Chapter Twenty-Five

Five days later I was sitting in Miranda's living room. It was quiet, except for drops of melting snow hitting the ground outside. The drip, drip, drip did little to ground me.

I didn't remember a lot from the previous five days. My memory didn't store information anymore. Everything hurt. My limbs were heavy. A dull static ache hissed inside my chest. My throat still burned. When I asked Miranda why it was so sore, she said it was from my screams. I didn't remember any screams, but apparently, I lost it when Miranda and Brian took me away from the hospital after hours of waiting. Miranda said we sat there for ten hours.

Doctors gave me a sedative shot. I opened my eyes in their house, and there, I spent all those days. Somewhere during this time Miranda took me to Jake and Alice's house, it was dark. There was a funeral, but I was heavily sedated. The casket was closed, and I spent the entire time looking down at my feet. Alice was not there, but a lot of people were. And I didn't know many of them.

I met their parents. Jake took many facial expressions from his dad, while Alice was a copy of her mom. Of course, they didn't know me. When Miranda said I was Jake's girlfriend, they just nodded. I think they were sedated like me because nothing but naked grief was in their features. I asked where Alice was.

"Gone," her mother said.

All I remembered from the funeral was the sky. Gray, heavy, rolling sky. Then nothing.

Only pain. I welcomed it as an old friend. I was familiar with it. I'd lost a person before. I knew how it worked. And I was so worried about Alice, because she didn't know.

A few days later I asked Brian to drive me to my dorm room. Miranda protested, she wanted me to stay, she said it was too early for me to be alone. I hoped Alice was not alone.

I hugged Miranda and said that I was okay. It was the second time she was saving me.

My room was tidy when I came back, Miranda had taken care of it. I spent hours sitting on my bed and watching the dreamcatcher that hung above it, white feathers unmoving.

I missed Jake, his light laugh. From our first dates I felt his presence, always close, and now I knew I was alone. He was there for such a short time, but he was there. His care was like a warm blanket. He wasn't there anymore, only a chilling cold gripped my body.

I knew how to cope, my mind remembered all the books and articles I read about it for months after my dad died, when I finally was ready to move on.

One night I found myself standing under the lamp post in the park, the one Jake always met me at. I stood there and watched the trees. It was dark and quiet, and no one was around. I didn't know I had it in me, but a gurgling wet sound pressed my chest. I was not whimpering, no, I was choking. I was choking on my grief—the miserable feeling of missing them both so much I could not breathe.

I took my phone from my pocket. The screen was covered in a tiny web, the bottom cover cracked. It was from the days I didn't remember. Miranda said I threw the phone at the wall after one of the times I had called Alice.

It showed three AM. With familiar movements, I scrolled down to Alice's number and dialed. It went to voicemail. I stopped leaving messages some time ago. I was sure she was not listening to them.

I sat down on the bench and pressed my fingers to my eyes. They were wet, and all I saw were dark spots.

"Where are you?" I asked out loud.

Only the wind replied. She could be somewhere in Eastern Europe for all I knew. She could be anywhere. But all I hoped for her was that she was not alone, that there was someone to ease the pain.

Slowly I returned to my dorm room. That night I dreamt of Jake. He was laughing, and by his side was my dad, they were both smiling. It was a bit easier in the morning, just a little bit.

* * *

I stood by Miranda's front door. A doormat cheerfully said that I was finally home. I wasn't.

She opened the door, surprise changing to worry in a second.

"Emily, come in," she said, opening the door wider.

I went inside; it was warm. The big illuminated deer stood turned off in the hall. They put it there after the Christmas party. Brian peered from the living room and waved at me. He didn't know how to behave around me, like I was a crystal ball ready to turn into a bomb at any moment. He had seen the worst of me when I had screamed and clawed at them in the hospital. It took three male nurses to calm me down, Miranda said. I listened to it as if it was a story of someone else.

I wanted to tell him that I was still just Emily, sad, shattered, but still the girl he knew.

I cleared my throat. No sound came out.

Miranda took my hand. "It's ok," she said, as I watched our hands together.

"Could you …" my voice trailed off, as the tears came back again. They always returned those days. When I thought there was nothing more to shed, no liquid, they came. They came in the most inappropriate place: in shops, in lectures, where I made myself go again, for the old promise I had made to my dad. But mostly, they came at night, smearing my pillow with stains.

I wiped them quickly as I noticed Bryan looking away.

"I'm sorry," I murmured.

Miranda nodded, squeezing my hand lightly.

"Could you please drive me to their parents" house?" I asked quickly.

"Emily," Miranda started to protest.

"Yes, okay," Brian said. Miranda turned to him, her brows raised.

I took a shaky breath, as more tears blurred my vision. "Thank you."

Somewhere deep in my mind, I thought about how uncomfortable I made Brian, with all my crying, and grief.

"I'll go," I said and turned to the door, dropping Miranda's hand.

But before I could even take a step, Brian came up to me—I was slow those days. He did the unexpected, he put his arms around me, wrapping me tightly in an embrace. My body shook with sobs as I cried into his shirt.

"I miss them so much," I said. "So, so much."

"I know," he said, his hand on the back of my head. "I'm sorry."

When he released me, I looked at Miranda. Silent tears ran down her cheeks.

"God, this is so unfair," she said angrily, her hands going to fists. "Jake was full of life, he should have lived! How could it happen?"

"Death happens." I said the phrase I had read in one of the books a year after my father died.

"Stay here tonight?" Miranda asked.

I looked at her and then at Brian, who nodded. I was so weak, I had no strength anymore to fight, to protest.

I glanced up. I was standing on the place where during what felt like ages ago, the mistletoe had hung. I remembered those red lips kissing Alice. I remembered figuring out what I felt toward her. The time we had afterward was such a short, short time.

Miranda and I sat on a battered leather sofa in front of their massive TV; Brian sat in his armchair, which he called Chandler's and Joey's chair copy. They turned on some random show, and as it played I knew none of us was really paying any attention.

I watched as Brian tried to hide his eyes with his hand, giving up some time later, and just wiping the tears from time to time. They grew closer when Jake had moved into town, spending a few times a week together discussing God knows what. Brian lost a friend.

And I lost them both. In my wildest dreams—before Jake disappeared from the world—I imagined him letting me go, imagined him happy for me and Alice, him and I staying friends. How it would have been in reality, I didn't know. Probably not so amicable and light. But they would have known the truth. And I hated that the night before he died, he figured everything out. I hated that I didn't have a chance to even speak to him. But what would I say? Sorry, we have to break up, I love your sister.

It was all so messed up before he drove to the market that morning. I had made it messy. All I had left was a scorched emptiness, the land of my heart where two people I loved used to be. I loved them both, but differently.

"You know," Brian said and turned to me, interrupting the spiral of my thoughts, "he was happy with you, you need to know that. He loved you."

I nodded. "I was about to break up with him," I said quietly.

They didn't ask why. By then Miranda and Brian had figured it out.

"I love his sister," I said to the silence and turned back to the screen.