June, Reimagined (18)

EIGHT


To: [email protected]

From: [email protected]

Subject: Josh’s stuff

Hi June,

I know you’re probably surprised to hear from me, seeing as we haven’t seen each other in four years (except for that brief minute at the funeral).

Anyway, I have a box of Josh’s stuff—pictures, a few tshirts, his old high school football jersey, a Weston College sweatshirt. I thought you might want them. I don’t feel right keeping any of it. I’m getting married next year, and I don’t think my fiancé wants my old boyfriend’s stuff in our house.

I know my relationship with your brother was . . . complicated. But all the bad times don’t seem to matter now. What I remember most are the good times. When Josh was so kind. Like the time I got my wisdom teeth out and he took care of me all weekend. He never left my side. And there was another time senior year when he offered to carry Lydia Reading’s books for her when she broke her leg. He followed her from class to class for a week. I was sure he was cheating on me (because I was insecure and needy back then). But Josh just knew what it was like to be hurt and he wanted to help. He didn’t want people to be alone with their suffering.

I’ll never forget the game when he dislocated his shoulder. I swear the entire stadium went completely silent. It gives me chills to think about. Coach Ricky said it was the worst “hospital ball” he’d ever seen. I never thought Josh would play again. I should have known better, though. Josh never liked sitting on the bench. Not when other people were having fun.

Anyway, sorry to rehash. I’ll put his stuff in the mail next week. Now that I’m writing this, I might just keep the jersey. Don’t tell my fiancé. ;)

I hope you’re doing well.

Xoxo,

Siena

Anderson’s Pub smelled of rain, barley, and people. June finished a pint of beer and licked her lips clean of foam, her body humming. The uncomfortable weight that constantly pressed on her chest had finally dissipated, thanks to the beer. She had one goal tonight: get bloody drunk.

Earlier that day, June had come home from the café, taken Josh’s remains from the urn, and held the plastic bag out her bedroom window in the rain. “Siena thinks you actually gave a shit about her stupid wisdom teeth,” June had said to the ashes. “What a fucking joke.”

She had laughed like a lunatic. She could hear how crazy she sounded, and yet she couldn’t stop herself. For a second, she thought she might actually release the ashes. Let the wind and water carry Josh away, so she could finally be relieved of the burden. The ashes would turn to mud and mix with the soil. Josh’s remains and the ground would slowly amalgamate, no difference between him and the earth. But June had stopped herself.

After the maniacal cackling subsided, her body went heavy. She sat on the floor of her bedroom, Josh’s ashes across from her, as if they were young again, face to face for an intense game of Uno. June, younger than Josh, had a hard time holding so many cards in her small hands and would inevitably display her cards.

“You’re not supposed to let me see your hand, June,” Josh would complain. He’d take her cards, organize them, and fan them out perfectly to fit her tiny grasp. “There. Hold them just like that.”

But not three turns later, June would pull a card from her hand, spilling the rest on the floor, and Josh would help all over again.

“Uno,” she said to the ashes. “I’m the only one left alive.”

June didn’t deserve the relief of letting Josh go, hadn’t earned it. As mad as she felt at the lies that people believed about her brother, he was her burden. The desire to relieve herself of it was selfish.

She had stuffed her brother’s ashes back into the urn and returned it to the closet. Amelia knocked on the door shortly thereafter, insisting that June come out for a night of drinking at the pub, and June was all for drowning her sorrow.

The table was now full of pints. Eva sat across from June, glasses perched on the tip of her nose, notebook in hand, intently writing. Amelia and David were at the bar procuring another round. June reached across the table and took Eva’s barely touched pint. When Eva noticed, she adjusted her glasses. Her blond hair was worn sleek tonight, parted in the middle and falling bluntly just beneath her chin. Eva would seem severe with her pale skin if it weren’t for her warm brown eyes, always intrigued.

June slugged down more beer. “What are you writing, anyway?”

“I’m collecting characters.”

“You’re what?”

“Look around. This place is full of stories.” Eva gestured across the crowded pub. She pointed to an older gentleman in a booth by himself, a half-drunk pint of beer and a glass of whisky his only companions. “What do you make of him?”

“He looks lonely,” June said.

Eva bit on the end of her pen. “D-list Scottish porn star whose recent release, Mary, Queen of Cocks, in which he played the Prince of Wails, was panned. And his agent just called. He didn’t get the lead role in While You Were Sheeping.”

June laughed so hard she had to cup a hand in front of her face to prevent beer spilling from her lips. “Who knew we were among royalty?”

Eva pointed to a young girl, maybe fourteen, who sat with her pudgy, rosy-cheeked family of five. “Britain’s deadliest assassin, whose unique form of torture is playing Chumbawamba on repeat until her victims go insane.”