Happy Reading!
**Edited as of August 7, 2008**
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PART TWO
Strike me down with lightning…
The sky cried with open sorrow, the clouds parting to reveal a downpour of acid tears that stung the faces of those who were unlucky enough to feel such a proclamation of melancholy.
I was one of those unfortunate souls.
My hood was drawn tight around me, in a vain attempt to keep the rain from touching my hair. It was a hopeless cause, however, and the raindrops clung to my hair, creating a halo of frizz around my head. The people around me were smart enough to bring umbrellas and the roof of black rippled in the suddenly violent wind. I held up my hands against the on-slot of water but my eyes wouldn’t leave the scene that was tearing my heart to shreds.
Next to me, a sobbing woman shielded by a large umbrella shook in the cold. Feeling for her as I would for my own mother, I shed my windbreaker and wrapped it around her shoulders. Her eyes turned to me, the chocolate orbs rimmed in red. “Thank you,” she choked out, clutching the windbreaker tighter around her. I couldn’t find words to reply so instead, my eyes traveled to the younger girl next to her. Melinda looked no different, her mascara leaving black streaks down her ruddy cheeks. My heart went out to her, or what was left of it. I couldn’t bear to see her so lifeless, so blank. Her eyes were worse, vacant, dead, as if she couldn’t believe what she was seeing.
I felt the same way.
Turning back to the service, I was forced to keep a placid face, to be strong for the people around me. I had always assumed this position for my fellow siblings, especially after the Home split us up, sending us off to various families to carry out our lives. But after all that misery, it had seemed like my life was finally falling into place.
But now I had to resort back to this, to this place of dread and despair…back to the land of the dead.
As I watched, my mind brought me back to similar time. But this day was sunny, so joyful, that I found it hard to control my anger. I had hated everyone. I had loathed my fellow siblings, my uncles and aunts who had sat back and let my mother deteriorate until she was merely skin and bones.
But most of all, I hated my father.
There he was, standing in the corner, looking none-the-ware. He was dressed in back suit, white tie, and shiny shoes. His hair was combed, his cheeks and jaw cleanly shaven, his eyes clear of sorrow. He looked as handsome as usual, and the hateful monster roared inside of me, begging me to tear into him, to hurt him as much as he had hurt my family, my brothers and sisters, my pour mother who was now gone from this earth.
The preacher’s final words severed the memory and I was pulled back with a jerk into reality again. Mrs. Benson thanked him graciously, and I showed my own gratitude, even though I hadn’t heard a word of it. Then, in a long line, we all walked past the coffin and paid our respects. I was third in line, between Melinda and one of the uncles. I watched as Mrs. Benson wailed over his body, over her…I halted before this thought came crashing around me. Before I faced the facts, before I finally let the inevitable sink in, the unbelievable become real.
Eventually, Mr. Benson tore his wife away from the body and it was Melinda’s turn. She wrote a poem for him, something that touched me so deeply that I felt nearly ill. She was whispering softly then, reading the poem to him. She looked so strong, even to me. She was like myself. Brave in the face of death. And I admired her more than ever right then.
Before she left, she pressed her fingers to her lips, sealing a kiss, and presenting it to him on his forehead. Then, she walked away.
It was my turn.
I feared what I would see. Would he be the same as before? Would he still be mine? I swallowed hard and forced myself to look.
He looked so angelic, so clean, so unnaturally perfect that I wanted to scream. He was dressed in a tuxedo that didn’t suit him and the nerdy glasses were absent from his face. In his hands, he held a rose from his parents and around his neck…I clutched at my throat…was the identical necklace that I wore around my neck. That was the only thing that reminded me of the Adam I knew.
Otherwise, he looked like the image he had painted for his parents long ago. An image of the A-student, honorable boy who competed in track and basketball while doing community service at the Soup Kitchen.
But I would always remember Adam as the boy who hated to wear a shirt in the summer. Who loved to run in sprinklers and play football with his younger cousins. Who reached out to everybody, small or big, and who never got discouraged.
He was also the boy who got angry when his favorite television show was canceled and secretly hates his mother’s hot dishes. He was also the boy who had won my heart and broken it too many times to count.
I knew I was holding up the line but I couldn’t tear my eyes away from the picture before me. I didn’t want to remember him like this, but I knew that after I had seen it, I would never be able to forget it. I glanced up at the uncle waiting patiently behind me. He smiled softly but I couldn’t smile back. Instead, I turned to Adam, looked at him one last time, and walked away without one word spoken.
I want a simple explanation; what I’m feeling inside…
The rain lashed against my window, fitting my mood perfectly, which angered me even more because I knew that nothing was perfect. Nothing was ever the happy ending you wanted it to be.
Fairy tales were lies!
Pulling my knees to my chest, I felt the sudden urge to scream. But I swallowed it down, hearing the mumbling just outside my door of my foster mother and father debating if they should check on me or not. I waited patiently until I heard the slight click of the door being opened. “Sweetie? You want anything?” my foster mother asked in that motherly tone that suddenly irritated me more than anything. Her hair was immaculate, pulled away from her face in a intelligent looking bun. She still had her work clothes on—a cream-colored blouse and brown pencil skirt that would have matched Adam’s eyes.
“No, I’m fine,” I said through clenched teeth, feeling the tears well.
“Well, you just let us know if you need anything, okay?” my foster father said softly. He was dressed in his construction outfit, bright orange hard hat in his hands. I nodded once and they departed, still whispering to each other all the way out the door.
Once I was alone, I rolled over onto my side and buried my face into my pillow. My body seemed to be cracking at the seams. I didn’t feel like myself; it felt like I was watching myself through somebody else’s eyes. And in my chest was a vacancy that I knew would never be filled.
I rolled onto my back, glaring at my ceiling. I wanted to ask someone why. Why him? Why me? Why now? Why that? It was painful to think of the possible answers. The Benson’s had only told me the basics of the story. They had said the car had rolled three times and it was said that he felt no pain, that it had been quick. Was that supposed to be helpful? Was that supposed to ease my pain, knowing he had left this world without any? I punched my wall, somehow taking comfort in the now throbbing pulse in my knuckles. I didn’t like feeling like this; I didn’t like revisiting this devastating feeling of confusion and lost. I had enough of that in my life, but it seemed that it wasn’t over yet.
I groaned and rolled back over onto my side, this time facing my alarm clock. The time blinked at me with its neon-green lights flashing. 2:42. I had gotten the call five days before from Melinda. She wasn’t crying, so no alarm had come to me until she had said those dreadful words.
“…Valerie…Adam is dead.”
It seemed that the word “dead” was connected somehow to my tear ducts and even now, thinking of the word, salty droplets scarred my cheeks. I rubbed them away and pulled my blanket over me, chilled by the thoughts of Adam. He had been my rock throughout everything. He had been there since the beginning. I had never really appreciated it until now. And like everybody says:
“You don’t appreciate it until it’s gone.”
lol)
