A/N: I got so many reviews from my story, More Than Friends? That
asked me to write the Melina story because so many readers were wondering
why she was mentioned but always in past tense. This takes place after my
last story, but only because Matt is telling Miranda and Lizzie and Gordo,
seeing as how they aren't sure what happened, having been off at college.
"You know that Melina was my best friend since we were naïve little eleven year olds, right? Well, you were in college when it finally happened. She isn't here anymore and none of you guys knew why for the most part. What did mom tell you guys about Melina's death?"
"Well, Matt," Lizzie started for the three listening, "all that she really told us was that for a while, you and Melina were inseparable, like, more than you and Lanny in middle school. Then she said that you got all mopey and wouldn't say what was up, next thing she knew Melina was gone and you weren't your usual self anymore. Understandably so, but still..." at the other two's nodding their heads in agreement with his sister's explanation, he decided to explain.
"Well, Gordo, I had those smelling salts because of Melina, right?"
"Yeah, I was kinda confused at that, mind explaining?"
"I was about to anyway. You see, I had smelling salts from Melina because before she passed away, she went through this stage where she would faint a lot, and I mean a lot. In school, at the mall, definitely at home, and here, when we'd be goofing around. I started keeping them here and got really good at knowing when to move to catch her before the ground did. It was a system we had."
"Okay, but Matt, why would she faint? What was wrong that kept her from acting like she always had?" Matt just looked into Miranda's face and she saw the pain that he had never fully dealt with. He had never let himself tell the story. "Matt, honey, I know what it feels like to go through loosing someone you love unexpectedly. Remember my abuelo; he died being hit by a drunk driver. And..."
"Miranda, our situations are different. You just said yourself that your grandfather's death was unexpected." At the three looks of utter shock and confusion, he decided to get back to Melina's story. "Don't look like that, I mean, all deaths are sudden, in a way, but sometimes, you're still not expecting it to happen as soon as it does. It just crept up on me; I didn't even know what to do. She had fainted at her house when we were about to watch a movie, she was in the kitchen, getting the popcorn, and I got this funny feeling that something wasn't right. I got into the kitchen just in time to catch her, and her mom heard the bowl Melina had been holding crash onto the ground." Matt stopped to wipe the tears from his face, only to be stopped by Miranda's soft hand wiping them away.
"Matt, if you don't let them fall, they'll never go away. You'll always feel like crying when you see a poster for her favorite movie, or play her favorite play station game, or see her favorite color, or hear her favorite song. Let them fall, sweetie, it helps, trust me on this, okay? Now, were you saying that you were there when it happened? Keep going if you can Mattie."
"Mattie, huh, no one's called me that for years, she was the last one to...Anyway, I had just thought that she had fainted again, but this time, I tried the salts and they wouldn't work. I carried her into the living room and put her on the couch. At this point I was freaked out. I called her mom down, but she was already on the phone with her dad. I checked her pulse, it was weak, but still there, she wasn't breathing though. I had to give her CPR. You guys know that I got certified for my job at camp. Well, I got Melina's mom off of the phone, and told her to call 911, and she did, but then she started crying and hyperventilating. I took the phone from her, caught a deep breath, and talked to the lady on the other end of the line. The paramedics came and I was helping them as much as I could in the back of the ambulance, her mom was too much of a wreck to sit with her in the back." Matt stopped and let out a shaky breath of air, grasping for Miranda's hand and finding that she had already slip it into hers. He looked up finding an encouraging glance from his girlfriend of a few hours.
"When we got to the ER, she had crashed, her heart was barely pumping, her lungs were bagged on the ride over, and don't get me started on her consciousness level. She was awake through most of it, and when they could take the bag out, she was making short, sharp gasps for air, like there was a steel anvil on her chest. She told me to be strong, to keep up the mischief, and tell her parents that she loved them; she told me she loved me and that she couldn't have ever asked for a better friend, then, she stopped gasping. I called for her doctor, but when he got there, she mustered all of her strength and nodded her head no. She was gone about fifteen minutes later, the wires had been disconnected, the machines unplugged, except for her heart monitor. Right before she passed, I grabbed her hand, squeezed it, and kissed her forehead. Then all I heard was that long beep, like in the movies, you know?"
