March Novel Essential Information

Novel Title: Withstanding Trials

Time Setting: VI1715¹

Genre: Fantasy

Minimum Word Goal: 90,000

Timespan: September–November

Locations: Finscéalta, Inis Neamhaí, Taoiseach Finscéalta; Inis Faireoir, Taoiseach Finscéalta, O’Enne

Main Characters: Aodhán Ó Maolmhuaidh, Saraid Ó Caoimháin²

Background Information:

Located in the easternmost reaches of Ureonaiea, O’Enne is both the easternmost and southernmost country in Ureonaiea. It is comprised of thousands of islands which, according to local legends, were created for a race of people who left the realm of the gods to live on Ureonaiea, and were persecuted for their immortality.

Fleeing this persecution, they headed for the realm of the gods, but were stopped by a storm and told by the gods they could go no further, so they settled on the islands and worshipped the gods, to whom they sent their dead in unmanned boats.

Legend also states that their first king was the son of the demigoddess Enne, and that because she loved the people of the islands so much, they all came to be identified as her sons, and thus the islands were known as O’Enne, because when foreigners arrived, the locals introduced themselves as the sons of Enne, or O’Enne.

This first king died in VI391, and it is held in tradition that the current monarch is descended from him, and so has the faintest strain of demigod blood in his veins, however, the traditional polytheistic religion is no longer the majority in O’Enne.

Owing to the complexity of the language of O’Enne, communication with foreign peoples was difficult until it was discovered that the language of Aifos was similar — which the people of O’Enne explained by saying that when their forebears were fleeing persecution, four boats of the party of twenty were lost, and that the people of Aifos are the descendants of those boats’ occupants — and as a result, the people of Aifos were able to pick up the language of O’Enne the best.

As a result missionaries came from Aifos proclaiming other religions, of which only two have taken hold, the one was initially known as Universalism³, while the other was known as ‘Aloneism’ owing to the five ‘alone’ statements that its proponents proclaimed.

Universalism arrived first, in the VI700s, and was initially resisted by the population until the King of O’Enne was converted. His son was also converted, and when he became king, he slaughtered adherents of the traditional beliefs who would not convert to Universalism.

In the years thereafter Universalism merged with the traditional beliefs, taking on many of the traditional festivals and superstitions, although there remained people who refused to mingle Universalism with the traditional beliefs.

Aloneism arrived in the VI1500s, when it was accepted by a nobleman whose territory is the only part of O’Enne where it is the majority. The rest of O’Enne, not liking Aloneism any more than they initially liked Universalism, reacted against it strongly, with a revival of sorts coming along and creating a second branch of Universalism, known as Truism, which has expunged much of the traditional polytheism from Universalism, and is adhered to by most of the nobility, as well as the king himself.

The only two groups that somewhat coexist are the Universalists and the traditional believers, although the Truists can, for the most part, tolerate the two of them. The Aloneists try to live at peace with everyone, but since everyone is hostile toward them, it’s easier said than done.

Matters have not been helped by the difficulties that have come to O’Enne in the last century and a half or so either, as each of the religious groups consider the others to be the cause of these misfortunes.

The first misfortune to arrive in the VI1550s was the itch, a disease which afflicts the sheep from whom many — especially in the north of O’Enne — make their living in the northern reaches of O’Enne, where the landscape is made up of rocky highlands.

It is named because it’s first symptom is the sheep scratching itself on anything it can find, but it isn’t merely a case of fleas, but a degenerative disease that is uncontrollably contagious, which led to the creation of laws banning the sheep on O’Enne’s largest island, where the disease first appeared, from being sent to any of the smaller islands, whose flocks remain untroubled by the disease.

Second, in the later VI1600s came the blight, which affected O’Enne’s potatoes, which are grown in abundance in the south, with a series of severe years of blight forcing many to abandon their farms for the cities.

Thankfully, the last of O’Enne’s major industries, fishing, has so far been unaffected by any plagues, but considering that the third plague, of sorts, is affecting the citizens themselves, that’s not necessarily heartening.

The third disease to affect O’Enne was a disease known as spots owing to the spotty rash that erupts on the skin of the infected. It first appeared in VI1712 in the slums that had developed around the cities as former potato farmers and shepherds, having lost their livelihoods to the blight or the itch, flocked to the cities for some means of provision for their families.

Initially it was suspected to be a disease of the poor, but in three years that myth has been dispelled as the disease has spread rampantly not only in the slums, but among the wealthy, as well as spreading across O’Enne as people who’d gone to the slums fled them in order to not die, but inadvertently carried the disease with them.

As a result, things look incredibly bleak for O’Enne, and the fact that many people in each of its religious groups are inclined to believe that the fact that their religion is not the only religion in the kingdom is the reason for the troubles isn’t making things any better.

Born the ninth of twelve children and youngest of six sons, Aodhán was one of only three sons living when he was born. His father was the cousin of the King of O’Enne, and Aodhán was second cousin of the Crown Prince.

His grandfather was the Chief of Gealach, and the oldest living younger brother of the previous King of O’Enne, but his health was failing and, as his oldest son, Aodhán’s father had taken on day-to-day management of the Chiefdom, thus Aodhán was born in the Chiefly Castle.

When he was two, his grandfather died and his father became the Chief of Gealach, and Aodhán became the third in line for the title after his brothers. As a result of his father’s being a Chief, which was second only to the King in rank and power, Aodhán was given a good education, even if he wasn’t slated to become a Chief by inheritance.

