The Midnight Rose

By Sarah Jarvis

While out with his friends one night, Yuan Lee sees a girl plummet into a nearby river. As the four friends rush to the river’s edge, Yuan dives into the icy water and pulls the floating, seemingly lifeless soul to the surface. After he unsuccessfully attempts to breathe life into the frail girl, she is loaded into an ambulance. Unfortunately, the experience haunts Yuan for some time.

Cora is a shy yet defiant thirteen-year-old who helplessly watches as other girls in her orphanage are adopted. Because of her age, she knows she is running out of time. When she decides to run away, Cora has no idea where her path will lead her. Still, she knows that whatever awaits her has to be better than staying at the orphanage. As her life changes in ways she never imagined, she is confronted with unknown dangers and challenges. Meanwhile, Yuan has become the manager of a health clinic that is dealing with the emergence of a strange illness that is also afflicting him. As fate brings them together once again, now only time will tell if Yuan can find a cure for his sickness and if Cora will find a way to overcome her internal demons, open her heart to new relationships, and begin her life anew.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse UK
• Release date: Jun 16, 2021
• ISBN: 9781665590594

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© 2021 Sarah Jarvis. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or

transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse   06/16/2021

ISBN: 978-1-6655-9060-0 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-6655-9061-7 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-6655-9059-4 (e)

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in

this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views

expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the

views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

CONTENTS

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Chapter 48

Chapter 49

Chapter 50

Chapter 51

About the Author

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CHAPTER 1

AFTER THE SEEMINGLY ENDLESS FALL into the icy limitless river, the sudden sharp shock stunned her body into motionlessness. The intense weightlessness felt divine. She was submerged for only moments, and while her arms and legs were already losing feeling, that didn’t stop the freezing waters from shocking her system into fighting to survive. However, she didn’t want to fight; she didn’t want to survive. But her body fought against her will. It was as if her will and her soul were fighting for control of her body, one to keep her alive and breathing, but the other wanted to keep her under until the very end.

She fought with all her might, so much so that her heart began to throb with an ache previously unfelt. It throbbed with such fierceness that she could feel every throb in her ear, and every throb became louder and louder. Who knew that the simple act of dying could be so painful? She hoped against all hope that this pain would soon disappear, and everything would be over as quickly as it had begun.

She would soon vanish, disappear, forgotten by everyone, and then she would find some sort of peace. Is that not what people are destined to find when they pass? Peace. She so desperately wanted to find peace, and she would go to any length to find it.

She pushed herself away from the surface of the water, diminishing her chances of surviving. On impulse and in frantic desperation, her body gasped, urgent for air, only to be met with freezing water. The last bubbles of oxygen gushed out of her freezing body in a race to break the surface. Her very life drained with every release of breath.

Her mind and her body dived into a sudden but expected panic and fought wildly. Her arms and legs thrashed in a fit to survive, but she didn’t want to break the surface and face the world again—the loveless, tasteless, and darkest desires of this decaying world. No, she didn’t want to be part of that world anymore, and her desire to disappear became even stronger.

Forcing her arms and legs to be still, she felt the tug and pull of the current as she began to sink farther down. With her last smile, she released her last bubble of air. The last thing she saw was a distorted view of what seemed to be people looking down at her in the icy river. They seemed to move so frantically. The water made it look as if they were almost dancing, and then the calmness of the river shattered.

Her body jerked, jolted, and spasmed to the last beats of her dying heart. In her last moments of consciousness, she again felt the strain of her heart and the pain as it tried to stay alive, but soon enough the ache of her heart began to subside.

The pain gave way to the last bit of peacefulness and calm that felt as if it could be addicting. Now the endless sleep called for her so strongly that she couldn’t resist; she didn’t want to resist. As the feeling of weightlessness overcame her, she allowed the current to gently rock her and carry her dying body farther down to the bottom. She found a last peace in the gentle rocking of the current, rocking her to sleep like a little girl in her father’s arms. She allowed her eyes to close for the last time as her weightless body slowly became numb and lifeless. The noises of life began to die down as she drifted off.

