I was doing twenty six in a twenty five zone. My engine purring, my feet itching on the gas pedal- but for now, the one notch over the limit that I was happened to be enough to settle my need to jam the pedal to the ground. It was the curse of being a new driver, my dad said. 'The need for speed gets to your head.' Maybe that's why I didn't see him.
I mean, it's the only plausible reason I could think of. I wasn't on my cell phone. I wasn't getting the pack of Stride out of my pocket like I'd been wanting to do for the last four blocks. I wasn't even changing the stations on my new stereo. Maybe it was this one notch over the speed limit that caused it. The ball was a dark brown that nearly blended into the road, so as it rolled out in front of, and then past my father's white Chevy, I didn't even notice it.
The boy that followed it, I couldn't help but see. Or forget.
As the hard metal of my bumper smacked into the side of his small body, I heard the crunch and snap and breaks, and slammed on my breaks so hard I sprained my ankle. But that was nothing compared to the damage I'd done. As the car finally came to a halt, I flung open the door, scraping it against the ground and tearing away at the old paint.
Screams erupted from my left. From the house that the boy'd run from. From the place where he'd chased the ball into the street. And I froze. The woman's screams ripped me apart. They etched their way into my brain and still remained there to this day. They were high, and tortured, and like nothing I'd ever heard before. They weren't directed at me, nor did they form words, but instead they were formed at the little boy who lay twisted in a way that I could only describe as broken on the ground. They were screams of fear. Screams of mercy. Screams of fright. And I had caused them. I turned toward them, and caught her eyes for only a slip second.
I'm pretty sure the shock was displayed clearly on my face, but I don't know if she even registered it. She kneed over, and for a minute, it looked as if she were going to throw up, or maybe she was choking on her tears, but she seemed like me in a sense- not able to move, not able to think, not able to help.
When I was young, my parents owned a funeral home. I remember seeing people being carried in at all hours of the night, and taken out to the back or the house. But they weren't people really, right? They were just bodies now. Lifeless, cold, dead.
Is that where the little boy was now? Out the back, with the rest of them? Laying somewhere with a woman like my mother- thin, pale, skeleton like- leaning over him, covering his face with white powder, and fixing his bones in a way that made him look less broken? I close my eyes, because I can't think of anyone this way, let alone this boy.
My parents used to joke, and say things like, "Eat your greens. D'you wanna die before you're thirty?" The image of me being taken out the back was enough to force the greens down my throat, and now I wish I hadn't eaten a bite. Don't I deserve the same fate? Don't I deserve to go out the back, where the boy is, and have my mother's ghostly hands running down my face instead of his?
Death is a thing I tried not to think about much. I was taught to see the end of life as Heaven and Hell, but the way I saw it was nothing like either. In my mind, when you died, you're buried in a box, six feet under, and still very much conscious. Only, you couldn't move, think, breathe. All you could do was sit with you're thoughts, forever after, thinking about what you'd done, or what you will never be able to do. Is that what the boy was going through now? I stay up late at night, thinking about him in that box. I see him picturing my face, conjuring my thoughts, and plotting his revenge, though this is impossible, because he was dead on impact, and never had a chance to see my face. Maybe he never even knew he'd died.
"We don't blame you." His father would say to me, two years later when I happened to be in the same coffee shop as him, reading a copy of Moby Dick and blocking out the world, if only for a few chapters. It was these four simple words that broke me. I remember my throat burning, and my tears spilling over before I could even think about it. And then here I was, breaking down and crying in the middle of a crowded shop in Forks. And I didn't even care.
I haven't looked at a car accident without crying. My fear grips me, holds me inside of myself. Sometimes, when I lay awake and think of the boy, I picture my own brother being taken out the back. I picture his face, covered in white powder, laid out in a cedar wood coffin, white flowers spread around the church, people staring down at his fragile, lifeless body. Sometimes I picture myself as that lifeless body. Sometimes, I'm the one who was laying down, watching people cry over me, and looking up at my mother, who would kiss my forehead and I would try to smile at her, but I couldn't and I'd remember in an instant what death really entitled. But before I wake up, she closes the casket, and I'm buried six feet under, alone with my thoughts and regrets.
It's this dream that scares me the most. But not because I'm no longer living, but rather because when I wake up, I wish I could be there, where the boy is. My brother lays next to me, the warm blanket spread out on our bed feels like it stretches miles between us, and I reach out and place my hand on his hip, just to feel him there. He would wake up sometimes, and see the look on my face, and know I've had one of those dreams again. But other times he slept, like now. So I pull back the blankets from myself, and double them up on him, because it gets drafty in the old house we rent, and I creak my way down the hall into the kitchen where I heat up some water on the stove because it's what he would have done for me.