Things changed two years later, however, as Aodhán’s second cousin, the Crown Prince, had a fatal riding accident while vacationing at one of the royal estates ahead of his wedding, and his death devastated the King, whose health deteriorated rapidly until he died a year after his son, who had been the only one of his sons to live long enough to nearly get married.

As a result of the King’s sons all being dead, and the fact that all of the kings brother’s had predeceased him without producing sons, Aodhán’s father, as the oldest living son of the King’s uncles inherited the throne and became King of O’Enne, which made Aodhán now third in line for the crown.

This caused a great stir in elite circles as Aodhán’s mother was descended from the Chief who’d accepted Aloneism in the VI1500s, and just as her forefathers before her, was a devout Aloneist, making her the highest-ranking Aloneist in the history of O’Enne as Queen.

People were thus concerned that, although her husband remained a devout Truist, Aodhán’s mother might convert her sons to Aloneism, and considering how the King who’d accepted Universalism had enacted state-sanctioned persecution against the traditional beliefs, there is fear that an Aloneist king would do the same.

Many were reassured that it wouldn't be so over time, however, as Aodhán’s oldest brother became a devout Truist like his father, and his middle brother was also strongly inclined in that direction, while Aodhán owing to the death of one of his little sisters from sickness, was terrified of taking ill and dying.

When Aodhán was eight his family went out to visit his grandparents in the northwest of O’Enne in the summer, where Aodhán and his brothers went out sailing with their cousins. Aodhán’s oldest brother was quite cocky about being the Crown Prince, and looked down on his cousins not only because of their low rank, but their Aloneist beliefs.

Furthermore, he believed he was a better sailor because he’d spent a portion of the summer training with the Navy of O’Enne, and so when storm clouds loomed one day and all of their cousins turned back, Aodhán’s oldest brother called them cowards and refused to heed Aodhán and his middle brother’s calls for him to turn back also until the storm was bearing down heavily on them.

Additionally, when they arrived at the docks, Aodhán’s brother refused his uncles’ help mooring the boat, which was suddenly launched at the rocky cliffs by a severe wave.

Aodhán was flung from the boat by the wave and found by one of his uncles, who carried him up through a secret passageway in the cliffs into his mother’s arms. It wasn’t until the following morning that he learned that his oldest brother had been killed, having been crushed between the boat and the dock by the wave, making Aodhán second-in-line to the throne, and his middle brother the Crown Prince.

The storm which had killed his brother raged for several more days, during which Aodhán remained in a terror, even as his mother explained that the storm was a famous Guardian storm, which traditional legends said the gods had created as a protection for O’Enne from invasions out of the west, thus why all major routes to the rest of Ureonaiea from O’Enne went either north or south for a ways before finally turning west.

Eventually, Aodhán’s mother, wanting to relieve Aodhán of his fears, shared Aloneism with him, and Aodhán accepted Aloneism, finding comfort in the fact that Aloneism taught that God was in control of storms and diseases, while his brother was driven even more to Truism by the trauma of the storm.

Aodhán spent time living with his maternal grandparents — during which he became less afraid of storm and sickness as his faith grew — learning more about Aloneism and becoming friendly with the locals, as his grandparents taught him, but when he was fifteen, he was called back to the capital of O’Enne, and sent to Gealach with his brother, who was now the Chief of Gealach, which had become the territory of the Crown Prince.

Since Aodhán’s brother wasn’t yet married — although he was actively seeking a wife — Aodhán was to be trained by his brother in how to manage affairs at Gealach in order to take over whenever his brother became king, either as the outright ruler, or potentially as the Regent for his brother’s son in the future.

Although Aodhán wasn’t outspoken about his Aloneist beliefs, he was more inclined to be friendly with the locals than his brother was, and when the locals asked him about Aloneism, he answered them, which actually caused some of them to become curious about Aloneism.

His brother didn’t appreciate this, not wanting to be overthrown by radical Aloneists wanting an Aloneist ruler, and so ordered Aodhán to leave Gealach, prompting Aodhán to return to his grandparents’ home.

However, with the rise of the spots outbreak, Aodhán’s father wanted to split up the royal family so they couldn’t all catch spots and be wiped out at once, and he wanted Aodhán’s youngest sister to live with her grandparents, so Aodhán was ordered to go to Neamhaí, where one of his father’s younger sisters lived with her husband, the Chief of Finscéalta, both of whom are devout Universalists, and whose territory is close to one of the most sacred sites on O’Enne to traditional believers, meaning that Aodhán is headed for a place far from his fellow Aloneists.

Born the seventh of nine daughters and twelfth of fifteen children to a shepherd and his wife who made their home on the northernmost inhabited island of O’Enne, Saraid was part of a hardworking family.

Owing to the rough landscape of the island, the majority of the approximately 700 people who lived on the island raised sheep, and if they didn’t their business had something to do with sheep, whether dealing with the wool, the leather, the meat, or the milk.

Even though Saraid’s family was large, it was not long-lived, as by the time Saraid was born, six of her siblings had already died of disease, cold, or accident, and by the time she was ten she’d lost four more siblings.

Because one of her sisters died as a result of a head injury sustained when a frisky weanling lamb had knocked her sister over, causing her to hit her head on a rock, Saraid was wary of being around the sheep, although she willingly worked with her mother to card and spin wool, and weave it into wool garments for the family to wear, as well as making cheese from the milk, shoes from the leather, and meals from the meat.