The warmest burst of life shattered the icy numbness of her hand. It was the last bit of hurt as she felt her soul being drawn up.

She let go.

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CHAPTER 2

HE HAD SEEN HER. HE had seen her plummet into the icy water, oblivious to anyone else walking the river’s edge. He dashed with bated breath to where he saw her fall only to see nothing but the ripples she had left.

Did you just see that?

Four friends, best and closest of friends, rushed frantically to the river’s edge. Their eyes darted frantically around as they tried to find something, not having a clue what to expect. A hurricane of frantic voices gathered like vultures to a decaying body. Some, unsure as to what to do, just gawked at the sudden disturbance. Only one soul was brave enough to dive into the icy waters, and what he saw wounded him enough to try that little bit harder. With a terrified hand, he reached out to the floating, seemingly lifeless soul just drifting away from him. He swam and fought to reach the girl, and with his frightened hand reached out and grabbed wildly at her. Her hand was freezing, and he imagined that the rest of her was just as cold. A sudden panic rose within him; he had to get her to the surface as quickly as he could. Dragging her to the surface, he shook with icy chills and a fear he had never felt before.

He pushed her body up first, allowing her to be the first one to return to the world. His friends wasted no time in dragging this young girl from the river. They laid her gently on the stone pathway before they turned their attention to their friend. People gasped and just stood there and stared at what was unfolding before their eyes.

She lay there in front of everyone, and all everyone did was stare at her. She lay motionless, blue in colour. Her body radiated no sign of life. To the surprise of her rescuer, she was younger than he was. He shook with a chill, but it did not stop him from rushing to the girl.

With the kiss of life, he attempted with all his might to return some sort of life to this petite thing. At first sight he thought that she was barely older than ten. She wore no shoes, and her thin clothing made him question why she was out here alone. His friends frantically phoned the ambulance and police, who arrived in a matter of minutes. They arrived in a blizzard of sirens and blinding lights while he was still trying to bring life into this little girl. With every breath he gave, he hoped to hear her heart beating. He did not stop until the paramedics pulled him off the frail girl. Her life was in their hands now.

The four friends could do nothing but stand by and watch as the ambulance crew lifted the little girl up onto the steel-tray trolley, but in the commotion, her arm drooped lifelessly off the side. Her rescuer’s heart sank with a failure that he had never known. Her light-blue bracelet fell aimlessly from her wrist, left abandoned on the ground as they grabbed her hand and placed it back along her side. They loaded her into the back of the ambulance like a slab of meat, and with the slamming of doors, they sped off into the night, sirens blazing, never to be seen again.

The friends looked on in a state of shock that stayed with them for some time to come. They watched as she was driven off into the night, bound for the hospital. The four friends returned home to their families that evening and cried on their parents’ shoulders for what they saw stayed with them and haunted their dreams for many, many nights to come.

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CHAPTER 3

FOR MONTHS FOLLOWING, ALL FOUR best friends had nightmares of what happened that evening. But after a year or so, their nightmares began to disappear, and their preparation for entering college took all focus off the trauma. They seemed to return to normalcy. Or all of them but one.

Yuan spent all his spare time searching newspapers and magazines for any mention of a girl drowning or of a girl jumping into a river that night. Two things occupied him the most at this still very delicate time. First was his schoolwork. But if he wasn’t working on that, he was searching high and low for the girl he lost that night, the girl who seemed to disappear into thin air for the newspapers reported nothing of what happened; nor was it mentioned on TV news. He kept newspaper clippings in an unmarked cardboard box tucked under his bed, hidden from prying eyes and inquisitive minds.

All he had to remember her by was the light-blue beaded bracelet that had fallen from her wrist and was now wrapped around his own. He swore that if he couldn’t find out what happened to her, he would at least remember her. He dreamed of her still sometimes, and her face, touched by death itself, seemed blissfully asleep.

