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This is kind of an original story about a teenager (Josh) who's still learning to cope with the loss of his mother, and deal with the return of his best friend (Melanie) whom he hasn't seen in 3 1/2 years after she left one summer and never came back. She also returns with the secret that plays a big part in why she never came back.
This is only chapter one. It's kind of...sketchy. Idk, I need critique because I'm writing this from his p.o.v. and I want tot know if it sounds 'guyish' enough. lol.
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Everyone has to die at some point. I guess that’s the moral of my life story. Or maybe
that’s what I’m still trying to force myself to believe. It’s been fours years. Four years
since that stupid night in May that the car crash that took my mom’s life away.
Damn.
It’s hard to believe I was only thirteen when it happened, but I was. My parents and I
were driving home in the rain from a game I’d had that evening. We’d won of course, even though Dylan Cooper almost caused a huge loss on our side by throwing the ball to first instead of home. I laugh because I can still remember how stupidly angry everyone was at the poor kid. Even the parents and our coach were throwing their hats down.
Anyway, my mom was the one driving that night. My dad was tired from work and helping me practice all day, so she offered to drive. They let me pick anywhere to go out to eat that night to celebrate. I remember taking a while to make a decision, but finally deciding on Rosebud Steakhouse. Their burgers were huge and delicious.
So, my mom made a right at the light, something I wish she’d never done had I known what was going to happen next. The traffic was clear and the next light was green, so she pressed on the gas a little.
In my dreams I always hope she’ll press on the pedal just a little bit harder, and maybe then she’d make it. But she never does.
Just as we were crossing the intersection, a car comes slamming into us from the left. For the first few seconds I didn’t know what to think. It took a while for my brain to process what had actually happened, but when I did it hit me hard. All I could see was complete darkness. For a moment I thought I was blind as a result of the crash, but then I realized the car was flipped upside down and I was staring at the ground. I heard a moan, and then movement from somewhere beside me. I opened my mouth to try and speak, to ask my parents if they were alright, but all that came out was blood. And then I felt it.
Pain like I’ve never felt before in my side and my leg. I couldn’t move enough to tell what exactly was broken, but I knew at least my leg had to have been, probably a rib or two as well. My nose was bleeding badly as well—the result of the blood in my mouth.
I couldn’t move at all, too constrained by the seatbelt, which was now keeping me anything but safe. I tried to turn my head to see who it was I’d heard beside me, but my neck hurt too much.
“Josh…..Josh….Josh?” I felt a hand on my arm and heard my dad’s voice in my ear.
“Mhmmm,” Was the best response I could manage without choking. I felt so weak. I remember thinking how I wish all the pain would just go away and I could suddenly not feel a thing. I was thinking of some doctor injecting a giant needle of anesthetics into me so I couldn’t hurt anymore.
After that I don’t really remember much of what happened. I woke up in the hospital the next day with a neck brace, a cast on my left leg, and bandages around my torso. My dad told me the nurse said my ribs were only severely bruised, not broken. And my nose had been fractured.
My dad was the only one who’d escaped with minor injuries that night. All he had was a couple of bruises, and a few scratches here and there.
He’d been the one who told me about my mom later on that day, after I was awake. His eyes were full of tears and he could hardly get the words out at all. I thought about how different life was going to be, how hard.
Never again would she wake me up, or take me home from school early when I was ‘sick’, even though she knew I was faking. She wouldn’t be there to help me with the natural things in life like girls, or bullies, or friends, or any of that.
In the dim light from the lamps above I can make out the words carved in my mom’s tombstone. Going the cemetery at night isn’t something I usually do, but I was busy today. I run my fingers over the engraved words and mouth each word through my lips because by now I know them by heart.
“Joanna Marie Davis,” it says. “November 23, 1967 through May 10, 2004.”
Underneath is a poem written by my dad himself dedicated to her. He’s not much of a writer, but the words here are powerful. They really show how much he cared…how much he was really going to miss her.
“Bye, mom,” I whisper. “Happy birthday.”
I shine the flashlight I have with me inside my jacket on her grave one last time before turning away and walking out of Rosehill cemetery back to my car.
