Losing Her
Saffron knew something was wrong the moment her husband turned their daughter off.
“She was playing,” Saffron said, motioning to where Kira knelt, frozen, a doll in each hand. Her eyes were as dark as the night sky, void of all life. Lacking any fire, any spunk, any personality.
Saffron hated seeing her like this.
“We need to talk,” Dominik said. He took his hand from behind Kira’s ear and sat back down next to Saffron on the couch. “About Kira.”
“There’s nothing to talk about.” Saffron reached forward to turn their daughter back on again, but Dominik put his hand around Saffron’s wrist before she got to Kira’s ear.
They stayed like that, his hand around her and his eyes pleading with her, before he sighed and let go. Saffron reached for Kira, turned her on.
Kira’s eyes turned brown again, and she continued playing with dolls. Saffron felt her whole body relax at the sight of that lovely innocence. She hated the moments when Kira had to be turned off.
Dominik got up and headed to the kitchen, fuming silently.
Saffron tried to ignore it, but when she heard him cuss in the kitchen after dropping something, she pushed herself off the couch and headed after him. Her bones creaked with each step, reminding her how old she’d become even though their family had hardly changed.
“Are you okay?” she said, leaning against the doorway. She knew the answer, but wanted to play the part for a bit longer.
Dominik grunted in response. The wrinkles made permanent scars all over his yellowing body. Reminders of what they’d gone through, what they were still going through.
Saffron licked her lips to ignore how dry she felt in the wooden house. How old.
“We can’t do this forever,” he said.
Kira squealed excitedly in the other room, making Saffron’s heart flutter. Their daughter was happy, was alive.
“What do you mean?” Saffron tilted her head. She needed him to say it, to say that he cared more about her than their daughter.
Dominik poured water into a pot instead of responding. Saffron took the moment to check that their daughter was alright. She’d been quiet for a second too long, and it made Saffron’s heart pulse in fear.
Kira was there, playing with her dolls. Perfectly fine.
Fine. Okay. Alive.
“I can’t talk to you with her here,” Dominik said behind her. Saffron hated the way that he emphasized her as though Kira was some otherworldly creature, not a blessing.
“You agreed to this when…” Saffron lowered her voice so Kira wouldn’t hear, “when she passed.”
“That was forty years ago.”
“And? Nothing’s changed,” Saffron lied. She didn’t mention how her bones ached every morning, how even though she woke up excited to see her daughter, she knew it wasn’t sustainable.
She didn’t mention how last night, as she was getting ready for bed, she saw Dominik searching for symptoms of pancreatic cancer.
Kira would never grow up as a replik. Never get sick. Never sleep. Never be truly human.
Dominik rolled his eyes. He walked around her and turned Kira off again. Saffron didn’t stop him this time, but she stared at him with daggers. Water turned to steam in the kitchen, but neither of them broke eye contact to tend to it.
Dominik sat down on the couch with a relieved sigh. She stood next to her daughter. Their daughter.
“I think it’s time that we let Kira go.”
“You want to kill her.” Saffron’s breath quickened.
“She died forty years ago.” He leaned forward, tears on the edge of his eyes, just like the night of the car accident. Saffron was driving. “This is just a replica of her. We have to move on.”
He moved to the corner of the room, far away from Kira as though he was afraid of her.
He hated her. He wouldn’t say it, but she could tell in the way he cried, curled in a ball, facing away from their daughter. She could tell in the way he held himself close, as though he was alone in this.
Saffron smelled smoke, fire within her soul fueling her anger. She walked up to Dominik and stood over him. “She’s not a replica. She’s our daughter.”
She didn’t know how to make him understand that she needed this. Without Kira, she was nothing. Without Kira, they would stop acting. They would become older. They would lose their love for each other, if there was any left.
She held him, hoping he would understand that for their marriage to stay as it was, for them to keep pretending instead of fighting, Kira needed to stay alive.
Soon the smoke smell was too strong to ignore. Saffron looked over to see flames consuming the living room.
It was coming from the kitchen, from the unattended pot.
Saffron hesitated. She was helpless, just like how she was in the car, just like how she was in her marriage. Playing a part until she wasn’t sure what else to do.
She glanced over at Kira, frozen, mid-playing with her dolls. Saffron could already see Kira’s face bending from the heat, the skin slipping down to reveal the metal underneath. Saffron reached for her, but Dominik grabbed her hand.
“I don’t want to lose you, too. We can replace her,” he said, but Saffron wasn’t paying attention.
“No, we can’t. It’ll never be the same.” If Kira left, Dominik would too, she knew it. If their daughter wasn’t keeping them together, he would have told her about his symptoms. He would have told her he was dying. He would have stopped trying, stopped acting.
Dominik held Saffron close, his hands wrapped around her, tight and loving and restricting.
Saffron screamed. Tears streaked down her face. She kicked him in the shin and he let go.
She dove into the fire after her daughter.
Camden Rose is a queer author who loves seeking out magic beneath the everyday world. Her works have appeared with Inner Worlds and Heartlines Spec. She lives in the Pacific Northwest with her spouse, black cats, and collection of books and board games. You can find her online at www.camdenscorner.com.