She heard the crunch of the snow as her boot covered feet walked up the snow covered street. It was cold but with the yellow rays of sun touching the atmosphere, causing the white snow to glitter like diamonds. She smiled warmly, taking off her black fingerless gloves to touch the white snow that number her fingers red. The cold wind blew against her face and honey brown hair that was covered in a dark purple hat that covered her ears.
She sniffed, loving the feel of the cold burn her lungs and throat.
It reminded her of the days when things were good before they took a turn for the worst. She lost so much at a young age, including her brother Jamie and her sister Sophie.
She was glad they didn't get the big brunt of the cruelty that was once their happy lives. She sighed again, watching her breath form a puff of white cloud before disappearing. She blew on her tanned hands to warm them before putting on her gloves again. She walked again, turning the corner of Walderf Street that was being sprinkled with melting salt by workers in orange.
She placed her hands inside her black jacket as she walked past them, being careful not to be sprinkled by the salts. After another half an hour of walking, her breath coming out in white puffs of smoke, her nose red and her pink lips chapped from the cold; she was finally here.
HEFTILL CEMETERY, it said in big, black letters that curved down slightly on the gold gates with the tips pointed up like a devil's tail.
She scoffed at the gold gate, wondering who in their damn right mind would paint a cemetery in gold.
As if it was a beautiful place to be in after you died. It was stupid.
No one was glad to be buried on the ground, being eaten away at maggots until there was nothing left but bones. Even the damn bones would eventually turn to dust and soon everyone wouldn't remember the dead anymore.
They should've painted the cemetery gates black to show people that death wasn't as cracked up as everyone made it to be.
Are the dead going to care if the gates were gold or not? No, because they're dead.
No matter how much she wished it wasn't the case.
Sighing, she pushed the gates open, the gates creaking, the sound echoing across the headstones and into the cemetery. She walked, surprised that the there was not much snow in here then out there.
She walked, her body already knowing where she wanted to go. It took a few minutes until she finally got to the place that she both wanted to be and leave. She stared at the gray headstone, the frosting of snow covering it and the ground where the person she loved was there. Brushing away the snow from the headstone and ground, she kneeled, the cold seeping past her jeans and into her skin, causing her to shiver, but she did not move.
"Hi, Dad." She said softly, her voice cracking with the thickness of emotion.
She cleared her throat which hurt. She didn't want to cry. Not anymore.
"I miss you." She cleared her throat again, finding it difficult to talk when her throat had a lump the size of a tennis ball.
"Jamie's big now. You'd hardly recognize him now if you were still here. Sophie just turned three now. Mom forgot her birthday. Again. Not that that's new."
She couldn't help the surge of anger and resentment rise in her as she thought of her mother.
Her mother, who forgot about them when their father died.
Her mother, who was so lost in her grief that she didn't realize that Jamie and Sophie had turned to her as the mother figure.
Her mother, who didn't pay attention whether the bills got paid or if there was food on the table.
Her mother, who now wants to be a mother after three years and doesn't realize the tension between the kids and herself.
Kailani tried to let go of her resentment and anger but she couldn't. She was only 14 when she took on the role of being a mother to her younger siblings. Her mother didn't even notice the remarks Kailani made to her whenever she tried to do something motherlike and being rejected subtly by the kids.
"Did I do something to make you angry?" Her mother would ask her when Kailani had put the kids to sleep after pushing away their mother so Kailani could read them a story and make sure they had hot milk with sugar to help them sleep.
Kailani had to clench her fists and bite her tongue until it bled so she wouldn't say anything hurtful to her mother.
"Why?" Kailani had asked hotly.
Her mother, with the brown eyes her brother, Jamie inherited, blinked with confusion.
"Jamie and Sophie don't seem to like me and you always seem so serious. You used to be happy and cheerful. What happened?"
Dad's death happened. You checking out for three damn years happened.
She wanted to say it. They were clawing up her throat and banging at her teeth to get out in the open air. She bit her lip to stifle them.
"What do you think happened?"
"I know after your father's death, I wasn't here as often as I'd like to be..."
Kailani interrupted her harshly, not standing the note of pleading and understanding in her mother's voice. "As often as you'dliked?! You were never here. You haven't been here for three goddamn years!"