Saraid’s family was close-knit, with all of them living on the same island, although they would often travel together to visit her mother’s family further east, who, like Saraid’s family, were devout Aloneists, although her mother’s family were part of a small minority group, while Aloneism was the majority belief on Saraid’s home island.

Her oldest sister lived the furthest away by living at the lone major settlement on the island, which was where, eventually, refugees from the spots outbreaks started making their way as islands further south refused to allow them mooring.

As a result, it was her oldest sister’s family who first came down with spots shortly after Saraid’s thirteenth birthday. By Christmas they had all died.

Wanting to help her daughter, Saraid’s mother had gone to care for the family as they were ill, and came down with spots for herself, which was passed on to the rest of Saraid’s family from there, first claiming the life of Saraid’s little nephew, the son of her widowed older brother, then her younger brother, her mother, her father, and her two older brothers.

Saraid caught it as well, but somehow survived her infection while the rest of her family was wiped out, leaving her with little to no family on the island less than a year after the first member of her family had fallen ill.

The whole island, in fact, had suffered, with over half the population being wiped out in just under two years, which meant Saraid’s prospects for finding a husband were slim, and since her family’s possessions had been burned in an effort to prevent spots from claiming more victims, she couldn’t live on her own.

One of her mother’s brother’s and his wife, however, agreed to take Saraid in on the larger island they called home, which hadn’t been so badly hit by spots, but when Saraid arrived at the island she learned that between their sending the letter that they’d take her and her arrival, her uncle and aunt’s family had been wiped out by spots.

However, one of her older maternal uncles — who had died years ago in an accident — had a daughter who was still alive and living with her husband on a nearby island where her husband was an Aloneist minister, who expressed willingness to take Saraid in.

Although she dreaded finding her cousin’s family similarly deceased when she arrived, she found them alive and well, and has stepped into something of a motherly role with her cousin’s three little children, as her cousin is expecting her fourth child, and needs the help.

Additionally, since the island on which her cousin lives is an island very close to one of the sacred sites for traditional believers, Aloneism is very unwelcome, and thus anyone who is an Aloneist, or even associates with an Aloneist, is treated very cruelly, which is hard for Saraid to adapt to, but she’s trying. 

      The most disappointing things are, however, that the island on which she’s now living is smaller than the one she grew up on, and there are few young men who’ve been converted to Aloneism, as they prefer the power over women they have in Universalism or the traditional beliefs, both of which don’t view women much higher than livestock, meaning that her husband prospects are closer to nonexistent than they were on her home island, not that she’s in a hurry to get married, being only fifteen, she just wanted to maybe meet a young man sooner in order to know him well before they were married.

¹does not correspond to 1715 AD

²pronunciations are limited owing to the lack of access to resources on how to pronounce Irish.

³does not correspond to the real-world doctrine of universalism.

Pronunciations:

O’Enne: ohehnay

Taoiseach: teesahkh

Aodhán: eeon

All That Remains: Day 15

Word Total: 90,085

Year to Date: 180,125

Summary of Events:

Chloë was transferred to a hospital in Brussels, where she ended up being visited by a former teammate of Tristan's whom she'd really not wanted to see because of the mixed feelings he caused within her. Will, meanwhile, was released from hospital into the care of his mother and stepfather in the Netherlands, which allowed Enka to return to Croatia to continue her medical studies. Unfortunately, Will's mother had invited the nearby family over to visit, despite the fact that Will just wanted to be alone, and when he went off to his room, she tried to cajole him out…

Excerpt of the Day:

Mama sighed. “You’re not inclined to think positively about anything, are you?”

“You’re the third different person I’ve asked,” Will said. “How is someone who has had such an overwhelmingly negative life experience, such as myself, and is in the throes of a particularly negative experience at the present, supposed to feel positive!?”

“You draw on your good memories,” Mama replied.

“But you just told me I wasn’t supposed to dwell on the past!” Will exclaimed.

“Not the negative past,” Mama countered. “But you can dwell on the positive past.”

“Did you not hear me just say I’ve had an overwhelmingly negative life experience?” Will demanded. “Overwhelmingly negative means the vast majority of experiences which I’ve had in my life were not positive. Like, seventy five percent of my life, minimum has been negative and unhappy. I don’t have a lot of positive stuff to think about. It’s going to get repetitive really quickly if I try to think on just the positive stuff that’s happened in my life, and nobody enjoys repetition.”
“I’m sure that’s not true,” Mama said. “If you’d try to think about the positive memories you’d find there’s more of them than you think.”

“Not likely,” Will said. “Besides, the majority of my positive memories are corrupted by negative ones.”

“What exactly is that supposed to mean?” Mama asked.

“They were positive at the time, but they’ve now become negative,” Will replied.

“How can that happen?” Mama asked.

“The people I made them with died,” Will replied. “I have positive memories of time spent with Papa, but where is he? Buried under two metres of dirt at Turnhout. I have positive memories of time spent with Ad. He’s in the same place. I have positive memories of time spent with Azim. He’s geographically closer, but in the same state as the other two. I have positive memories of time spent with Tristan. He’s buried in Corsica. I have positive memories of time spent with Sefu. His family’s burying him in Kenya.”

“At least you made good memories with them,” Mama said.