A light snowfall starts to pick up just as I start the car and head home. I hate winter, but unfortunately it’s right around the corner. I’ve lived in Chicago my whole life and still can never get used to the terrible cold weather.
My cell phone vibrates in the passenger seat and I pick it up and answer it without looking as I pull up to a stoplight.
“Hey,” I say into the phone.
“Josh?” My dad answers. “Where are you this late? Why aren’t you home?”
“I was visiting mom,” I say quietly, pressing on the gas as the light turns green.
“Oh,”
He always grew quiet whenever mom was mentioned for any reason. I have a feeling he’s still learning to accept her death just as I am. They were married for a shorter period of time than they knew one another. They were just about to celebrate their fifteenth anniversary in June, but they knew each other for twenty years or so. High school sweethearts, I guess.
“Well, when you get home I have some good news for you.” He says, suddenly his normal, enthusiastic self again.
“You finally learned how to cook?” I say sarcastically.
“Ha, ha…” He mutters again. “No, just hurry up and get here. You’re going to love what I have to tell you.”
“Why can’t you just tell me right now?” I bother.
“Because you shouldn’t even be driving and talking on the phone for one,” He says, sounding more like a father figure now.
“You’re the one that called.”
“I didn’t know you were driving.” He recoiled.
“Well, I’m pulling into the driveway right now,” I tell him. “You can stop worrying now.”
“Ha, ha,” He says sarcastically.
I close my phone and shut off the engine, making the night silent again. My sixty six Ford Mustang has a very loud engine. Since most of our neighbors our old, they have problems with the noise, but I don’t care.
My parents picked it out for me for my sixteenth birthday. Even though they complained, I definitely wasn’t about to get rid of it for a quieter car.
When I step inside I’m surprised by the smell of food coming from the kitchen. Usually on Sundays Dad and I go out to eat. Not to mention he’s not much of a cook. The biggest meal he’s ever cooked was on Christmas a year after my mom passed. The only thing he hadn’t burned was the mashed potatoes.
“What’d you make?” I wonder. “Or try to…” I add as I see the smoke coming from the oven as he opens it and takes out a dish full of something.
“Casserole,” He cringes as he glances at the slightly blackened surface. “I guess we’re not eating this tonight.”
“Ha, I'll call and order pizza.” I say. My stomach growls just as I realize how hungry I am.
While I’m in the living room about to out in the order, my dad comes in and stands beside me. He waits until I’m finished before speaking.
“Harvey called today.” He says. I stare at him blankly trying to remember who he’s talking about. The name sounds familiar…I just can’t put a face to the name.
“Harvey Carson,” He finally says after watching me struggle for a few moments. “Do you remember him now?”
“Yea,” I say honestly. Harvey Carson grew up to be one of the youngest CEOs of one of the largest banking companies in the state. By young I mean he’s in his early forties. He’s a very rich man who lives in a large house a few miles away from ours. Him and my dad used to be good friends when I was younger.
He has a daughter who’s my age. Melanie Carson. We were best friends in elementary
and middle school. Her parents got a divorce when she was five and her mom took her to stay with her in California. She moved out here from to be with her dad when she was nine, and that’s how we met. However, a few years later she decided she wanted to stay with her mom again, but she came back every summer to visit me and Harvey. One summer she never came back and I never heard form her again. To this day I still wonder if it was something I’d said or done to make her not come back. She was there for me when my mom died. I wonder if that traumatized her or something.
“What about him?”
“Well,” My dad begins, unable to keep the giant smile off his face. “We were catching up and all, because you know, we haven’t talked in quite a while and he told me Melanie’s back.”
“Really?!” I say. For some reason my heart starts to beat faster, and my stomach does this weird flip. The thought of seeing her again after three and half years is…exciting.
“When did she get back?”
“This morning, actually. Harvey told me she’s tired from the trip, so we’ll go and see them both tomorrow after I get off.”
“Sounds good,” I say, suddenly not so hungry anymore. All I can think about is the one girl who used to be my best friend, along with a million and one questions in my head.
I wonder if she’s thought about me, too.
I'm going to be doing you a review this morning. I hope you don't mind, but I do them in 
