Chapter 27 Ten
Ten
The image changes similarly to the way that milky cloud sometimes drags me out of the memories.
I thought I would be in more pain. Seeing her like that, watching it in real time, it still hurt, but not the way I thought. Things are finally making sense.
“Are you ready?” Kat’s voice cuts through my mind.
Yes. I meant it. I look around the scene, seeing I’m beneath the large tree in my parent’s backyard. The one I spent so many days sitting under.
Is this…
“Yes, this is how you died, Laney,” Kat replies.
Okay.
I start walking to the back door, ready to make the familiar walk up to my old bedroom, but I pause, looking up. The tree.
I died here. Under the tree.
“Yes.” It’s Van who speaks this time. “I stood by the roses and watched. I tried to call out to you, to stop you, but nothing worked. I have never left your side, Laney. You’re not getting rid of me.”
I remember now.
I woke up before sunrise after another night filledwith dreams of her.
The pain was too much. I remember wiping the tears off my face before I had fully opened my eyes.
Each time I blinked, I just seen the image of her face so scared, tear stained on the floor of that convenience store.
I couldn’t handle the guilt anymore. I spent a week in the hospital after it happened.
My mom was the one who told me she died.
I remember the weeks leading up to her funeral, the police questionings, the interviews, and I was a shell. So hollow.
I remember getting out of bed, putting on my jeans and a baggy shirt, and tying my shoes.
I remember sitting at my desk, writing “I’m sorry” over and over until there was no more room on the page, and my tears had smudged the ink.
Then I walked down the stairs, out the back door, straight toward the tire swing.
I didn’t feel anything. Just a soul deep ache and this constant, unrelenting need to be free. Free from the guilt, the memories, the pain. It all flashed in my mind, a jumbled reel playing on a nonstop loop.
I remember untying the rope from the tire swing, climbing up the tree like I had a thousand times before.
Then sitting there, high in the branch, just as the sun crested over the mountains.
Then just thinking to myself, it was nothing compared to the sunshine Van radiated each day.
And she was gone. And the world was nothing but a cold, empty, dark place without her. And it was my fault.
As the rope wrapped around my neck, the tightness and burn grounded me as I pushed off.
I fell. I was weightless against gravity’s hold on me. For such a short moment I was free. I was flying. Then the rope tightened, the burn grew stronger, and there was a loud snap as it pulled taut.
And just as the darkness set in, I could see Van.
Standing there screaming silently, a fear much greater than that night at the store contorting her face.