Her mother gasped, hurt filling her watery eyes. "Kailani, I lost my husband. How did you expect me to act?"
"Don't ask for pity because you're not getting it from me. I was 14, mom! 14 when I paid the bills, took Jamie to school and had the neighbors babysit Sophie. I had to learn how to cook and get a job to pay our house so we wouldn't lose it! All you ever did was sit there and look blankly at the T.V. I had to force feed you! Sophie cried for you! Jamie cried for you!I cried for you! We all did for months and all you ever did was ignore us!" Kailani was shaking with the anger, her cheeks flushed and her breathing heavy.
"That's not fair. I was grieving..."
"So were we! We grieved for dad and for you! You were supposed to be there for us! We had to suffer together, become a family so we wouldn't fall apart but you never cared!"
"Of course I cared but it was so hard. I didn't know what to do." Her mother's eyes were filled with pain and grief and tears and Kailani felt a small sense of guilt for putting this on her mother.
"3 years, mom! You shouldn't have left us alone for three years. Especially Sophie and Jamie. I could have taken care of myself but not them."
"Stop it! Stop it! You can't understand how it is to lose someone you love and feel like you wanna die!" Her mother was raising her voice in anger and accusation.
Her mother should not get angry. It was her fault for leaving them alone.
"I lost dad! I lost him! We all did! You weren't the only one! I wanted to stop everything and give up but I had my brother and sister to think about! I thought about them and forced myself to grow up!"
"You turned them against me! They hate me! Sophie doesn't want me to put on her diapers and Jamie doesn't want me to dress him anymore!"
Kailani was stunned into silence. Her mother had just proved her point.
"It's true, isn't it?!" Her mother yelled.
All that anger turned into resentment and disbelief. She didn't want to do this anymore. Blinking back tears of frustration and anger, she stood up.
"Actually, mother. You just proved my point. Sophie doesn't wear diapers. She hasn't for a year now. And Jamie has been dressing himself for two years now. You'd know that if you stopped being selfish and paid attention."
Her mother was gaping like a fish and Kailani shook her head before heading to her room and cried herself to sleep. The cold wind bit at her red cheeks and she returned to the present. She touched her cheeks to warm them and was not surprised to feel her tears frozen on her cheeks.
"Sorry, Dad. I kinda got lost there for a moment. Well, I got her the princess set and invited her friends from daycare. She was high on sugar and broke a vase and she crashed in the middle of the party." Kailani giggled before sobering up.
"Oh, Dad. I feel so lost." She murmured, the chill of the air biting her cheeks, the wetness of the snow seeping into her clothes, but she refused to move.
"I'm so lost without you. I miss you so much." She closed her eyes, trying to stop the tears at bay.
She was losing him every day. The way his laughter boomed, the way his eyes crinkled with joy, the way his arms would hug her tightly and whisper, "my beautiful princess."
She was losing it all. She couldn't remember how he smelled or looked. It felt like she was looking through a dirty glass and no matter how hard she tried to clean it, it never got cleaner.
And she knew it was because she was forced to grow up and set aside her needs for those of her siblings.
All she had left of him was his stories of the Easter Bunny and so forth. But each day, she was struggling to believe in them. It was her last link to her father, theonly link and she didn't want to give it up. With each day that passed, she was losing a fighting battle. She wanted someone to tell her, to show her that the Easter Bunny, the tooth fairy and so many other were real.
She wanted something. Anything.
And the only person who could do such a thing was gone.
"I want to believe, dad. I want to believe in everything you told me but it's just so hard. I'm 17 and no one my age believes in fairy-tales. But I do. I want to, dad. It's all I have left of you. I can't even remember how you look or smell. Your stories are my last connection to you. I don't want to give that up. Give you up. But..."
She couldn't continue that thought. She tilted her head back and blinked back her tears. She didn't know how long she stayed there but she felt the wind bite her and she shivered.
"I love you, Dad. I'll come by soon." She murmured, tears of sadness and longing cutting down her frozen cheeks. She pressed three fingertips to her mouth and kissed them before placing them on her father's headstone.
"I love you."
She sighed and stood up, not bothering to brush off the snow off her jeans. She let her fingers linger on the gray headstone as she walked past until they were no longer connected.