After Matt's long revelation reflecting Melina's death, no one spoke for quite a few minutes. When everyone in the room had finally taken in all of the information that Matt's speech had given them, Gordo, Lizzie, and Miranda had all realized one thing.
"Hey, Matt, I know that you probably feel a little overwhelmed right now, but there's one thing that you left out. You had said that you had been expecting Melina's death, right?" At Matt's slow nod that affirmed the question, Gordo continued, "Well, if it was expected, then what was the cause? Why had she been getting weaker and fainting and all of that stuff, and why did you two become glued to each others sides?"
"Well, Melina never wanted people to know that she was going to die, she never told anyone. Well, anyone but me. And she made me promise not to tell anyone at all, not Lanny, not Mom or Dad, not even you guys. At the end of sophomore year, when you three graduated, Melina had to go to a neurologist, that led to a CAT scan, and that led to an appointment with an oncologist. She was diagnosed with advanced stages of a malignant brain tumor. The CAT scan also showed that with the position and growth rate of the tumor, it was inoperable. She knew she was going to die, but I didn't. She told me she had a tumor and that she was taking meds. She also said that it was in her brain at a spot that, when there was applied pressure, from the tumor of course, she would loose consciousness momentarily but would wake up with any of the usual remedies. When the fainting spells got worse, the doctor gave her some smelling salts, for school and stuff like that.
"After I lost Melina, I decided to keep them around. Knowing Lizzie, when she came home from school, she'd trip and hit her head on the kitchen counter, so I kept them around for safe keeping. Anyway, that's what really happened with Melina. I never actually knew that she'd die, but over the few months that she had, during junior year, I saw her getting worse. She never complained, never said she was scared, never did anything to let anybody know. She just wanted to be remembered for being who she was, not why she wasn't. To this day, no one outside of us or Melina's parents knows. I want to keep it that way, out of respect. There was one thing though. After I went home from the hospital, I got a call from her parents. They asked me to come over because they had something to show me. I said okay, and I went." During the explanation, Lizzie and Miranda had started to cry, Miranda just holding Matt closer than she had been and holding his hand tighter.
"Melina had left me and each of her parents a letter. Apparently, she knew that she would have been gone sooner than any of us were ready for. When I got to her parents' house, they ushered me in with little or no words and her father led me right into her bedroom. When her dad said to take my time and that there was no rush because they loved having me there, I had to ask what there was no rush to get done. That's when I got it. Her mom, who hadn't said more than one full sentence since it had happened, pulled a white envelope from her back pocket and gave me a hug, pushing the envelope into my hand as she grasped me in a bone crushing hug. I knew what it said before I even read it. She had asked her parents to have me go through her stuff. She left it all to me."
After Matt wrapped up his last little bit of the story, he let go of the emotions that had been ripping at him since he started talking about his best friend that had died, in his opinion, all to early in life. Miranda saw how much his monologue was affecting him, but wasn't sure what to do for him. Never having actually been in this situation before, she let instinct take over. Moving her hand out of his and onto his shoulder, she put her other arm around him as well, moving to sit directly in front of him, she pulled him closer until he was sitting in her lap, his head cradled in the crook of her neck, tears dropping onto her shirt. Lizzie watched with Gordo as her best friend and her brother just sat there. Miranda was rocking him back and forth as if he was the little kid he had been when the events had taken place.
"Watching Matt like this, Gordo, it has such a sobering affect. I mean, I knew that Melina's death had changed him some, but it seems like her being gone caused him to grow up within a matter of hours. He skipped all of the stages that the two of us are still finishing up. Miranda, I have no idea how you know to do that, making him calm down like that. Our mother can't even get him to calm down that fast. You should show us how to do that for when we're all roomies, you know, in case you have to go somewhere and he gets all worked up."
"Umm, sweetie, sorry to disappoint, but I'm thinkin' it's more of a girlfriend trick than a comfort trick. I'm pretty sure you don't want Miranda teaching either one of us how to do that. Do you, Lizzie?" At her nod of confirmation, a smirk appeared on his face as well as Miranda's.
