Young Writers Society

My sister and I stared at the ground, our eyes bright red, a bloodshot kind of red. Our minds raced to the worst possible thoughts, and we revelled in devastation. Just the thought of losing her was unbearable, but to lose her so soon was incomprehensibly devastating. My eyes slowly drifted from the ground and into my mom’s eyes. Her eyes had changed into the sky, a bright blue that most would see as beyond beautiful. My sister and I had learned over the years that this was the blue that symbolized depression in my mother. Just as she began to open her mouth, my eyes began to fog and drift into a daydream. I began to think about what started all of this and just how I felt when I first discovered the problem.

It all started in March 2013; my Aunt, Ashley, pressed her foot lightly onto the gas pedal and weaved through traffic. Most could see from the way she was driving what kind of mood she was in. She drove pretty recklessly and did not seem to care about anything except getting to her destination. After pulling into my neighborhood, she stopped at the edge of our driveway and stayed there for about five minutes. Her head laid against the steering wheel as she wept. The moisture built up along the edge of it as she pulled into the driveway. Her trembling wrist pressed the car door open as her feet scraped along the driveway to my door. It was during spring break of my freshman year, so I was asleep. The knock on the door eliminated all chances of continuing my miniature hibernation. I lifted my head, wiped the sleep from my eyes, and pouted as I put some pants on. Looking out the window, I realized it was only 10:00 in the morning. I complained to myself about being woken up so early during my break from school and trudged down the stairs. A peer through the front door window revealed Ashley’s exhausted and depressed face. My mind raced to a respectable resolution to the problem, which resulted in quickly dialing on my iPhone 6, 3-1-7-5-0-4-2-9-0-4. My feet quietly tapped on the floor in a circular pattern as I impatiently waited for the other line to pick up. Finally, I heard my Mom’s voice. “Yes Bailey?” she incoherently asked.

I stuttered, “Mom, Ashley is here and she will not leave. What do I do?”

My mom asserted, “What do you mean she is there? Is she alone?”

“Yeah, she is alone and I do not know. She kind of looks upset, though,” I replied, sympathetically.

Just as my mom was about to reveal the solution, Ashley’s feet pounded down the driveway, sprinting to her car. After she spun out of our driveway and slowly crawled down our street, I unlatched the handle and examined the patio, at the request of my mom. A quick and lazy search revealed nothing, so I brushed off the unsuspected visit and went back my room to pass the time. About four hours later, the garage door spun open and my Mom’s car raced into the garage. I pounded down the stairs and the door loudly squeaked open. My mom’s feet lightly tapped on the hardwood floor.

“Hey Bay, how was your day?” she asked.

Quickly, but reluctantly, I answered, “Hi, it was alright I guess. I did not find a note or anything on the porch but I am really worried about Ashley.”

“I know, honey, we both are. I am going to go recheck the porch in case you missed the note or something,” she decided.

My legs refused to move as I rested on the couch. Simultaneously, I heard her high heels press against the floor and down the hallway to the front door. A quick peer into the crack of the screen door revealed a thin piece of white paper stuck inside the door. Relaxed, she grazed her feet along the hardwood back into the dining room.

“I found the note, you just suck at looking,” she remarked, sarcastically.

“Thanks, Mom. Really mature,” I snarled.

Unfolding the paper, she read the note to herself. I could see the mood in her face turn from sarcastic and happy to worried and depressed. My feet still refused to move, as I watched her quickly sprint to her room and dial the number that Ashley had supposedly left on the note. My aunt never answered, and perhaps that was the most worrisome sign of all. We spent the night trying to relax, watching crappy sitcoms and listening to my mother reveal millions of childhood stories just to cope with the possibility of pain soon to be inflicted. My mother ordered pizza and we revelled in happy memories with Ashley, still waiting for news on her wellbeing. At around 9 P.M., I made the executive decision to head to bed.

“Goodnight guys, I am going to go to my room,” I stated.

I was out by 9:15, and as far as I knew, the two of them had headed to bed shortly afterwards. The next afternoon went the same as pretty much every other afternoon on spring breaks. I slept until who knows when, and when I did wake up, I stayed in my room and subdued myself to video games. It was not until around 5, when I heard the screeching sound of the garage door again, that I trompled down the stairs. I seemed to meet her at the door, and her eyes were that blue again. It was the kind of blue that was beautiful, but a sad kind of beautiful. The kind of beautiful you see when realize when you lost someone you love. Her shoulders were incredibly relaxed, almost to the point of stress. I wrapped my arms around her and held my emotions as I felt my shoulder soak in tears. I had no understanding, at the time, but I knew it was something pretty serious. This was the first time since becoming a teenager that I had seen my mom cry.