“Seriously?” Will snapped. “At least I made good memories?”

“Yes,” Mama said. “It shows you have the capacity to experience positive things, and to even regard them as positive; at least for a time.”

Will wasn’t really sure what Mama was getting at, but he wanted her to leave him alone. It wasn’t like he could kill himself at the moment. Mama had the pain medication he’d been prescribed, which meant he couldn’t overdose, if the quantity he’d been given in his prescription was even enough to kill him. There wasn’t really any other way he could think of that he might be able to kill himself in a bedroom while wheelchair-bound.

“I know your life has been touched by tragedy and sorrow Will,” Mama said. “But life isn’t all bad. There are good things to see and enjoy in life. You just need to see it and enjoy it.”

Although he wanted to demand how he was supposed to do that, Will said nothing; he was tired of arguing with Mama and just wanted her to go away.

Pronunciation:

Turnhout: turnhowt

Next Post: 28 February

All That Remains: Day 14

Word Count: 84,052

Summary of Events:

Following their departure to the guest house on Tristan and Chloë's property they'd been invited to stay at, Will learned from Enka that Chloë had actually been taken to the hospital for psychiatric reasons, which surprised Will, as he'd not seen any medical personnel come to take her away. Regaining consciousness in the hospital, Chloë told a nurse she wanted to be euthanised, and became enraged when the nurse told her that active euthanasia was illegal in France, which led to her having to be sedated. Will, Enka, and many of the others who'd gone to the funeral took a ferry from Corsica to Nice, and then a lengthy train from Nice to Brussels, where Will was returned to the hospital, although Enka wanted to transfer him to Croatia so she could care for him and continue her studies, but Will resisted the idea…

Excerpt of the Day:

“I wish you would just believe that you’re worth loving,” Enka said. “I feel like all this death and negativity in your life has made you feel like you’re worthless or something. You’re not. Any thoughts you have that try to tell you that you’re worthless are lies. They’re completely false. You matter. You’re worth something.”

“Why?” Will asked.

“Because you’re special,” Enka replied. “You’re you.”
“How am I special?” Will asked. “There’s millions, maybe even billions of footballers in the world. I’m sure that a good deal of the defenders among those footballers are at least as good as I was, but probably even better. There’s nothing about me that isn’t true about at least a couple dozen other people in the world.”

“But none of them are you,” Enka said. “You have the special, unique combination of attributes that makes you. No one else has those.”

“And why is that special?” Will asked.

Enka looked to be groping for words, and not only because she was trying to explain herself in her second language. “Because! The world wouldn’t be the same without you!”
“Seriously?” Will asked.

Uttering a frustrated sigh, Enka looked at him like she didn’t know what he was getting at.

“You seriously think that the entire planet would be radically altered if I ceased to exist?” Will asked. “I doubt anyone would care.”

“I would care,” Enka replied. “And so would your family, and your teammates, and your friends. You’ve touched a lot of lives, and those people would miss you.”

“They hardly make up a worthwhile fraction of the global population,” Will replied dryly.

“What, would you only consider staying alive if you were as famous as… like… Cristiano Ronaldo or something?” Enka asked.

“No,” Will replied. “But something better than ‘I’m special’ or ‘I’m me’ might be nice.”

“What’s better than that?” Enka asked.

“I don’t know,” Will replied bitterly. “Maybe that my life had a purpose or something?”

“Every life has a purpose,” Enka said.

“Well, then what’s the purpose?” Will asked.

“It depends on the person,” Enka replied.

“You’re not helping,” Will snapped.

“Usually part of it is to have a positive impact on the lives of others,” Enka said, hurt clear in her voice.

“How am I supposed to have a positive impact on the lives of others when my life is just a series of miseries?” Will demanded profanely. “How is a person who knows nothing but negativity supposed to make anyone else think or feel positive?”

“Well, you could find the positive in the situation,” Enka said.

Will stared at Enka. He would’ve considered screaming at her, but he was sure that would bring in a nurse chastising him for disturbing other patients.

“Where is the positive?” he spat.

“You survived,” Enka replied, somewhat hesitantly. “And… you’re recovering well.”

“Other people died,” Will said. “People who deserved to be alive. How am I supposed to be happy? That would… desecrate their memory. Are they worthless because they died?”

“No,” Enka replied. “It’s just… fate I guess.”

Will rolled his eyes and placed his hand over them in frustration. Enka’s efforts to go about giving him a reason to live weren’t helping. None of her reasons were reasonable, but she didn’t seem to want to admit that he had no reason to live, and he’d yet to figure out why.

All That Remains: Day 13

Word Count: 78,102

Summary of Events:

Having spied an attractive young woman at the funeral, Will hoped to get the opportunity to speak to her later on, but it took some time before he finally saw that she wasn't busy talking to someone else at the same time that Enka was occupied in conversation, and so wouldn't notice. Unfortunately Elle dragged him into a conversation about Tristan's wardrobe he was set to inherit, but before he died of boredom because of his lack of fashion knowledge, the young woman actually came up to him and got Elle to go find someone else to talk to so that the two of them could talk together about things Will actually had knowledge of, such as himself and his family…

Excerpt of the Day:

“Oh,” Mlle. Lavoie said. “Is your grandfather determined to see you fill his boots?”
“No,” Will replied. “I do believe he played football, but I don’t know if I’ve ever heard why he only got so far. I don’t know if it was an injury he’s done well to hide, a plain old lack of talent, or if maybe his parents refused to let him pursue football professionally and by the time he was able to make an attempt on his own he was ‘too old’, but I’ve never seen him play football, and he certainly wasn’t a famous footballer.”

