Chapter 19 Mabel
MABEL
I nod once and hold her gaze as I respond.
“Always. Only honesty here.”
Her eyes search mine, misty and conflicted, and I rub my thumb over the back of her hand. Tell me, I plead silently. You can trust me. Tell me, please.
When she finally speaks, it’s one of the bravest and most difficult things I’ve ever witnessed.
“Grief is a strange thing, you know? It can change you in ways you never expected. Turn you into someone you never thought you’d be without you even noticing.
It’s like this...this thick, dark cloud.
It’s sticky and heavy and coats everything.
It makes it hard to see clearly. Hard to think.
Makes you physically ache. Makes you feel like you’re drowning, or being buried alive, until you’re.
..you’re desperate. Until you’ll latch onto the first thing that offers refuge, even if. ..”
She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath, then blows it out slowly.
“Even if deep down, you know it’s bad for you.”
She pauses again, but I don’t try to fill the silence. I just rub her hand and wait with her until she’s ready to continue. And when she does, my heart breaks.
“The accident happened on a Tuesday. My graduation day. I was pissed off because Paul wasn’t coming home for it.
He was in grad school out of state and doing this internship thing, and he said his car was acting up.
He told me he couldn’t come for the ceremony, but he would try to get a flight out that weekend for the party.
We’d gotten into a fight the day before.
I told him he was a shitty brother. Said I’d spent my whole life being dragged to all his stuff, and he couldn’t at least make it home for the biggest day of my life. ”
She lets out a sad laugh and shakes her head, wiping away a few tears.
“God, I was so melodramatic. The biggest day of my life. I actually threw the phone after I hung up on him, and then I blocked his number. I was being such a selfish brat. The next morning, when my parents dropped me off—I had to be at the venue, like, three hours early—I wouldn’t even speak to them.
I didn’t say goodbye. I didn’t tell them I loved them.
I just slammed the car door and marched off without looking back.
I was determined to be a bitch, you know?
My feelings were hurt, and I took it out on them. ”
Her gaze drifts behind me—to the orchid, I realize—and then they go unfocused. I watch her pained expression, and it becomes clear to me that she’s picturing it. That day. She’s reliving everything, and it’s agonizing.
I don’t resist the urge to take her other hand.
I cup hers in mine and bring them to my chest, pressing them against my skin.
I hope she can feel my heart beating. Feel my chest rising and falling with each breath.
I hope she uses it as an anchor. So if she gets lost inside that memory, in that pain, she can use me to find her way back out again.
“I kept my phone off. I met up with my class advisors and my friends, and then the excitement kind of took over. I stopped being angry. I realized that I’d been unfair and immature.
I turned my phone back on and unblocked Paul.
Sent a text to the group chat with my parents and told them I was sorry.
I said I wasn’t mad anymore, and I loved them.
And then I put my phone in my pocket, got in my alphabetical place in line, and waited.
“I knew something was wrong when we got into the commencement hall. I couldn’t find my parents anywhere.
I kept checking where they were supposed to be sitting, and the seats were empty.
I texted and asked where they were. They didn’t answer.
I texted the group chat. I texted Paul separately.
Nothing. When the ceremony started, I was officially panicking.
I knew something was wrong—I knew it—so I checked their locations. ”
Her face crumples and her next inhale is ragged. Her lips tremble. Tears flood her cheeks. I have to blink away my own so I can see her clearly. I don’t dare let go of her hands to wipe my eyes. I don’t dare take away her anchor. I just hold on tight, and I listen, and I hope it’s enough.
“It showed them on the highway. All three of them. And they’d been there, unmoving, for over an hour.
It didn’t make sense. My parents were supposed to be at the commencement hall.
My brother was supposed to be out of state at school.
They weren’t supposed to be on a highway together. It was wrong. It was all wrong.
“I left immediately. I ran to the lobby and called Uncle Wade. We were only allowed ceremony tickets for immediate family, so he was still in LA and was planning to come for the party. I told him my parents weren’t answering their phones.
Told him about their locations. He said to stay put and he made some calls, and then. ..then...”
She sucks in a harsh breath and starts to sob.
