Chapter 44 - Viktor Drichey, part 2

The first time I saw a corpse, I was five years old.

Well, I guess that's not entirely true. He had seen Old Jack, Black Jack, the town drunk, before that. But it was the first time I had seen the corpse of someone close to me. Now it seems strange to think that he has never been close to someone, but in other times, I must admit, that someone was my mother. She had died of a fever.

Did her death affect me deeply? Looking back now, I think it must have been.

My sister Karen was only three at the time, and she could barely remember our mother. Our dear mother. But to me, her smiling face is as warm and bright as she was when she was alive; even now, after so many, so many years.

It was she who raised us, who took care of us. She was the one who fed us when we were hungry, she comforted us when we were sick or unsafe, she encouraged us when we were sad. She was the one who loved us.

And for us she was much more than just a mother. Certainly, she was