Her eyes grow large and she quickly grabs a napkin and wipes it off. She takes a bite of her cone. “Can we go to the zoo today?”
I take a spoonful of my Strawberry Cheesecake. “I’ve got a lot of homework. This weekend, though. Okay?”
Her smile drops a little and she sucks in her ice cream–coated bottom lip. She doesn’t say anything for a moment and I think she’s going to get mad or try to manipulate me, but she simply says, “Okay,” with a sweet smile.
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Had I known it would be the last time I was going to talk to her, I’d have taken her to the damn zoo, maybe imparted some sisterly wisdom. Given her more hugs.
Something inside me tells me Let go. It whispers memories into the night while I sleep. It claws at my insides, begs me to surrender to the words. I don’t know if it’s Happy Ellery trying to prepare me for the end, or if it’s an angel, or my own subconscious. But it’s always there, calling to me.
“I know I told you I would try to forget, but I can’t get over what happened. So I’m going to do the one thing that’s still in my control.” My voice is carried on a gust of wind.
I wait to see if her spirit will appear and tell me not to do it. I’m not sure if I want her to or not. She’s the only one that can set me free.
Mom hasn’t visited Tate’s grave in months. Sometimes when I look in her eyes I see it. The pain she’s trying to hide. The shameful thoughts she denies. Why wasn’t it you? Why is my precious girl in the ground and you’re here taking up space?
Jackson was there after she died, holding my hand, telling me it wasn’t my fault.
He has no idea what the real story is. No one does.
It was raining hard that night and my tires kept slipping on the wet pavement. The bridge loomed in the distance, mocking me with its height.
I close my eyes and I’m there. Driving on the bridge. Then I’m floating, floating down.
My phone’s shrill ring echoes in the cemetery. It’s a call again, not a text.
I groan and push the button to ignore it.
It rings again. I put it on speaker. “What?”
“Ell?” Colter says, sounding panicked.
“Yeah?”
He clears his throat. “Just wanted to make sure you got home okay.”
I told him I had to go to the store to meet a friend and that they would make sure I got home. “I’m fine, Tom Sawyer. I can take care of myself. Just leave me alone.”
“Believe me. I wish I could, but I can’t. If I have to ride your ass, I will.”
I laugh. “I have to go,” I say, hanging up on him, still laughing until tears come again and then I’m crying, weeping, and screaming into the empty darkness.
This decision was supposed to be easy.
I crouch down in front of Tate’s grave and stare at it. I can barely see a thing in the shadow of the hidden moon. Tate’s laugh bubbles up in my mind, and her ice cream–covered mouth, and her big brown eyes as they looked up at the stars. Her tiny hands as they grasped mine when we visited the zoo. She pointed at the zebras and wanted to pet the goats. She told me she wished she could have a goat as a pet. She begged Mom, but Mom told her we didn’t have a farm. So she begged for that too. She never gave up. She wanted to be an astronaut. She could have been one. She was so smart.
I sink deeper into the freezing grass. Guilt seeps into every thought, it colors every blink, every breath. It turns love into something ugly, something undeserving, wrong. It tackles my soul and demolishes it. I rip at the grass in front of her headstone and toss it to the side. I need something to hold in my hands, something to squeeze the life out of. I tear more grass and hit soil. I shove my fingers into the dirt and squish it in my hands. It’s soft and cold and I toss it on her grave and it falls on me and turns me black. I dig. I dig down into the grave. I want to be there. I want to be there instead of her.
“It should’ve been me,” I whisper. “This wasn’t the way it was supposed to be.”
I collapse onto the dirt and continue digging weakly, trying to get somewhere else. My fingers are so cold I can’t get very far. My tears drip into the soil, absorbing instantly. I lay my head on the curb of her headstone; it’s cold and the jagged edge hurts my face, but I don’t care. I want it to hurt. I want to feel the pain. I want something to feel right. A trickle of blood flows down the gray stone. Wiping it away, I lie there, watching the clouds hurry past the moon, covering and uncovering it in a special dance that can only be seen at night.
My face is stiff from tears, and my nose won’t stop running. I curl my feet up into me, scraping the soil with my shoes. I grab my knees and lie next to my sister, wishing for once she could tell me what to do.
I close my eyes and listen to the animals scurrying, the slight wind rustling the leaves, my own heartbeat.
Maybe tonight I can die. Out here among the trees and the moon and stars. Where I belong.
“I’m so sorry.”
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