I wrap my arms around her, and she collapses against me.
Her tears soak through my shirt, my shoulder and collarbone wet with them, and I rub her back.
I hum and kiss her hair and slowly, I lower us to the ground, until she no longer has to support herself.
Until I’m supporting us both. And then I let her cry.
I don’t try to quiet her. I don’t give her platitudes or reassurances. I do the only thing I know how to do. I let her feel, and because I don’t want her to be alone, I feel with her.
I don’t know how long we sit on the patio. I don’t know how long we cry together, but when her tears slow and her breathing calms, I don’t release her. When she speaks again, it’s a steady, strong whisper, but she doesn’t take her head off my shoulder. I feel every word on my neck. In my chest.
“Paul had decided after our fight to come home. He felt bad. I made him feel bad, and he drove all night. Then his car died on the side of the road, so he called my parents to pick him up. On the way back, another driver fell asleep at the wheel. Went off the road and over-corrected. Crossed the median. There were four cars involved in the accident. Nine people total. Only three fatalities.”
Only three fatalities.
Her family.
On a day that was supposed to be a celebration, she lost her entire family. Everything she knew changed in an instant, and along with grief, she’s been harboring guilt. Four years of agony. I can’t even imagine how heavy that must be. I can’t imagine how exhausted she is from carrying it.
I almost tell her it’s going to be okay, that it will get easier, but I stop myself. That’s not what she needs to hear. More condolences and false promises. I can’t tell her something I don’t know to be true. I press another kiss to her head and instead say what feels necessary. I give her honesty.
“It wasn’t your fault.”
“I’ve spent so long believing that it was.”
“It was a terrible, horrible accident, Aurora, and it wasn’t your fault. Not only that, but your parents and brother loved you, and they knew you loved them.”
She shakes her head. “The last thing I told my brother was to go to hell. I slammed the car door on my parents as they were telling me they loved me. That’s my last memory of them. Their last memory of me...”
“My apology came too late. They never saw my texts. By the time I stopped being a brat and sent them, my family was already dead. Now they’ll never know how sorry I am. They’ll never know I didn’t mean what I said. I was too late.”
Her apology came too late.
It makes sense, now. The constant apologizing. That must be why she’s so quick to say she’s sorry. For everything, all the time, even when she’s done nothing wrong.
I hold her tighter and press my face into her hair, willing my words to penetrate her skin. To burrow into her. To become permanent.
“They knew you loved them. They did. I promise you, they did. Foundation of truth, remember? I wouldn’t lie to you.”
Aurora sniffles and nods, but she doesn’t say anything. Instead, she sits up, and chill bumps rise on my arms from the air when it hits my shoulder, replacing her warmth and cooling my skin that’s still wet from her tears.
I loosen my hold on her, but I don’t let go. I don’t wipe my face of my own tears, and I don’t hide from her pain. I don’t want her to hide from it either.
Her eyes bounce between mine, and she chews on her lower lip before folding it between her teeth. Her brows furrow, and I hold my breath for whatever she’s going to say next. Then she huffs out a small laugh. It’s quiet and tired, but it’s still such a sweet sound.
“Second time in a week you’ve found me sobbing on a floor.”
I smile. “To be fair, you found me this time. And we weren’t on the floor to start with. Or sobbing.”
“I suppose that’s true.”
She leans back onto the sliding glass door, cheeks flushed and glistening with slowly drying tear tracks.
Her lashes are matted, and her eyes are red-rimmed, but I can’t look away from her.
She’s a mess—we both are—and she’s beautiful.
Raw, real, vulnerable. Beautiful. Her attention moves back to the orchid, and her frown returns.
“Uncle Wade wanted me to move to L.A. with him until the college semester started, but I didn’t want to leave my hometown. We sold my house, but my friends, memories of my family, everything I’d ever known was in that town. I couldn’t go through another huge change. I couldn’t.”
She shakes her head and sighs, slow and defeated. Then she shrugs. “Enter Brady.”
My spine straightens at the mention of her husband, and I can’t fight the downward turn of my lips or the slant to my brow. Her shoulders droop. I can see her regret in the way her body deflates. In the crease of her forehead and the tone of her voice.