Secret Lucidity(8)

“Were you able to eat dinner before I came?” she asks. “There’s not much at the house. I haven’t been able to make it to the store.”

“I’m not hungry.”

We stop at the pharmacy to pick up my prescriptions, and before I know it, we’re pulling up the driveway. My mom turns the car off, and the both of us simply stare at the house. I know she feels it too—the dreadfulness. What used to be our happiness, our comfort, our home isn’t any of those things anymore. It’s two stories of brick and stone, surrounded by a large manicured yard. Its wrought iron fixtures and the rustic chandelier that hangs over the double front doors are lit. But it isn’t what’s on the outside that matters.

“I thought about selling it, but I think letting it go would hurt worse than keeping it.”

I step out of the car, walk over to the front porch, and wait for my mom. It takes her a moment before she joins me and unlocks the door. When I step in, the feeling is foreign, and I realize that I won’t hear ESPN blaring from the family room or smell the lingering notes of my dad’s aftershave ever again. No longer will this home be a reflection of our family.

“Let me help you upstairs, dear.”

I follow behind as she leads me to my bedroom. When she flicks on the lights, I walk straight to my window, which overlooks the pool in our backyard. The pool my father tossed me into when I was just a baby, birthing my love for the water. After he taught me how to swim, we used to race each other. If he found himself ahead of me, he would fake a cramp to allow me to gain the lead and win. He always made sure I won.

“Is there anything you need?”

I turn around and, with slight hesitance, ask, “Can you help me change?”

To my surprise, she agrees and helps me out of my clothes and into a pair of pajamas.

“Mom?”

She looks at me with red-rimmed eyes.

“I love you.”

She blinks and tears fall down her face. “I love you too,” is all that’s left of this evening before she closes the door behind her, leaving me alone with medals, ribbons, and trophies—reminders of the passion my dad and I shared.

More hollow than a person should ever be, I turn out the lights, crawl into bed, and listen to my mother’s sobs through the walls of our house that no longer feels like a home.





STANDING AT MY WINDOW, I watch the mingling of people down below in the backyard.

We buried my father today.

After everyone got into their cars, I stayed behind with my mother. We watched them lower the casket into the ground, and when they started to shovel the earth over the varnished mahogany, I fought the urge to jump down into the hole to be buried with him.

Everyone was there. Friends from school, teachers, family; all of them walking to the front of the church to look at his body and bid their final goodbyes.

When I die, I want a closed-casket funeral.

I couldn’t stand to watch everyone looking at him as if he were a morbid piece of artwork hanging in a museum.

And now, they’re all at our house, reminiscing and mourning. His scent is almost nonexistent at this point, and with everyone roaming around, touching everything, they’re stealing the last of the lingering remnants.

Familiar eyes from down below glance up to my window and lock to mine. He shoves his hands into the pockets of his suit pants and dips his head somberly as we look at one another. The man who feels responsible for my loss wears painful burden beautifully. Coach Andrews stands in a sea of black, and somehow, in the loneliest existence I’ve ever known, I don’t feel so alone. In his eyes, the eyes that watched me cry as his words shattered my world, there’s a link that will forever tie him to my dad and me.

“I’ve been looking for you.” I turn away from the connection and look to Kroy as he shuts the door to my room before coming to my side. “Are you doing okay?”

I shake my head at his stupid question.

Kroy has been calling and texting nonstop, oblivious that I’m ignoring him and don’t want to talk, but here he is . . . wanting to talk.

He turns me toward him and cradles my face—even my reaction to his touch has changed. Last week, we couldn’t keep our hands off each other. If we weren’t holding hands, we were hugging or kissing or making out. Now, his touch feels like an invasion.

“Why won’t you talk to me?”

“What do you want me to say?”

“Anything,” he tells me with worry etched all over his face. “I can’t help you if you won’t let me in.”

“You think I need help?”

“You don’t even cry,” he whispers, but I hear the accusation in his words. “I’m worried about you.”

I turn my head out of his hold and take a step back. “Why do you need me to cry? To prove to you that I’m hurting? Will my tears prove it to them?” I say, motioning my hand to the people outside. “You all say the same things. You think I don’t hear it, but I do. ‘She needs to talk.’ ‘She needs to eat.’ ‘She needs to get out of bed.’ It’s all about what everyone else wants to make them feel more comfortable around me.” My words come out hard. “What about what I want—what I need?”

“Tell me what it is, and I’ll give it to you.”

“I want to be left alone!” I lash out. “I want everyone to stop touching my dad’s things and get out of my house so my mom and I can have a chance to find some sort of peace in this goddamn nightmare.”