Note: I know this is the second time I posted this topic, but the first one doesn't seem to work. At least, for me.
Anyways, please enjoy.
~~~
I had long ago given up trying to straighten my life. I used to be able to straught it easily; to take the ends of it and pull. And everything would fall back into place. I could do this because I was unaware of reality. I was unaware of the future, of my future, and of all the one’s closest to me. Of their futures, too. I was completely, and utterly, unaware.
I told myself once, long, long ago, that no matter what happened I would stick up my chin and hide all my feelings behind a gigantic, artificial smile. Of course it would seem authentic to anyone who looked at it. I figured, hey, if I could pull off a smile, after a while I’d become happy because everyone would treat me like I was happy. So I started practicing my smiles in the mirror, every day for at least five minutes.
I guess, technically, I was never truly happy. Oh sure, I’d laugh with friends. Oh, of course, I’d joke around with my family and smile when they teased me back. But that wasn’t happiness. I had never known happiness.
~~~
I sat in the old car, worn out from so many years of running. And yet it still plodded faithfully along the road whenever I pleaded it to. Of course at the moment I was sitting cross-legged in the front seat, staring at the rain splattered window.
Splot, splot, splat.
And then the sound of the window wipers, sweeping away the rain as if it was a finger wiping off the tears from someone’s swollen eyes. It was rhythmic, all the sounds. The patter of the rain, the occasional swish of the window wipers, and the engine, quietly humming as it waited for me to lead it to the next destination. But there was no destination. There was no where else to go.
I thought desperately back to all the days. The ones that always come first in my memories are the happy ones. My older sister, pushing me on the swing. Playing tag with my friends. I remembered Lucy distinctly- she had been my best friend. She had always been my best friend. Not because she had always been there, but because she tried to always be there. She tried, but I pushed her away. Like I would push an unappetizing plate of food as far from my nose and mouth as I could get it.
Picnics with families and friends. School lunches where all the children leaned forward to shout across the table so they could be heard over the roar of the cafeteria. And one of my most perspicuous memories: sitting under the shade of the tree, staring into the caramel brown eyes. My breathing seemed heavier, louder somehow, and it continued to grow no matter how hard I tried to silence it. I could see him- feel him leaning closer. Something dry pressing against my lips. My first kiss. It seems silly now, how nervous I had been.
And then the negative memories come next. My sister smoking, leaning under the shade of the exact tree where my first sweetheart dared to make the first move. My mother and father and sister, all shouting at each other in the middle of the night as I buried my head beneath my pillow and tried to force all the sounds out of my ears. I never succeeded at doing that.
The blurred memory of a dark night- or maybe it just seemed dark?- when the news came to my doorstep.
Lucy’s dead. Lucy’s dead. The words chimed in my ears, not really having a distinct sound, though I remembered it was my mother’s mouth moving. Days blurred together after that. I remember the faint sounds of a bell chiming, and a small funeral. Grades slipping past my grasp, friends gliding out of my reach. My sanity, once a thick, strong wall around me, slowly collapsed to debris, scattered across the floor.
And now I sat, staring at the rain dropping onto the window shield.
Splot, splot, splat, swish.
I opened my door and a draft of cold wind seemed to settle immediately into the car. Pulling my jacket around me, I slammed the door shut and hurried across the sidewalk towards the small gravestone. I knelt down besides it and stared at it.
Jenna E. Netherford. 1990-2009
I traced the letters slowly with my forefinger. The gravestone felt slimy, yet dry at the same time. I pulled my hand back and stared at my name. Jenna E. Netherford.
I remembered it now; I remembered my death. Parts of it, anyway. The room seemed to sway and rock as I stood up from the table, pulling the wine glass away from my lips. I felt it- just barely felt it- slip from my fingers and shatter on the floor. I stepped over the glass, my body too numb to realize if it cut me or not, and I walked towards the drawer that kept my father’s gun.
