Tuesday Tales: From the Word LAMP

I’m back! I had a marvellous and eventful vacation and now I’m raring to go with a new book. Listen to the Stones.

This week, our scenes are based on the word LAMP. Enjoy!

Going into her bedroom, Marina turned on the lamp and opened the bottom drawer of her dresser, removing the small metal box in which she kept her important documents and photographs. These included her divorce decree, her mother’s death certificate, her Canadian passport, and citizenship papers her mother had applied for when she’d been three and had returned to Canada, and her own birth certificate. She unfolded the last document.

Date of Birth: June 21, 1990

First Name: Marina

Middle Name: Alice

Last Name: Fraser

Mother’s Name: Eileen Alice Harrington

Father’s Name: Hugh James Fraser

Place of Birth: Stornoway, Isle of Lewis, United Kingdom

“Go home.”

Was this what her mother had meant? Was it time for her to go back to the place where she’d been born? An island in Scotland’s Outer Hebrides? Was it time to learn about her father and his family? She knew the man had been a journalist and an artist. Mom had been traveling through Europe when she’d met Hugh Fraser and the two had fallen hopelessly in love. After six months together, her mother had gotten pregnant. Intending to do right by her, he’d taken her to his home and family where she’d given birth. A few months later, the paper had sent him to cover peace talks aimed at ending The Troubles in Northern Ireland as they’d been called. Sadly, he’d been killed in one of the last IRA bombings in Newry.

She reached for the photograph of a handsome man with dark hair and blue eyes, her eyes. The photo had sat in a frame beside her mother’s bed right up to the day she’d died. Digging through the other photos, she pulled out the only one she had of her parents together, the one she’d found after her mother’s passing. It showed the two of them, smiling and happy, standing in front of some stones, most likely the Standing Stones of Calanais. She’d seen other pictures of the monoliths. Her redheaded mother, very pregnant, looked up at the man holding her. Her father smiled down at her, his face filled with pride and love. They’d never gotten the chance to marry. After his death, Mom had stayed in Scotland, living with Hugh’s father until Iain Fraser had died in his sleep, leaving her alone once more. Adrift, without family, her mother had taken her and returned to Canada, to the brother she had here, the last of her own family.

That’s it. Stay safe, and don’t forget to check out the other Tuesday Tales.