“But he does obviously love football,” Mlle. Lavoie said.

“Very much so,” Will replied. “If he would’ve had a son, I would probably be the nephew to, or maybe even the son of, a famous footballer, but since he had no sons he turned his attention to his grandsons.”

“It’s probably been nice to have that support,” Mlle. Lavoie said. “As in, to have family that want to see you do what you love.”
“It is,” Will agreed.

“Did you end up starting in the youth academy of your grandfather’s favourite club?” Mlle. Lavoie asked.

“Yes,” Will replied. “I was enrolled in the age-appropriate level of Feyenoord’s youth academy as soon as we moved to Rotterdam, and I stayed with them all the way to my professional début. It wasn’t bad, we were successful, I have all kinds of prizewinner’s mementoes from winning national and international youth competitions with Feyenoord and the Dutch national team, but, aside from the present, my two years with Anderlecht have been nicer.”

“Because you’re out from under your grandfather’s thumb?” Mlle. Lavoie asked.

“Yes,” Will replied. “Very much so.”
“What position do you play?” Mlle. Lavoie asked.

“Defender,” Will replied.

“Like Tristan, then,” Mlle. Lavoie said.

Will nodded.

“Were you two close?” Mlle. Lavoie asked.

“Yes,” Will replied. “Very close.”
Mlle. Lavoie nodded. Will noticed that her eyes looked a little glassy. “We were too.”

“Really?” Will asked.

“Yes,” Mlle. Lavoie replied. “We weren’t just fellow models, we had become friends as well.”

Will nodded. “Even if he was kind of a private person, we… had really become close, almost as close as family.”

Mlle. Lavoie nodded, producing a handkerchief from the little black clutch purse on her lap and dabbing at her eyes. “He was like a big brother to me.”

Nodding again, Will felt moisture coming to his own eyes, but he had a sinking feeling he’d discarded the tissue that Enka had given him at the funeral.

“It’s been very hard,” Mlle. Lavoie said. “From the moment I heard about the crash and that it involved his club this was the news I dreaded, as now they’re both gone.”

“Who else is gone?” Will asked.

“Both my actual older brother and the friend who replaced him,” Mlle. Lavoie replied.

“He wasn’t on Anderlecht, was he?” Will asked. “Your actual brother?”

“No, no,” Mlle. Lavoie replied. “He committed suicide seven years ago.”

“Oh,” Will said. “I’m sorry.”

Pronunciations:

Mlle.: mahdehmwahzehll

Lavoie: lahvwah

All That Remains: Day 12

Word Count: 72,009

Summary of Events:

Will was brought to tears quickly at Tristan's funeral, which he found not only to have similar surroundings to those of his father's funeral, but also evoked similar emotions. Chloë had felt herself getting angrier at the fact that she was left behind to play widow as Tristan's funeral neared, and she didn't feel any better during the funeral, eventually becoming so enraged that she tried to throw herself into Tristan's grave. She was prevented from doing so and was hauled away to the house, leaving Will and the others gathered around the grave to stand around awkwardly before most of them decided to disperse. Will, however, noticed that just beside Tristan's grave was a headstone hidden behind a small shrub…

Excerpt of the Day:

Will had a feeling that whoever was buried there was someone who had been special to Tristan, and was part of the reason why Tristan had wanted to be buried in Corsica as opposed to being buried wherever it was the initial plans had been to bury him.

No one immediately came to Will’s mind as a possible person reposing in the adjacent grave, however. Tristan had rarely talked about his family aside from his mother and sister, as well as the odd very bitter comment about his father, whom Will knew was still alive.

There were, as far as Will knew, no siblings who had died, nor were there any grandparents or anyone else that Will had heard about from Tristan, or from anyone else who’d known Tristan longer. Many people had described Tristan as a private man, and even though Will had been able to form a close friendship with him in the span of just two years, he had to agree that it was true. Tristan was a very private man. He had never disclosed much about himself except when it came to football, and the few disclosures about his personal life Will had received he was sure had been expressed only to him because of the closeness of relationship they’d developed in the brief time they’d had together.

Will startled slightly upon feeling his wheelchair move.

“I don’t want to stand out here,” Enka said. “We’re going inside.”

“No,” Will said.

“Everyone else is going inside,” Enka said. “I don’t want to stay out here.”

“I want to look at that first,” Will said, pointing to the headstone. “Then I don’t care if we go inside.”

“Really?” Enka asked complainingly. “That’s morbid.”

“No it isn’t,” Will snapped. “I just want to know who it is because it was obviously someone Tristan cared about enough to want to be buried beside, but I don’t know of anyone.”

“Fine,” Enka said, her displeasure with the whole idea being quite evident.

She pushed Will around the opening and around the far side of the shrub so that he could get close to the headstone and read the words engraved on it.

A tiny handprint was engraved in a circle at the top, followed by the name Maël Jules Servaas Giroux-Lévêque, and a single date from a little more than two years ago. No epitaph was given.

Based on the surname — which was Tristan’s legal surname, although Will had reason to believe that contempt for his father was the reason why he didn’t use Giroux, his father’s surname, outside of legal contexts — and the presence of one single date, Will wondered if this Maël had been a son of Tristan who had died shortly after birth.