I take the tea bag from the cabinet and place it in my cup, and sit at the table to wait. "It's fine." I say in a sort of whisper-shout when I hear my mother coming down the hall softly, but it's not her, it's my brother. His dark hair is disheveled and his eyes are tired, but he walks anyway, dragging his hand along the green walls, and over the chipped paint that I'd meant to cover up days ago. I don't ask why he's up, or if he needs something, because for the moment I like to think that he's the same as me. That he was torn away from his dreams, and needed to get away from it all for a while.
"Don't touch that." I snap when he goes near the stove, and turns off the burner.
"But it's done- see, the whistles been blowin.'" He explains in a voice that's too high in defense. I realize that he is right, and that I hadn't even noticed that it'd gone off, or how long it's been doing so. I also realize that this is what has woken him up, and not his need or want for isolation like me.
It's awkward for a moment, as I pour my tea and take a sip. Me and my brother do not talk much. Though he is wise and understanding beyond his years, it seems that he has to be, more so than him wanting to be. The most we ever spoke was when my mother would say things like 'Johnny, don't you want to tell Ellie what you did at school today?" over the dinner table, in which he would shrug, and I would zone out. At nine, he was able to tell exactly what everyone around him was thinking, and how to deal with each specific personality. He had to be strong for me, because I couldn't be that for him.
He pulls a chair over to the counter and stands on it, opening one of the top cabinets and taking out a packet of powdered hot chocolate, and making himself a cup. I find myself wishing that things could be different. I find myself wishing I didn't see the little boy every time I looked at my brother. I wish I could get the screams out of my head. Or the image of his crumpled body being lifted into the ambulance. I wish I could have stopped in time. I wish I could have known.
I wish I could have saved you.
The long laces of my running shoes slide between my fingers, a comforting fit in my soft hands. Tying the knot tightly, I stand and walk through my apartment into the kitchen where my brother sits eating a pop tart, and my mother leans against the counter, her fingers wrapped around a hot coffee cup, her hair disheveled, and her eyes cold as the meet mine.
I don't have to tell her I'm going out, she already knows this. Running was my escape. And not metaphorically. I could escape the harsh looks of the town, the harsh thoughts of the people around me, the people who never forgave me for the little boy. Forks was small. Everyone knew everyone. It wasn't long before they knew about me too. My mother turns her back to me, like she does almost every morning, and pulls her bath robe tighter around her.
I look down at my brother, and smile slightly, as he nods as if to say, 'have a good run.' I know I will. The air was getting warmer, and the skies were clearing up, and for once, it didn't feel like everything was completely hopeless. "Here." Johnny says, and holds out his hand to me, where two small blue pills lay. They're for depression. They're for me. I take them from him and smile, and slip them inside my mouth before I rush out the door. Once outside, I spit the pills out into some nearby bushes, and look back over my shoulder to see if anyone saw. Forks was quiet in the morning. It was La Push where I really wanted to be so early.
By five every morning the elderly of the town would make their way to the roads, either setting up fruit stands, or visiting them to buy from them. It was busy, and lively, and no one knew me there. My feet hit the sidewalk with quiet thumps, and it wasn't until I was nearly to La Push that my breathing came out ragged.
"Honey, honey, take this." A wrinkly hand reaches out as I stop running and begin to enter the market place. I take the cup of water from the woman, smiling widely at her and gulping down a sip. The woman was hunched over and covered with age spots and sagging skin, but her face was bright like a young child's.
"Thank you." I nod to her, handing back the cup, and moving away from her quickly. I realized a long time ago it wasn't good to talk to anyone long. It wasn't good to get to know people, or rather, let people get to know me. There was something about killing an innocent kid that really got people angry at you.
I continued through the market place, stopping once more to purchase a plump peach off of one of the elderly men, before continuing down towards the beach. I took my usual seat among the rocks, staring out at the ocean. Closing my eyes, I focused on the waves crashing against the shore and took a huge bite from my peach.
My eyes pop open at the sound of numerous whoops and hollers, before a rush of bare flesh flashes past me. I jump, looking at the shirtless boys who just ran by me. Had they not even noticed me? Had they not wanted to? Should I leave before they do? I decide to watch them longer, blushing as they strip off their jeans until the only thing that remains is their boxers. What were they doing up there anyway? And what the hell did they look so happy about?
Just as I'm about to turn my back and leave, I watch one of the boys fling himself off the cliff, into the far off water below. For a minute I'm breathless, staring at the group with a new found realization. They were a colt. They were a suicide colt. I'd read about them at the library a few weeks ago. Groups of people who plan deaths together. Who have nothing to live for. I'd be damned if I let another boy die. In the next second, as the second boy is about to jump I catch my breath.
"Stop! Don't do it! Don't jump!"