Underneath the Sycamore Tree(90)

Everyone nods except Kaiden, who hasn’t let go of the wheelchair. Cam puts her hand on his shoulder and gives him an encouraging nod.

He lets go and kneels in front of me. “I expect you to be at every game, Mouse.” His voice cracking has my heart doing the same, a big split right down the middle. “Best friends support each other. They’re there for each other.”

The smile I grace him with is genuine. “I promise I’ll be at every single one.”

He wets his lips and nods once before standing, stepping back into Cam’s hold. Mama smiles down at me, Grandma brushes my hair behind my ear, and Dad offers me a single head bob like Kaiden.

It seems so final. Yet not final at all.

A beginning.

Kaiden will go to college.

Dad and Cam may have a child.

Mama could be happy. Date. Get remarried. Have more children.

There’s nothing that would hold them back. No excuse or emergency would cause them from living their lives, and the thought calms me completely until my body sinks lazily into the chair that Mama pushes.

Mama wheels me back to my room, greeting the nurses that say hello and ask if we need anything.

Mama. That’s all I need.

Once the nurses are done checking my vitals and it’s just Mama and me, she tells me about the friends she’s making. The understanding she’s accepting about how it all went wrong…and in many ways right.

“I’m sorry, Emery,” she whispers, stroking my hand with her thumb.

Sorry for shutting down.

Sorry for abandoning me.

Sorry for not realizing it sooner…

“It’s okay,” I tell her honestly.

Mama brought me to Dad. To Cam. To Kaiden. Her understanding that she couldn’t take care of me the way I needed brought back my father and more family that I had no clue I needed. She gave me a best friend when I lost the only one I ever knew, and an innocent love that I would have never felt otherwise.

I love Kaiden.

Like a friend. My best friend.

Like family.

I move over and slowly pat the empty spot beside me. “You gave me so much, Mama. We can’t change what’s happened and I don’t want to. Everything happens for a reason, right?”

She swallows. “Yeah, Sunshine. It does.”

Mama curls up in bed beside me, wrapping her arms around my body, careful not to tug on the wires and tubes. Her face is wet, matching my own damp cheeks. Her head rests on the same pillow mine does.

Sometimes words aren’t enough.

Sometimes nothing has to be said at all.

Mama opens her lips…and starts singing.

You are my sunshine, my only sunshine,

You make me happy, when skies are gray.

You’ll never know, dear, how much I love you…

Her words become suffocated by fragmented shards of emotion that slice the open air between us as the machines make pitiful noises.

“Please don’t take my sunshine away.”





Epilogue





Kaiden

Three fucking days. She lasted three days after being admitted before her mother’s wails chimed louder than the flat lining machines. It was long enough for her to submit finals from her hospital room and be considered a senior in high school for the new school year.

All she wanted was to finish junior year.

Security had to escort me out when I put my fist through the wall, and Mom didn’t talk to me until I calmed down outside.

Emery wore a fucking UM sweatshirt before she fell asleep on that too-tiny bed, and sure enough there was a makeshift patch with my name on the very back. Her eyes never opened back up though.

She never officially said goodbye.

I promise I’ll be at every single game.

She lied.



One Year Later





Rain nearly cancels our biggest game of the year, which half the upperclassman bitched about considering it was their last one before graduating from the University of Maryland. We worked our asses off in practice, and won almost every game against the other college teams. I could see their disgruntlement.

Then it happens.

The fucking sunshine.

The dispersing clouds.

The rainbow.

Once upon a time, I’d been told by a girl full of hope that her twin sister looked down at her from the sky. I thought it was bullshit. As much bullshit as the damn song she loved listening to that I can’t stand hearing when it comes on.

But there it is.

The weather report told us we were done for since we woke up. Ninety-nine percent chance of thunderstorms and rain showers. High winds.

We were fucked.

We were supposed to be fucked.

Someone slaps my back. “Is that a miracle, or what?”

Murphy was a dipshit who spent more time high than sober, but he was still one of my closest friends. He left me be when I got moody and distracted me with pot and girls when I sulked for too long.

He also kicked ass on the field.

I stare up at the sun. “Yeah. A miracle.”

I think about the two matching headstones underneath the sycamore tree in Bakersfield all while staring up at the sun beaming down on my teammates.

“Let’s kick some ass,” Murphy shouts, getting equal enthusiastic yells from everyone around us.