My second mother has always lived in the glass pane between the kitchen and dining room. I've never told my parents about her - they'd never believe me anyway. As far as they know the house has a few quirks and oddities but no more than anywhere else in the neighbourhood.
I suppose that's what you'd expect when building new homes on top of the infamous largest plague pit in Europe. My second mother still has the marks from it, still sweats and groans from the illness that not even death could cure. She's always covered in sweat and great black pustules that I glimpse whenever she lifts anything.
Still, she's always made it clear that she's going to watch over me for as long as I live and when I die her soul might be redeemed from the plague enough that we can both move on into heaven. When I was a child I loved hearing that - she had this way of making my eventual demise sound so happy, like every Christmas and birthday rolled into one and lifted up with the angels.
I never thought she might get impatient with the wonderfully prolonged lifespans our modern medicines afford us.
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