Finn.
I close my eyes again, and the heavyheavyweight presses on my lungs again, and I can’t breathe, and I don’t want to.
I trudge down the hall to my brother’s room and I stand in front of the door.
I stare at the wood, at the grain, at the indention, at the handle. I don’t want to open it because I know what I’ll find.
But I have to. I have to see it.
Reaching down, I turn the knob.
The door creaks open, revealing what my heart knew I’d find.
An empty room.
The bed is still there, neatly made. Finn’s posters are still on the wall, of Quid Quo Pro and the Cure. His black Converses sit next to the door, like he’s going to wear them again, but he’s not. His dirty laundry is still in his hamper. His books line the shelves. His favorite pillow waits for him, his CDs, his phone. All of it.
But he’s not coming back.
I grab his shoes, his smelly boy shoes and I clutch them to my chest and I sink into his smelly boy bed and I’m numb. I stare at the wall without seeing it, at the posters without registering the faces. I’m wood, I’m stone, I’m brick. I don’t feel. I don’t feel. Nothing can hurt me.
I’m like this for a while, until Little
By
Little,
Sounds begin to filter into my consciousness, and there’s water. Running water, and I feel dew-like condensation on my skin, and for a second, I’m annoyed because Finn knows to turn on the exhaust fan when he showers, but he always forgets.
Wait.
My head yanks up as Finn’s bathroom door opens and he sticks his wet head out.
“Calla! What are you doing in here? And why do you have my shoes?”
I faint.
Or I think I faint.
When I open my eyes again, Finn is holding my hand.
“Are you ok?” he asks, and his blue eyes are worried.
“Yeah,” I manage to say, once I’m over the shock of being seated next to my dead but now alive brother. “I think so.”
Mybrotherisalive
Mybrotherisalive
He’s alive.
He’s holding my hand.
I shake my head and try to drive the nonsense out, and suddenly, everything is clear for the first time in a long long time. I can think without murk, without voices.
What the hell?
Sabine’s words come back to me You have to choose, You have to choose.
Last night before bed, I’d chosen Finn, over anything, over my own life.
Did I do this?
It’s not possible.
Did I do this?
Finn looks at me. “Why aren’t you dressed? You’ve got to go get ready.”
“For?” I arch an eyebrow.
He’s quiet and still, I remember the accident, and a heavy sense of foreboding slams into me right before he answers.
“For mom’s funeral.”
Oh.
God.
My mother is dead and my memory has holes.
I somehow trip down to my room and put on a black dress, and I somehow trip down the stairs with my brother and sit in the family section of the chapel, and my dad holds my hand.
The casket is white and there are star-gazers on it, and the lid is closed.
Someone reads a poem, then another.
Someone else speaks about angels and Heaven.
My dad cries silently.
Finn is stoic, and grips my arm.
I’m numb.
Because I thought mom was in the hospital and Finn was dead.
Only Finn is here and mom is dead.
You
Have
To
Choose.
Reality isn’t real.
Like always.
The music plays as they roll the casket out, down the long aisle, as if my mother is on parade, her last parade.
We stand and the funeral-goers file past us, one by one by one.
I’m sorry for your loss.
Heaven has gained another angel.
If you need anything, just call.
All trite words from people who don’t know what else to say.
And then someone new stands in front of me. His eyes are dark, his hair is dark, his body is lean. He’s wearing a black suit just like all of them, but he’s wearing a silver ring, and it gleams in the sunlight, and something something something ripples through me, but I don’t know what it is.