Some Quiet Place (Some Quiet Place #1)(48)
The sun shines down as Pastor Mike continues his eulogy. We’re all dressed in black. Not sensible, really, since it’s sweltering out today—it seems even Fall isn’t around to do her job. The stench of sweat permeates my senses. I look down into the fresh grave, examine the girl in there.
The freckles that always marked her and made her Maggie now stand out, a stark feature that looks strange on such a vacant face. She’s wearing a neatly pressed dress. It’s pink. She hated pink. And they’ve actually done her nails. Maggie liked them chewed down to the nub and only used black nail polish. This isn’t Maggie. This isn’t my best friend. This is a person I don’t know. Where’s the life, the illumination? The sweetness, the contemplation, the wild abandon that made so many memories for us when we were young?
“Come on, Liz!” Maggie runs ahead of me to the ice cream truck, red pigtails bouncing all around her shoulders. I follow more slowly, feeling the heat of the day on my head. I can’t get any treats because Tim got angry when I asked him for money.
Just as I’m crossing the street, I pause. There’s an Emotion standing on the road, looking right at me. I recognize his white-blond hair.
“Why did you come back?” I ask him. Maggie is standing in line, getting her ice cream. She’s forgotten about me for the moment.
The Emotion smiles down at my upturned face. “You interest me. Not much can do that anymore.” There’s a hint of sadness in his eyes.
I don’t have a chance to answer; Maggie is running back up to me. Her cheeks are flushed and she breathes heavily. She holds two Dilly Bars in her hands.
“Here!” She thrusts the dripping thing at me, and I take it. “Happy birthday!”
I look at the bar and back at her. “It’s not my birthday.”
She grins, eyes sparkling. “It’s not? Oops. Oh, well. Come on!” She takes my hand in hers, dragging me away from the road and the Emotion who’s still staring at me, smiling.
The ice cream is melting in my hand, so I lick it quickly.
I stare down at the girl in that casket, feeling my nothingness dig a deeper hole inside of me. “She was often a counselor when her friends came to her in need,” Pastor Mike intones. Wrong, wrong. I was Maggie’s only friend. I never went to her for counsel. I never went to her at all.
Fear’s words come back to me: You’re a coward.
Doesn’t he know that if I really could, I would mourn my best friend? It’s not a choice, no matter what anyone believes.
As if my thoughts have summoned him, suddenly Fear is here, walking through the crowd of black like he belongs. Maybe he does. Apparently the threat at Sophia’s party is no longer a concern. I sense him coming up behind me. The crows on the gravestones hush.
“Look at her,” Fear murmurs in my ear, his lips brushing my skin. I turn to face him, but he wraps his hands tightly around my arms, forcing me to stay where I am. “No. Look at her, Elizabeth.”
He shouldn’t be here. Not now. I focus on Maggie’s face again, not really seeing it.
“Listen to me,” Fear breathes, and the hair on the back of my neck prickles. “I want you to look at your best friend. She’s dead, Elizabeth. She’s gone, and she’s not coming back. You were with her when all the life left her body; you saw every single one of her memories fade. Everything you two ever went through, every experience you ever had.” Somehow he thinks of the exact day I’d been thinking of earlier and uses it against me. “Remember all the times she bought you ice cream because you had no money? Do you remember when Maggie dragged you to the homecoming game, and after everyone left you two sat in the middle of the field and looked at the stars? She told you everything. You told her nothing. She sensed that, but she didn’t care. She always thought you would open up to her one day—”
“Stop.”
I hadn’t meant to speak out loud, but my voice slices through the still air. Pastor Mike does stop, staring at me expectantly. Someone coughs in the crowd. I can feel Tim stiffening. John—Maggie’s dad—turns around to look at me, and as his gaze settles on my face, it softens. It’s that expression that makes me realize something. Something bizarre; it doesn’t make sense.
I’m crying.
Fear leans down, kissing my neck with his cool lips. He’s accomplished what he came to do. “You will feel. I’m going to make sure of it,” he promises. He leaves me there, sending a chilly breeze over the funeral. Some shiver.
“Did you have something to say?” Pastor Mike prompts, eyebrows raised. It’s strange—his eyebrows are gray and his hair is black. Obviously dyed.
There are so many things I could say at this moment. So many words, meanings, memories, opportunities to make up for areas I’ve disappointed.
I just shake my head, backing away from the casket. I wipe away the strange tears with the back of my dark sleeve. “No, nothing to say. Sorry,” I mumble.
The pastor eyes me, then seems to mentally shrug. “Everyone loved her and will truly miss her,” he finishes, snapping the Bible shut with a thump.
I sit in the barn loft with a pad of paper and a pen. The bale of hay pokes at my bottom and legs, but I hardly notice. Mora is restless below; she snaps at another cow. I tap, tap, tap my way into nothing. No rhymes come to mind, not even free verse. Everything I think is numb and shallow … there’s just no inspiration to be found inside of me, and there lies the problem.