Will felt like that made the most logical sense, but, at the same time, he had to admit that he was a little bit surprised. Even if he was sure that Tristan and Chloë had loved one another once upon a time, and he’d even wondered if repeated failed attempts at parenthood together, or even the loss of a child, had caused the subtle coolness he’d observed between the two of them, he’d certainly not expected that failure to have come a scant two years ago.

Pronunciation:

Giroux: zhihrhooh

All That Remains: Day 11

Word Count: 66,045

Summary of Events:

Will spent the night at a hotel in London, but wasn't able to sleep much, so he turned on an early-morning news broadcast and listened to a report on Sefu's funeral and the crash itself, about which there wasn't much more information at the present. Chloë packed her things for the trip to Corsica for Tristan's funeral before meaning to try and finish up her will, but Amandine asked her about whether she and Tristan's mother could stay in the house with her, among others, which got her thinking about the guest house, which she decided to invite Will to stay in, as Tristan would probably have done, and she felt that she and Will had a common resentment to their present states. Will was informed by the doctor that his request for euthanasia had been denied, and Angelo, not understanding the Dutch exchange, tried to get Will to tell him why the doctor had come, but Will refused and the two got into an argumentative discussion…

Excerpt of the Day:

“But always you seem so negative,” Angelo said. “You seem so negative all the time, but yet you are open minded to everything? I cannot understand that. How can a person be negative and have an open mind? Negative is a relative of closed. When you are negative, you are closed. When you are positive, you are open.”

“Just believe it’s possible and leave me alone,” Will snapped.

“You are closing now,” Angelo said. “That is negative. You do not want to explain to me what is going on.”

“It’s not like you care,” Will said.

“Now you insult me!” Angelo exclaimed.

“You’ve been calling me a pauper for the last week all because I happened to be the beneficiary of a will,” Will spat. “It’s not like I asked Tristan for the money. I don’t need it, it was just a gift he decided to give me for reasons.”

“I am sure the money Tristan left you is more than all of the money you had before,” Angelo said. “I know very well he was a very wealthy man. I’m surprised he didn’t leave you one of his properties too. But I’m glad he didn’t.”

“You have no idea what my financial status is,” Will said. “And I’m not exactly going to go telling you either.”

“I’m not asking for that information,” Angelo said.

“Good,” Will snapped. “But why are you glad he didn’t give me one of his properties?”

“You would probably move to the place and become a recluse,” Angelo said. “Seeing you are always so negative.”

“Did Tristan strike you as a positive person?” Will asked.

“Of course not,” Angelo replied.

“He didn’t become a recluse at any of his properties,” Will said.

“He had no reason to,” Angelo replied. “He didn’t have any loved ones die.”

“Um, I’m pretty sure he did,” Will said.

“Who?” Angelo asked.

“Jérôme said something once that suggested Tristan and Chloë lost a baby,” Will said.

“When?” Angelo asked, sounding disbelieving.

“In the last five years or so,” Will replied.

“I think that is very unlikely,” Angelo said. “They’ve never seemed like the sort of a couple who loved one another enough to have a baby together.”

“Who says that isn’t the result of their losing the baby?” Will asked.

“Maybe that is a possibility,” Angelo said. “But I am sure that Tristan would not have cared. He never seemed the fatherly type.”

“Really?” Will asked. “He was the closest thing I ever found to a replacement for my father.”

“He wasn’t even old enough to be your father,” Angelo said, sounding incredulous.

“Even still,” Will said. “He taught me everything he knew about football and really cared about me in a way that even Arne never has.”

“It must’ve been because you are so negative like him,” Angelo said.

Will turned his head away from the curtain. Sure Tristan had been brooding, but he’d not really been all that negative most of the time. Clearly Angelo had never cared to take the time to get to know Tristan any more than he cared to take the time to get to know most anyone else on the team.

Pronunciations:

Jérôme: zhehrhom

Arne: ahrneh

All That Remains: Day 10

Word Count: 60,037

Summary of Events:

Will and Chloë spent many of the ensuing days at funerals in Belgium, where local football fans stood in solidarity with Anderlecht fans who travelled to the cities for the funerals, and players of local teams attended as well. The first funeral outside of Belgium was in England, and was that of Will's close friend Sefu Mwangi, whose family immediately commandeered Will for hugs and to express their gratefulness that he'd come, which prompted Will to cry as the fact that Sefu wasn't there was only reinforced…

Excerpt of the Day:

A strong hand rubbed him across his shoulders. “It’s got to be so hard for you, to be one of the few survivors, having somehow escaped with little to no injury, while others have not been so fortunate.”

Nodding, Will dabbed at his eyes, hoping to clear them enough to identify who was speaking to him. It sounded mostly like Mr. Mwangi, but he wasn’t fully sure that it was.

“Are your legs going to recover?” the man asked.

“They’re supposed to,” Will replied. “I have no idea if they will. They were crushed, but they were put back together and are apparently healing well.”

“Well, I do hope they become strong again,” the man said. “And I see you have a bit of a scar on the back of your head. Did you hit it on something?”

Will nodded. “I have a concussion.”

“Oh,” the man said sympathetically. “That is not good. It is only your first one?”

“I’m pretty sure it is,” Will replied. “I don’t recall having gotten a concussion before.”