He felt useless every time he dreamed of her lying in front of him helpless. He was disgusted with himself, even hated himself, knowing that he couldn’t save her, that he couldn’t breathe life into his frail girl. He so desperately wanted to see her eyes snap open with renewed life, to have her heart beat again. He failed to do that. He wanted to become a doctor, but he had failed in his duty to save a little girl.

William watched helplessly as he saw his only child, his only son, being eaten up by this guilt. Many nights he peered into Yuan’s room and saw him fighting in his nightmares, yet he would not ask what was troubling him. His son was becoming a young man, but William remembered the day he returned home and had launched himself at his father and clung to him as if he were just a child, desperate for his father’s comfort. Yuan sobbed his heart out on his father’s shoulder that night when he told his father what happened. But no matter what his father said to try and comfort his son, Yuan still suffered from nightmares because of it. He was helpless to help his son, and all the doctors could do was to dull the frequency of his nightmares by giving him sleeping pills.

The mornings following, there always hung an atmosphere of sadness and helplessness. Silence reigned supreme on those mornings.

Yuan? Are you okay today? a concerned father asked, almost with kid gloves. Yuan sheepishly raised his head from his breakfast, knowing why his father was asking. Yuan sighed lightly in defeat. He had hoped that his father wouldn’t notice, again.

Sorry, Dad. I’m having the nightmares again.

William was not surprised, but he dared not press too far or too deep. Only Yuan could fight this demon that followed him everywhere, held down and subdued only by sleeping pills.

A short but deep silence fell upon the room before Yuan answered again. But you already knew that though, didn’t you?

His father sighed in defeat himself. And with a fearful sadness, he attempted to comfort his son. Just making sure my son is okay. I’m not going to pry. I’m just worried. I am your father after all.

An argument was not needed so early in the morning, and Yuan knew that his father meant well. He was more thankful than he was angry, but he left breakfast early and almost sharply in frustration to disappear at college for the day. His father, regretted asking, and his appetite gone, William left his own breakfast unconsumed.

He loved his son most dearly in the world. He was the one thing his wife gave to this world before she died. He was all he had left of her, and he did everything he could to protect that which he loved most in the world, Yuan. But he found himself helpless to protect him this time, and it killed him inside bit by bit.

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CHAPTER 4

CORA WOKE FULLY IN THE cold bare room she shared with six other children. They were all different ages, but she was the oldest by far. The room was almost void of heating. Double glazing on the windows helped with keeping most of the heating inside, but that didn’t stop their breath from hanging stagnantly in the air, like a cloud that dispersed slowly. Candles lightened their lives in these gloomy circumstances.

The orphanage was built on the border of two drastically different sides of a vast city, the old city and the new city. The cold and dark, grimy, ageing brick walls personified no warmth or welcome. It was an orphanage tucked away from view, out of thought, hidden behind two thirteen-foot brick walls, the likes of which had not been seen since the days of the great war concentration camps. The walls were unkempt. The ivy had begun to take root, threatening to thrive and devour the whole wall. It was an effective means of keeping the children from running away and keeping those on the outside from creeping in. The grassy grounds, however, were kept immaculate and showed no signs of trampling.

The orphanage painted this pretty little picture on the outside that projected the image of caring, tenderness, and neatness. People looking to adopt a child were taken into an immaculately neat and tidy office that gave the impression of a richness that was never felt by the children. A chandelier hung low from the ceiling, illuminating the pearl-coloured walls in an angelic light. The very air smelt of vanilla and lavender, of tranquillity and calmness. The table hogged most of the space in the room. Its dark, shiny, polished surface projected love and care in its maintenance.

The cream velvet seat covers of the chairs were cared for so well that they felt oh so soft to the touch. They offered the person a very luxurious and comfortable experience when sitting at the table.

This was all in sharp contrast to the children’s rooms. They were as different as hot and cold.

All this was done to impress high-ranking people who came to the orphanage director in hopes of adopting a child. In return, the orphanage director would be given huge sums of money. The older children were harder to