Up until about twenty minutes ago we were talking non-stop since leaving Las Vegas. I found myself telling him things I’ve never shared with another living soul, not even Ben. He absorbed every word I spoke and actually wanted to hear more. I told him about my parents, what their hopes were for my future, about the dreams I once had for my own future, the ones that would have made my parents smile down on me from Heaven. I told him about my life when I was younger, the one when I had parents I loved and who loved me. I even shared with him how my parents died, which I rarely ever did. Something about him just makes me want to open up. It’s one of the many feelings I’m experiencing that I don’t understand.
He talked about his family. He has a brother, eighteen months older, and a sister, fifteen months younger. His father died when he was sixteen, but his mother is very much a part of his life. She has since remarried. His mother’s sister lives in Paris and has one child. He has never met his cousin. His maternal grandparents died before he was born, and his paternal grandparents died a couple of years ago. His father was an only child. He talked openly about his grandparents’ deaths, but he never mentioned how his father died and I didn’t ask. He was elusive about it, and I felt I shouldn’t ask. I respected his right to keep some things that are difficult to talk about private.
He told me about how he started his band back in high school with his two buddies; how their band’s name was so unoriginally conceived on a drunken bet and why they kept the size of their band to only three. He told me about his career goals, which ones he has successfully achieved, and which ones he has not, and even why. He told me about some of the disappointments life has thrown his way on his journey toward a music career. He discussed how it seems to be just an illusion that happiness and notoriety can work together in harmony. He further explained why it is just an illusion and why he feels happiness and fame don’t seem to be able to co-mingle in the manic commercial music industry. He even divulged his wish to remain an unknown and just make music; how his brother, the band manager, disagreed with him and kept pushing the band further into the limelight.
However, that fond exchange has long passed and now we sit in silence, both still processing the last conversation we had. I’m not sure what to say or do right now. My mind won’t stop traveling from the past to the present; from Ben to River and back. Why can’t I stop this time travel?
Thinking back to the start of this conversation, to when River asked, “Can I ask you something?” I question my immediate response of “Sure, anything.” I wonder if I should have been a little more cautionary before answering. But I wasn’t expecting the question he presented or the emotions deep within me that began to rise to the surface as I answered. Thinking about it now it makes sense, since thoughts of Ben never seem to be far away for long.
Over the last few months, I had become very good at pushing the memories of Ben’s murder back into the far depths of my mind. I had perfected how not to relive his death in my nightmares. However, the closer we got to LA, and the closer I got to the place Ben died, the quicker my memories started creeping to the forefront of my mind. Not just memories, but feelings as well. Grief over his death resurfaced momentarily, but guilt over returning with someone to where he died overtook me.
So, when River asked the very direct question, “How did he die?”, it triggered the flood of every horrid memory and ill feeling that was already there, just waiting to break through. Once I opened the dam, there was no closing it. I couldn’t. I had to let it open. I told River about the whole tragic night as I remembered it. With tears streaming down my face, my body shaking with fear, my voice trembling with emotion, I told him what I had never told anyone before. I retold my fiancé’s brutal attack as it happened, but from my point of view. This time I was not a witness, but I was me; the girl who loved a boy who was killed in front of her own eyes.