Toby was a particularly social boy who made friends with all of the neighbors and people along his paper route.

He was sharp, freckled and full of life.

I remember him telling me he would stop in the midst of his route to drop off cookies for an old woman named Diane every week. He would keep the widow company every time he passed by, that was the kind of person he was.

His mother sat in the front pew as people gave speeches, her face

swollen, distant, numb.

Meanwhile, I occupied a lonely spot in the back row, attempting to stifle my sadness beneath a black veil.

Heartbroken, guilt stricken, nauseous.

I went to the bathroom and threw up.

…

Following the day of newspaper deliveries, I continued to see Toby every day that summer. At dusk he would infiltrate the gardens, casting a soft flashlight glow from the gazebo into my bedroom. I'd gracefully slip out of my second-story window, descending the maple tree. We often wandered to the river, a few miles distant from our land. In the shadows, we spoke for hours while skipping rocks, he was good at it, I was not. The freedom I experienced in Toby's company was unparalleled, all expectations of me would suddenly dissolve. It was only him and I and the space between us.

That was the night I fell for that boy, hard.

After a month of this, we finally decided to go on a day trip. Deceiving Mummy, I claimed to be heading on a countryside ride with Lucky. Five miles past the river, near the valley, I met with Toby. Together, we rode to the densely wooded expanse we dubbed the old oak forest. It was Toby's idea to start a fire, and there we sat for hours. I brought my film camera and took photos all day long, I still keep these photos pinned to my vanity mirror.

It was dark as I returned home revealing a moon three-quarters full. I remember because it cast a glow upon my path and I was thankful, having stupidly forgotten a flashlight.

I rode in quietly, led Lucky into the barn and took off his saddle, slipped through the front door, went up the stairs, skipped over the 7th step that creaked, and turned down the hall.

There stood daddy, waiting in front of my bedroom door.

Suspicious, cold, angry.

I shouldn't mistake him for a fool he said.

I wasn't out all day alone, he said.

I should have made up a better excuse.

One thing you should know about Daddy is he doesn’t like secrets, other than his own.

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milanitalia44 · 7 months

Text

The last time I saw Toby

part one

Dear diary,

I never thought I'd find myself back here, pen in hand, scribbling away in these pages. Liz insists it's therapeutic. Daddy, on the other hand, would probably confiscate this if he knew about it. He's always been more concerned with security than emotions.

Despite Daddy's disapproval, in our session this morning, Liz urged me to write again. It seems she believes in its therapeutic power enough to risk her position. So, here I am, writing again as what seems like a last resort.

The house feels hollow these days, a cold shell of what it used to be. Often, I find myself lying on my bed, gazing out of the west window at the garden. The gazebo in the midst of the white rose beds feels like a gravestone. I like to imagine the the warmth of last summer,

When my face was kissed by the sun rather than sickly white.

When my heart overflowed with love, untouched by the sharp edges that now cut it into fine pieces.

Mum avoids me, drowning herself in white wine, tennis, and redecorating the front hall. And Daddy, well, who knows what he's up to? I'd rather not know.

He's a man of strong black coffee.

A man of pressed navy suits with long skinny ties.

A man who likes dark gray Porsche 911’s, lying, talking loudly on the phone, and women who aren’t my mother.

Liz suggested I write about last summer, to put my memories into words “as a way to set it off into the past and heal”… bullshit in my opinion, but I guess I'll give it a shot.

I’ve always been bad at memorizing for tests, daddy had to hire three different tutors just to get me through my biology class last fall, all of them quit within 3 weeks. My memories of last summer on the other hand effortlessly cut through the haze of my usual forgetfulness. It was a sweet smelling day. The cherry blossoms along the front gardens had reached full bloom, they smelt faintly of Mummy’s summer perfume. My birthday had just passed so Lucky was a fairly new treasure. I’d begged and begged for a new riding horse for ages, so finally on my 18th birthday, there came striding in a perfect chestnut English Thoroughbred with a red bow tied neatly around his neck. I remember the tears, the tight embrace with Daddy and the proud look on Mummys face. That afternoon I quietly set out and rode Lucky down the dirt road just south of our land, something I used to do with my old horse Bucky before he passed. About 20 minutes into my ride, a thud echoed behind me, startling Lucky. I swung around to an odd tableau: a blue bicycle and a cascade of newspapers scattered across the road. A few feet from his fallen bicycle, lay a brunette boy, rubbing his knee. I hopped off Lucky and helped him recollect his papers into his woven bicycle basket. Surprised by my act of kindness, he squinted at me and mentioned something about a familiar face. Instead of answering, I asked him what on earth all of the newspapers were for. It turned out, he was the paperboy—I felt stupid.

“How about I help you out then, I barely ever get to go into town” I said

He agreed. We decided it would be faster if we made the deliveries together with Lucky, so there we rode, it must've been such a peculiar sight. A paperboy and a princess riding an English Thoroughbred down the streets, flinging newspapers into yards and laughing foolishly. It was one of the best days of my life.

My dear Lucky.

Our white gazebo.

The newspaper article I've kept from that very first day.

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