She hates how perfect the day is—the way the sun beats warm and mellow against her skin, the light breeze wrapping her red hair in tangles around her face. She hates that on the second worst day of her entire existence, there are kids flying down the sidewalks on scooters, breathless and bright-eyed with freedom.
She almost vomits when she hears an ice cream truck in the distant.
It doesn’t fit. If this was a movie, there’d be thunderclouds rolling in and she’d be shivering under a sweatshirt and a heavy coat instead of sweating in her cutoff shorts and cotton tee shirt. The air would be thick, heavy, and foreboding, pressing down on her chest and cloaking her in a suffocating embrace.
Enough
I watch him everyday after school. After the bell signals that I get a reprieve from hell for a few hours. His locker is next to mine. When he opens it everyday, I get a glimpse of his soul. Song lyrics are taped inside the door next to pictures of the Grand Canyon and the pyramids of Egypt. A knit sweater that he got from building houses in Guatemala over the summer hangs inside next to his soccer jersey. When he catches me staring inside, he frowns at me beneath a mop of curly blond hair. He pulls out his jersey effortlessly, and slams the battered blue door closed. He hesitates, and opens his mouth as if to say something to me. Instead he nods and walks down the hallway, towering at 6’2”.
I grab my history book and my faded cardigan before walking the opposite direction. I pass Principal Barto, forcing a smile that I’m sure will only feed his already large ego. I slip down the back stairs, detected only by a few scrawny lower classmen. I push the heavy door open and shiver as I step into the crisp fall air. I shrug into the cardigan, attempting to ignore the tight strain on my stomach. It has shrunk, I tell myself. It has nothing to do with my drowning myself in a tub of rocky road ice cream after a hard day, which was pretty much everyday. It has nothing to do with munching anxiously on salty potato chips when my parents argue every night when they think I’m asleep. And it certainly has nothing to do with me stopping at the Quickmart every morning for a couple of doughnuts when there is no milk or cereal to be found in the dusty cupboards of the kitchen.
I brush my unruly brown hair out of my face, forcing the tangles behind my ears. I run my tongue over my lips. I wince at the contact, the wind cracking them. I hear a whistle shrill in the distance followed by what could only be the sharp tin of Coach Miller’s voice. I follow the sound, the leaves crunching obnoxiously under my feet. When I reach the field, I drop my worn backpack on the ground and lean against the tall oak tree that hovers near the fence. My fingers wrap themselves through the fence, clenching tightly.
He is graceful on the field, effortless. He glides over the green grass, a flash of white and blue. Mesmerized, I plop myself onto the ground and lean my back against the trunk of the tree. I wrap my hair into a low ponytail and hug my knees to my chest, shivering. I sit there for two hours, but what seems like only minutes when watching him.
I get up from my spot beneath the tree and walk around the field, pretending to be nonchalant. He notices me, though. I blush and duck my face, suddenly fascinated by the dead leaves that scatter the ground. He jogs past me to a girl I don’t recognize. She is everything I’m not. Tall, thin, straight shiny hair with an IQ of 160. He looks back at me, half apologetic. I nod, understanding his silent message:
I am not enough for him.
I see her there in my thoughts, hung from the closet. She wears a white robe and a purple scarf is tied across her neck. Her feet stick out under the doors of the closet. There are marks on her body from where she tried only breaths ago.
I walk on the ground with eyes wide open, and every now and again I think I spot her, but I do not. She is dead.
I see her in my dreams, her body full of life. She is her old self, blithe and sweet. She wears a pair of jeans, socks that don’t match, a pair of chucks, and a blue tee shirt that I bought her one year as a gift. We play Wii, watch TV, and dance in the house as if she still lives, as if no life has been torn in four since her death.
We breathe less easy now and cry over poems that she wrote. We grip photos of her tight in our palms. We smell her clothes and finger her hair brush. We hope that it will bring her back, but it won’t. She is dead.
If she were here, she would be mad. She would hate the blame and ill will that spews from mouths every day. She would appeal that every one get on with their life and not mourn over her. She would say she isn’t worth it. She is.
I see her there in my thoughts, hung from the closet. She wears a white robe and a purple scarf is tied across her neck. Her feet stick out under the doors of the closet. There are marks on her body from where she tried only breaths ago.
A piece I wrote for Fiction Writing. Inspired by Brittany Rebecca, my best friend who committed suicide. It’s supposed to be flash fiction (a stripped short story written under 300 words in this case).
The title was assigned to me by the professor in light of Tim O’Brien’s novel “The Things They Carried”.
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She hates airports— the smell, the bustle, everything. The noise makes her light-headed, so she is collapsed in a chair. A box of Girl Scout cookies sits next to her, half-eaten. The box top is mostly torn off.
In her carry-on is a passport, marked twice for England and for home. An eagle’s feather that her students gave her on a nature hunt pokes out. A wad of Euros is tucked away, large bill that roughly equal 500 American dollars, or so she thinks. Math isn’t her strong suit.
She fingers the bracelet on her wrist. The rope is fraying. The beads are faded from the sun. The water stains make it rough on her wrist. She touches underneath it to make sure they’re still there. They are. Strands of brown hair are tucked in between the braids, a reminder that she’s dead.
She was studying abroad when she heard. She snagged the first flight. She sat in the same airport. Except, the friendship bracelet that she wore then now carried a bigger piece of her best friend. She wore it often growing up, but hasn’t taken it off for the last six years.
She breathes a little easier. Her stomach doesn’t feel the same dread as the last time she returned to the States.
A hand squeezes her left one reassuringly. She looks down at their clasped hands, the diamond glinting on her finger. She smiles.
“Ready, love?” he says in a British lilt.
She nods slowly, her hand leaving his. She breathes deeply and reaches down to untie the bracelet. The frayed ends caress her fingertips. She slips her fingers through the braids to touch the strands of hair once more.
When it is free, it falls into her lap. She wraps her hand around the braids and pockets it. She reaches for him and her carry-on and begins to board.
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P.S.-The end of this story involves closure that I do not feel. It simply ends this way for story purposes.