“Good, good, too many of those is not good for the brain,” the man said.

Finally clearing his eyes, Will looked at the man and found himself feeling a little disconcerted, as he didn’t recognise the man’s face. He was clearly a member of Sefu’s family, as he was dressed in the same traditional Kenyan mourning attire as everyone else, but Will had no idea who he was.

“You were very close to Sefu?” the man asked.

Will nodded. “He, was… the, the same age… as my brother.”

The man nodded. “Is your brother deceased as well?”

Unable to speak, Will nodded.

“I am sorry,” the man said. “He did not die in this crash, though?”

Will shook his head. “He died… when I was thirteen.”

“Oh,” the man said.

“But… Sefu, was also… like… another friend… I lost,” Will said.

“Previous to this you lost this friend?” the man asked.

“He was… murdered… by his stepfather… when we were seventeen,” Will replied.

“You have lost many people in your life,” the man said.

Will nodded. “My father too.”

“That is very, very sad,” the man said.

“I want it to be my turn already,” Will said.

A sudden shock shot through him and he covered his mouth with both hands.

“Why do you do that?” the man asked.

Will looked at the man warily. The man didn’t look to be terribly insulted, but Will didn’t dare uncover his mouth to elaborate.

“It is only natural for those who go through suffering to want it to end,” the man said.

Slowly Will uncovered his mouth, although he still didn’t say anything.

“And for people like you, who are among the few to survive such a great tragedy, the question is even more prominent,” the man said. “They call it survivor’s guilt. People who survive an incident question why they did, and others did not.”

Will nodded. He certainly wanted to know the answer to that question.

All That Remains: Day 9

Word Count: 54,039

Summary of Events:

Seeing as Tristan had left a will, Chloë decided that if she was going to take the idea of taking her own life seriously, it might not hurt to have a will of her own, but she didn't know how to write one up, and ended up being interrupted by her best friend Céline, who'd finally made it back from North America, coming to visit. Will enjoyed a reprieve from Angelo, who had told Enka about Chloë's visit in what Will suspected was a deliberate effort to hear what Will and Chloë had said in a language he understood, and since learning that Will had been a beneficiary of Tristan's will, had been mocking Will as being so poor he needed financial aid from others, but was presently out of the room for some medical tests…

Excerpt of the Day:

Hearing approaching footsteps, Will hoped they wouldn’t stop at his room, but he heard the sound profile change, indicating that the feet were no longer walking down the open space of the main area, but were instead walking within the smaller confines of his room.

Will looked toward the curtain. A nurse carrying a tray appeared in a moment.

“Bonjour Monsieur,” she said.

“Hello,” Will replied in Dutch.

“Oh, I’m sorry, hello sir,” she said in Dutch. “May I have a look at your hand?”

Seeing as she was on the side of his bed closest to his left hand, he elevated it for her and she looked it over.

Will gasped at the sudden pain signals his brain received from the hundreds of hair follicles on the back of his hand as she ripped the tape off.

“Hold still please,” she said.

Looking away, Will whimpered, not wanting to feel the needle. His insides squirmed as he felt it move before he felt a cotton ball being pressed against the back of his hand.

“Can you hold this please?” she asked.

Reluctantly Will turned his gaze back and saw that the nurse was holding his own hand out to him, so he grabbed it with his other hand, putting pressure on the cotton ball so that the nurse could have her hands free to tear off a strip of medical tape from a roll. She affixed the tape over the cotton ball and to the back of his hand.

“Why did you take it out?” Will asked.

“It’s time to change for a fresh one,” the nurse replied. “We’ll probably want a fresh site too, otherwise there could be a risk of your blood vessel collapsing.”

“Oh,” Will said.

“Although we’ve been notified by your girlfriend that you’re going to England shortly, and it would probably be more convenient if you consumed nutrients by oral means than having to be taken to a hospital to receive them” the nurse added.

“So I’m supposed to eat then?” Will asked.

“Well, liquids at least,” she replied. “We wouldn’t want you to go back to normal quite as if nothing happened, as there could be complications. You’ll need to ease back into a regular diet if that’s what you want.”

“I want to be euthanised,” Will replied.

“Oh?” she asked.

“I made a request for it, and the request has been filed,” Will replied. “That’s the only reason I consented to this.”

“But you’re only here because you can’t get around on two broken legs,” she replied. “If you’d broken only one you’d be home already. You’re in perfectly good health.”

“So?” Will asked.

“You’re not likely going to get your request granted,” she replied. “If you had a mental illness or a terminal disease you might, but not a couple broken legs and a concussion. I am aware that people go on about how liberal our euthanasia system is, but it’s not that liberal.”
“You’re sure?” Will asked.

“Very sure,” she replied. 

All That Remains: Day 8

Word Count: 48,009

Summary of Events:

Following the public viewing, Chloë was called on by a French lawyer who revealed that he was Tristan's lawyer, and had been waiting for her to call him since he'd heard about the crash, eventually deciding to come to her house, in case she'd forgotten. He revealed that Tristan had written a will, and read it to Chloë, as well as Elle and Amandine. As a result of the will containing a few thoughts Tristan had on what he wanted for a funeral, his planned funeral in Brussels had to be cancelled so that they had the time to honour his wishes. Will was forced by Enka to attend the joint funeral of six of his teammates, despite the fact that he didn't want to be reminded that they were dead and he wasn't. The next day, he heard someone coming into his room in high heels, who was greeted by Angelo…

Excerpt of the Day:

Will didn’t hear any answer, only a slight hesitation in the steps before they continued and their wearer appeared around the curtain, revealing herself.

