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I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me. It wouldn’t be the first time that happened, especially when I’m here. Sitting with my back against the tree, with my hand on the cold, wet ground as if I could touch her. The same spot where they found her, the spot where she lost her life. The same spot I come and sit at a couple of times a week. It used to be every day, but now I alternate from being here or being at her grave site. I watched from the darkness as she got out of her car and onto the road where our lives changed, her feet moving her around in a circle, probably reliving the horror that was that night. I slid up the bark of the tree in the darkness as she walked toward me. Toward the scene where my life turned into the hellhole it is now.
My eyes narrowed to slits as I saw her take steps toward where the white wooden cross I planted sits, along with the wreath that I replace monthly. I stand here in the darkness, my body tense and burning like it’s on fire with rage as I look at the woman who could have stopped all of this. The woman who with one word could have changed the lives of five other people. Selfish, that is what she is, and I hate every single bone in her body.
The silence of the night is almost deafening. I watch her short blond hair move side to side as she stands in front. I can’t help myself, nor do I fucking care. “What the fuck are you doing here?” The harshness of my voice is tamer than what I feel inside me. The hatred I have for this woman feeds my soul. I hate the world. I hate the whole fucking world for the pain I walk with every single day. But I don’t hate anyone as much as I hate Autumn.
Her body looks like it’s shaking, like she’s outside in a snowstorm without a jacket. “Hello, Charlie,” she says softly.
“I asked you a question,” I growl out, ignoring she was trying to be polite at the same time watching the tears run down her face, tears she has no right having. “What the fuck are you doing here?”
“My father is sick.” Her voice comes out broken. “I won’t be here long.” I watch her body shake even more, her arms wrapping around her stomach. She’s changed in the last six years since I’ve last seen her; she looks like she’s skin and bones.
Her face is ghostly. “You come home, and the first fucking place you come to is here?” I say in disgust.
“I shouldn’t have.” She shakes her head, her hand coming up to wipe away the tears streaming down her face.
“Yeah, you’re right. You shouldn’t have,” I snap at her. “Let’s hope this is the last fucking time I see you.” I don’t stand here long enough to see her reaction. Instead, I turn and walk back into the darkness, past the tree where she died, and toward the path that after eight years I could find with my eyes closed.
I hear a car door close in the distance and know it’s her. It has to be since it’s the middle of the night. The sound of a car driving by makes me turn to the side as I see her. It takes me forty-five minutes to walk back to my house. Coming out of the dense forest into the clearing, I walk past the barn and straight to the house I moved into four years ago. When we bought the property, it came with a main house, but it was falling apart. So my parents had it renovated slowly, and when it was done, they came down and helped me move in here.
My parents were beside themselves watching me drown in the house I shared with Jennifer. I hadn’t touched anything that was Jennifer’s. Her clothes still hung in the closet with mine. Her clothes still folded in the drawers. Every single thing she left was still out, untouched. I never wanted to move from the house Jennifer and I shared, but I gave in. It was easier than fighting with them day in and day out. I was a shell of myself. I’m still a shell of myself. I’ve just learned how to hide it from everyone now.
I walk up the back steps, going to the sliding door. Grabbing the handle and pulling it open, I feel the cold air from the air conditioner hit me right away. I kick off my boots on the little mat before I make my way to the kitchen. Going straight to the cabinet over the fridge, I grab the half-full bottle of whiskey before going to the couch. I sit down and place the bottle on the coffee table. Twisting the cap off, I toss it across the room and watch it land somewhere in the corner before I bring the bottle to my mouth and take a big pull of the amber liquid. The burning is almost nonexistent anymore since I drank some before I took my walk after dinner.
“Fucking hell.” I shake my head, seeing Autumn in my mind before I take another pull and sit back into the cushions of the couch. She was standing there alive, breathing, while Jennifer rots under six feet of dirt. I ignore the way her eyes looked, just as haunted as mine, if not more. I ignore that Jennifer would not want me to blame her. I ignore it all while I take another pull of the amber liquid. My eyes go to the frame sitting in the middle of the coffee table of Jennifer and me from the first night we met, standing beside her with my arm around her shoulder. The regret of not marrying her is something I carry with me daily. Not making her mine forever will always be my biggest mistake.
My heart feels the usual pressure when I look at the picture, as the sorrow comes slowly after. I take another long pull before putting my head back and closing my eyes, bringing me back to the day my life ended.
In that hospital room, staring at my grandfather. His stoic expression, his face saying what I think I already knew in my heart but not in my head yet. “She’s gone.” The words cut me off at the knees, and I swear I blacked out for a minute. All I saw was darkness until I felt two strong arms lift me and place me on the bed.
I snapped out of the darkness. “No!” I shook my head in disbelief. “No, no, no, no, no,” I chanted over and over again. “You’re lying,” I hissed at him. “You’re lying. She’s not gone.” I looked at my father, wanting him to tell me it wasn’t true. But I could tell from his eyes, from the way he was looking at me, he wasn’t lying to me.
“I’m so, so sorry.” His voice sounded as broken as my soul was at that moment. It felt like half of me, fuck that, the whole of me was gone with her. Like a piece of me was going to be forever lost.
“I have to go to her.” I turned to get out of the bed. “I have to go and be with her.”
“You can’t.” My grandfather came to stand beside the bed next to my father.
“It’s cordoned off; no one can go in.” He said the words, and I thought at that moment I hated him. I hated him for telling me this.
“Where was she?” I asked, my voice as dead as my heart.
My grandfather looked at my father, not sure if he should tell me. “He’s not going to stop until you tell him,” my father communicated to my grandfather.
“She flew out of the window. She died on impact.” He said the words, and all I knew was I had to turn to the side, and I threw up everywhere.
“Fuck,” my grandfather said as he rushed out of the room to get someone. The nurse came back in and called someone to come and clean it up.
My father went to get me something to drink, and all I could do was stare at the cream-colored wall. “Where is she?”
“She’s going to be sent to the coroner,” he murmured softly. “There is going to be an autopsy performed.”
“What about everyone else?” I asked, even though, to be honest, I didn’t care. At that moment, I wished everyone had died, including me.
“Waylon didn’t make it either,” my grandfather said, and I laid my head back on the bed and closed my eyes, never wanting to wake up again. But sadly, I did.
Every day, the alarm rings, and I have to ask whoever is listening why. Why keep me here? My eyes open again, taking in the darkness as I take another gulp of the whiskey, getting up right after and heading to the bedroom. I place the bottle on my bedside table, falling onto the covers of the bed.
I look up at the ceiling. “I miss you,” I tell the empty room, “every fucking day.” My eyes close. “I wish you were here,” I mumble as my eyes get heavier. “I wish I was there.” Those are the last words I say before the darkness takes me.