“Go get your sister, we have some things we need to talk about,” she fretted.

My socks slid across the floor, then jumped up the stairs to my sister’s room.

“Mom wants us downstairs, and I do not think it is good at all,” I murmured.

Apparently, my general stigma revealed insane amounts of depression. We both pounded down the stairs and plopped onto the couch. My mom was already in her spot, clicking her lighter against a cigarette, the same cigarettes that my sister and I have called cancer sticks since day one.

“Ashley is in the hospital, and according to them, it’s because of an apparent overdose,” my mom recounted.

The tears poured down my sister’s face as I sprawled across the couch trying to cope with the news that had just been revealed. Generally, I had no idea how to respond to the news. Obviously I was distraught to the point of a complete mental breakdown, but in all honesty I had kind of expected it. It brought back memories of losing my step-dad, and the deja vu was something I had never wanted to deal with again.

Over the next week, my mom made multiple visits to Community North. I refused to leave my room, and everything became about coping with life not enjoying it. Her death obliterated relationships with a couple of family members, and people I had never seen cry before, were sobbing. The day after we found out, for example. My mom used her powers to convince everyone to go to my Uncle’s for a dinner in her memory. The houses on 9 flew by as we drove to 400 N., eventually slowing down as we pulled into my uncle’s driveway. A quick stroll up the driveway and into the garage revealed my uncle sobbing with a broken beer bottle at his feet. To most, this would not be much considering the circumstances. But, we had never seen Mikey cry and it resulted in a full night of sorrow from my entire family.

About a week later, her mother made the decision to pull the plugs, even with the discouragement of my family. My mom came home the day after she found out and again rounded up the troops. My sister and I were used to this because over the week we had had daily meetings of updates about Ashley’s status since I was not allowed to go to the hospital at the expense of my mom. I remember seeing her eyes stare at the ground until her head fell into a pillow. It took her about ten minutes to raise herself from the pits of depression and spit out what we had already assumed. Her voice eerily cracked and her eyes were bright red.

“They pulled her plugs last night, and we are barred from her funeral,” she whimpered.

“Are you joking? Darlene is that selfish?” my sister sobbed.

As a little background, the reason we were barred was never completely explained to us. Darlene, her mother, was married to a different man so technically she was not related to us anymore. She barred us because we had abandoned Ashley at her time of need apparently. My mom had made the decision as a mother to cut her out of our lives so we would not get involved in that lifestyle.

The night afterwards was spent attempting to cope with her death and planning our own funeral for her. My fingers pounded against the desk, thinking about the numerous possibilities of how this happened and why. Towards the end of the night, my mom completely described the story in detail that she was told.

Apparently, after leaving our house, Ashley had decided to drive to Mooresville to hang out with some friends in an attempt to cope with the death of her cat. While there, she began heavily drinking with the same crowd that had gotten her addicted to drugs in the first place. They began popping uppers while drinking alcohol and eventually resorting to cocaine to avoid a complete downfall. She overdosed on a combination of the three. Her friends panicked, and threw her lifeless body into the back of a truck, eventually tossing it onto the sidewalk like you toss cups onto the side of the road. A fireman looked out the window of his bedroom at the fire station and a quick glance revealed a lifeless mass on the sidewalk. Unfortunately, by the time she had received medical attention, she was already 90% brain dead.

After finding out the complete story, I was more angry than anything. My entire family became flooded with hatred for the people who let Ashley die. It was not for another couple years that most of us overcame the hatred and let it change our lives for the better instead of worse.

As a reflection, Ashley’s death changed me for the worst at first. I let it completely change who I was, I sobbed regularly, and I pushed away everyone I cared about to avoid being hurt. I resorted to writing and video games to cope with the inability to talk about my issues. It took me about two years to realize what I was doing to myself and regain all of the people that I had lost because of my conclusive issues. Afterwards, I let her death motivate me. I let it motivate me to turn around my performance in school, attempt to enroll in college, and become a responsible human being. I made numerous choices in my life to completely avoid drugs as well and turn my life around to avoid being just like her.