Dressed all in black except for one of the brightest orange scarves Will had ever seen,  she had a slender and decently pretty figure, that was, thanks to her black clothing contrasted against the whitish walls, silhouetted appealingly.

Her brown hair — whose reddish tint seemed to be emphasised by the vibrant scarf — was drawn back and up into the sort of hairstyle that seemed typical of a woman in a professional field who didn’t want her hair blowing around in her face, while her blue eyes were shadowed by grey makeup, and her lips were tinted by a red lipstick that was dark, but still vibrant enough to compete with the scarf.

She wasn’t unfamiliar to Will; in fact, just the opposite. She was familiar to him as Tristan’s wife, Chloë, a woman who didn’t look like she was ten years his senior, despite the facts.

“Hello,” she said in Dutch.

“Hello,” Will replied.

He wasn’t sure what she was calling on him for, but he saw something in her eyes and the expression on her face that gave him the impression she wasn’t there to try and pick up his spirits like everyone else seemed intent on doing. She actually rather looked like she was on some sort of business.

“He doesn’t understand Dutch, does he?” she asked, pointing toward the curtain.

“I don’t think so,” Will replied. “He’s fluent in French, though.”

She nodded, walking over to the chair, which sat empty, as Enka had left for some lunch, and seated herself.

“You are… aware that… Tristan, is, dead?” she asked haltingly.

“I am,” Will replied.

“And you… probably, have heard… that… he left a will?” she asked.

“I did,” Will replied.

She nodded. Will didn’t get the sense that sadness was causing her halting speech, but because she felt highly awkward. Considering what Tristan had confided in him when he’d confided in Tristan about his annoyance with Enka’s nosiness, he wondered if Tristan’s feeling had been mutual with Chloë.

“He… named you a beneficiary in it,” she said.

“Oh,” Will said, feeling a little surprised. He’d been left something by Tristan. He’d not expected that.

“He left you… one, sixth of his wealth,” she said. “As well as… his… entire wardrobe… and… some of his football memorabilia.”

Part of Will felt like he should express his thanks, but at the same time, it wasn’t like Chloë had decided to give those things to him, nor could she pass his thanks on to Tristan because Tristan was too dead to hear it. He didn’t know what to say. What was he supposed to do with all of Tristan’s clothes?

All That Remains: Day 7

Word Count: 42,023

Summary of Events:

Will's paternal grandparents and aunt came to visit him after Enka had left to check up on his house and the perishables within it, and Will became incredibly irritated by his aunt's exhortation for him to think positive without any instructions on how he was supposed to do that in the face of the tragedy he'd been involved in. Chloë, along with Tristan's sister and mother and all the other loved ones of the deceased gathered at Anderlecht's home pitch for a large public viewing of the bodies, for which some fans had been waiting hours in order to not miss out on a chance to pay their last respects…

Excerpt of the Day:

Now the doors were minutes away from opening, with police in position to ensure the group kept moving and no impassioned fans tried to take mementos from the bodies or the coffins. All they were allowed to do was take pictures or videos.

Chloë shifted restlessly on her heels. The cool wind was chilling her legs despite her choice to wear decently thick tights, and she really wanted to get this event over with so that she could go back to hiding her acute lack of grief.

Finally streams of purple, white, and black emerged from the access points and were guided by police toward the beginning of the line, which was located to Chloë’s left, where the team personnel were arrayed, their coffins adorned with special arrangements of purple and white flowers that were holding up cards that said their name and position.

The players each had the team shirts which had been secured to their coffins when they’d arrived from Frankfurt laying across the lower portion of the coffin with a smaller arrangement of purple and white flowers in order to not obscure their name and number on the shirt.

As for the bodies themselves, they were fully dressed in their own actual team kit, with the only difference from the norm being that flesh-coloured sleeves were slid over the arms of those who didn’t usually wear a long-sleeved undershirt while they played in order to look a bit more normal.

Chloë watched the stream of fans advance, with almost all of them snapping photos of each person as they walked past, some lingering for a moment, some even lowering themselves across the lower half of a coffin to weep.

Many of them spoke to the family and friends assembled at the head of each coffin, with some even exchanging hugs. Chloë didn’t want to be embraced, she was sure she’d feel stiff, and she didn’t want people to get suspicious of the truth.

Finally the first fans arrived, snapping photos with their phones and expressing earnest condolences that Chloë forced herself to nod in acknowledgement of while Elle and Amandine sobbed their thanks.

Following the arrival of the first fans, the stream was constant, leaving Chloë with hardly any time to observe much of anything, as she was too busy striving to look like she was grieving and sad, despite the fact that she was actually annoyed to be standing out in the cold and wishing the whole ordeal could be over.

Despite the fact that it felt like she stood there for about a month, she was eventually caught by surprise when she looked away from a fan who’d expressed condolences to her and found there wasn’t another fan waiting.

Looking down the line, she saw that mortuary personnel were closing the lids of the coffins, handing the floral arrangements and things to families, and moving the bodies out.

She slid back the coat sleeve and looked at her watch. The hour hand had advanced three twelfths of the way around the face, and the minute hand was a little bit past where it’d been when she’d last looked. Three hours had, in fact, elapsed.