Letters to Nowhere(3)

I sucked in a breath, my heart drumming up into my ears.

The urns. My parents’ urns.

Nausea hit me like a punch to the gut. I clutched my chest and pulled at the zipper of my warm–up jacket. The thud thud of blood pumping inside my ears prevented me from hearing Grandma’s words as she spoke to the man, but I saw her mouth move.

A large warm hand clasped my shoulder and Coach Bentley’s voice broke through the pounding sound. “Breathe, Karen,” he whispered into my ear.

Years of competitive gymnastics had trained me to follow a coach’s directions. Even mid double twisting double back somersault on floor, I heard directions, I followed directions. My chest rose and fell as I forced air into my lungs. Even Grandma looked shaken when she led the man to the mantel where we’d apparently decided my parents would rest for eternity. The second the two of them were out of the foyer, I fled the house, walking quickly through the snow, and because I could no longer stand the sight or smell of my house or my parents’ car, I jumped into the passenger seat of Coach Bentley’s car.

I bent over and put my head between my knees, trying to rid myself of the dizziness and nausea. After a couple minutes, Bentley joined me, but didn’t start the car. He sat in his quiet way and waited for me to speak. I raised my head, leaned back against the seat, and closed my eyes. “I can’t go back in there.” Telling Bentley I can’t wasn’t exactly an easy thing to do and I was sure he knew that.

“We can go somewhere else for a little while if you want,” he said. “We can go back to the gym or to Blair’s house if—”

I shook my head, feeling the panic creep back in. The last thing I needed was a trip to my best friend’s house. The place where I had first heard the bad news. A house with a mom and a dad and a brother and a sister. No way.

I opened my eyes and forced myself to tell the truth, to make him understand. “I mean I don’t want to go back in there, ever. It’s too hard, I just . . .” The lump in my throat grew too big to swallow. I used the back of my hand to wipe away a few tears. “Can you please tell my grandma I need to leave now?”

Bentley’s forehead wrinkled. “So you do want to go with her to New York?”

No. I don’t want that. At least there was one thing I was sure about.

“If I stay with you, I can keep training like normal?” Like an elite, not like a girl headed for college and only needing watered–down routines. “I can go to National training camp and everything?”

“Absolutely,” Bentley said with a firm nod.

I exhaled. “Then that’s what I want. Can you tell her?”

Bentley didn’t move right away like I’d hoped. He watched the guy from the funeral home get into his car and drive off. “Karen, you’re going to have to go back in your house eventually. You’ll have to come inside and pack. There’re things to take care of before making this change. It’s not something we can do in a day.”

“Right.” I nodded and opened the car door, planting a foot in the snowy grass. I made it two steps toward the house before collapsing onto the ground. I pulled my knees to my chest and buried my face. No matter what Bentley or Grandma said to try to coax me out of this state, I couldn’t get myself to do anything but crawl back into Bentley’s car.

It was humiliating, and I don’t think anyone knew what to say or do except to let me have my way.

Eventually, Coach Bentley took me back to the gym, and a couple hours later, Grandma showed up in her rental car with suitcases for both of us and a room booked at a hotel between the gym and the lawyers’ office, where we could stay and finalize the details. It was the only time that I got scared and didn’t fight through it. I didn’t even consider fighting through it. I just needed to move on. Even if that meant agreeing to therapy for my panic attacks (Grandma’s idea) and regular calls with her to check in.

I’d do anything she asked if I could pretend that they were still there in that house while I stayed somewhere else. Like being out of town for a competition or training camp. And therapy was something I’d be willing to try if it got rid of the visions I kept having ever since the policemen showed up at my best friend’s door to deliver the bad news—the sounds, the images, the video playing through my mind of a black Toyota tumbling off the interstate, the semitruck slamming into it, the woman inside with a half–crushed skull and the decapitated man beside her with seventy percent of his body still determined to remain with his wife…All of it was contrived by my own imagination and sometimes, like right now, I couldn’t help but wish I’d seen the real accident, because nothing could be worse than this. Nothing.





CHAPTER TWO





January 29

Mom and Dad,




Grandma left to go back to New York today. She’s spent ten days giving me a crash course in financial independence and how to order room service. She also gave me a couple books on grief and grieving. I’m currently reading about the stages of grief and very excited to hang out for a while in stage one—denial.




I’m sorry I freaked out about staying at home but I’m making up for it in other areas, like gymnastics. I’ve gotten on a daring streak and I think I’m making Bentley nervous. You know how he is about technique and drills. He doesn’t yell and push like Coach Cordes. Sometimes I think I’ve become dependent on that kick in the ass and pushing myself to the max with Bentley requires a higher level of internal drive.