The Golden Echo.

Trigger note: Depicts loss and grief of a relative, with christian belief systems from the characters.

The Golden Echo.

It was strange watching my young child of seven rifle through his grandma's things. We had inherited the lot on her passing, just two weeks prior. The house was to be sold, but its contents were ours to do as we pleased.

Having gone through a divorce myself, barely six months before, our current home was void of objects. Basic necessities only, for he had taken much. 

The death of my mother had been a timely one, as sad as it was to say goodbye. Her wedding picture glared at me from the wall, dark hair against a white gown and sparkling tiara. It still amazed me at how rapidly the onset of old age and dementia had taken effect, stealing her youth and vitality. At least now she'd be free of pain and suffering, something I hoped to protect my child from. 

He ran to the kitchen in search of something. What, I was not sure.

"Mummy, where's granny's spoons?"

"In the drawer I suspect, why?"

"Oh goodie."

He proceeded to open every one, piling out its contents onto the kitchen counters, one small handful at a time.

"Nope, not that one" he huffed in exuberant exhaustion. "Not that one neither."

The mess on the sides were steadily growing. I couldn't help but chuckle to myself. He sure was good at making a mess.

"What are you looking for?"

"The golden spoon. You remember right mummy?"

His eyes looked up with a pleading intensity that made him look like one of those cute, wide eyed paintings, light glinting inside. My heart melted.

"What a strange thing to want" I mumbled, recalling the small, wooden handled teaspoon, which my mother often used to put sugar in her tea.

I remembered the spoon because it was smaller than a standard teaspoon, and never sweetened the tea enough for my preference, but Alice was hardly ever without it now I came to think of it.

"Maybe it's in the sugar canister." Seeing him frown in misunderstanding, for the word 'canister' was a new one on him.

I reached for the sugar pot and brought it down to his height. Facing my excited child, on my knees, hunched over the pot, we opened the lid together.

Sure enough, there it stood. Its wooden handle, intricately inlaid with gold that ran the length of the curved wood, to the topper where two bevels and bumps shaped it like a golden crown on a head of brown hair. The scoop of the spoon hidden under a sea of white grains.

Jacob's face beamed as though he had found the greatest treasure of all time.

"Can I have it?" He asked.

"Jacob honey, you can have anything from this house that your heart desires…" giving his hair a ruffle with my free hand, "...but wouldn't you prefer the trains or box of toys grandma gathered for when you came to stay."

"Nope, this'll do." 

He whipped it out of the canister, sending a rainbow of sugar to the floor, then used the step-stool to gain access to the sink. He ran the spoon under the flowing tap until the wood darkened and the gold shone. As he ran off to play airplanes with his find, the task of boxing up the kitchen-wear stared at me. 

“Now's as good a time as any.” I began organising it into cardboard boxes of stuff we could use, stuff to be sold and stuff my mother would prefer to be donated. Hours went by. 

It was amazing to see how much stuff she had shoved into every nook and cranny, from the iron-cast saucepan set to the cupboard of table cloths, and birthday candles. Even the drawer of miscellaneous items, half broken and well worn, found its way into an assigned box for the clearance men, due to come another day. My head continuously evoked past moments of memories as I worked.

My son was content playing in the garden with the golden spoon and an old action figure. The sun had come out to play too, surprising, for the rainy season. 

Holding a hot cup of perfectly sweetened tea (because an ordinary sized teaspoon had been used,) and leaning against the patio door, I took a break. We would both miss this place, as we'd miss Alice who once owned it. She'd be able to sit beside her lifelong husband again. A relationship that had spanned nearly fifty-five years, before he had passed of a heart attack, leaving her to live alone, as quickly as I had been left. 

I watched my child play, wondering what the boy found so special about such an ordinary item. That night, after taking the box packed for charity to a secondhand store, and eating a McDonald's in the car park before returning home, I would find out.

“Goodnight Jacob” 

The sheets were tucked in, and I kissed his forehead.

“Say goodnight to granny too” he pleaded, holding the little spoon up for me to kiss as well. 

“Goodnight mother.”

A smile crept into my cheeks, hardly believing the silliness of the moment. 

It seemed to please Jacob, so with awkward reverence, I kissed the scoop of the spoon with gentle lips, my mind saying another farewell. Water gathered under my lower eyelids. 

“See you in the morning kiddo” ruffling his hair once again.

“Nite nite mummy, and Granny says thank you”

“Whatever for?”

“For letting me keep her magical spoon.”

“Magical hah?” 

The gold glinted like a wink. My child hugged it to his chest.

“Yep, granny says that's why she used it for the sugar. That way she could feed a bit of magic into every spoonful.” He yawned and instantly fell to sleep. 

Walking towards the door, flipping the light switch off, an eerie white silhouette of my mother sitting on my son's bed was the last to fade into darkness. 

“Until the morrow” I repeated her words, with a warmth in my heart.