"Matt, sweetie, come on, you need to calm down. Close your eyes and take a deep breath, then exhale slowly. Okay?" Miranda just felt a slow nod against her shirt, and then heard Matt take a deep breath. "Okay, sweetie, look at me. I find it incredible that you got through this without help from anyone. I couldn't even begin to go through that, and that would be like me loosing Lizzie or Gordo, wouldn't it?" The slightly younger man in her arms answered with a simple nod of his head. "Okay, that was a rather depressing story to hear the day that my life finally turns into something worth living. I mean, come on, Matt and I get together, Lizzie and Gordo finally get over the barrier of SOOO many years of denial. It's good. Now then, are you three ready to pick out our apartment? I for one can't wait to see what we end up with, after starting with the idea of a four bedroom and then coupling off like we did."
"You know that Melina was my best friend since we were naïve little eleven year olds, right? Well, you were in college when it finally happened. She isn't here anymore and none of you guys knew why for the most part. What did mom tell you guys about Melina's death?"
"Well, Matt," Lizzie started for the three listening, "all that she really told us was that for a while, you and Melina were inseparable, like, more than you and Lanny in middle school. Then she said that you got all mopey and wouldn't say what was up, next thing she knew Melina was gone and you weren't your usual self anymore. Understandably so, but still..." at the other two's nodding their heads in agreement with his sister's explanation, he decided to explain.
"Well, Gordo, I had those smelling salts because of Melina, right?"
"Yeah, I was kinda confused at that, mind explaining?"
"I was about to anyway. You see, I had smelling salts from Melina because before she passed away, she went through this stage where she would faint a lot, and I mean a lot. In school, at the mall, definitely at home, and here, when we'd be goofing around. I started keeping them here and got really good at knowing when to move to catch her before the ground did. It was a system we had."
"Okay, but Matt, why would she faint? What was wrong that kept her from acting like she always had?" Matt just looked into Miranda's face and she saw the pain that he had never fully dealt with. He had never let himself tell the story. "Matt, honey, I know what it feels like to go through loosing someone you love unexpectedly. Remember my abuelo; he died being hit by a drunk driver. And..."
"Miranda, our situations are different. You just said yourself that your grandfather's death was unexpected." At the three looks of utter shock and confusion, he decided to get back to Melina's story. "Don't look like that, I mean, all deaths are sudden, in a way, but sometimes, you're still not expecting it to happen as soon as it does. It just crept up on me; I didn't even know what to do. She had fainted at her house when we were about to watch a movie, she was in the kitchen, getting the popcorn, and I got this funny feeling that something wasn't right. I got into the kitchen just in time to catch her, and her mom heard the bowl Melina had been holding crash onto the ground." Matt stopped to wipe the tears from his face, only to be stopped by Miranda's soft hand wiping them away.
"Matt, if you don't let them fall, they'll never go away. You'll always feel like crying when you see a poster for her favorite movie, or play her favorite play station game, or see her favorite color, or hear her favorite song. Let them fall, sweetie, it helps, trust me on this, okay? Now, were you saying that you were there when it happened? Keep going if you can Mattie."
"Mattie, huh, no one's called me that for years, she was the last one to...Anyway, I had just thought that she had fainted again, but this time, I tried the salts and they wouldn't work. I carried her into the living room and put her on the couch. At this point I was freaked out. I called her mom down, but she was already on the phone with her dad. I checked her pulse, it was weak, but still there, she wasn't breathing though. I had to give her CPR. You guys know that I got certified for my job at camp. Well, I got Melina's mom off of the phone, and told her to call 911, and she did, but then she started crying and hyperventilating. I took the phone from her, caught a deep breath, and talked to the lady on the other end of the line. The paramedics came and I was helping them as much as I could in the back of the ambulance, her mom was too much of a wreck to sit with her in the back." Matt stopped and let out a shaky breath of air, grasping for Miranda's hand and finding that she had already slip it into hers. He looked up finding an encouraging glance from his girlfriend of a few hours.
"When we got to the ER, she had crashed, her heart was barely pumping, her lungs were bagged on the ride over, and don't get me started on her consciousness level. She was awake through most of it, and when they could take the bag out, she was making short, sharp gasps for air, like there was a steel anvil on her chest. She told me to be strong, to keep up the mischief, and tell her parents that she loved them; she told me she loved me and that she couldn't have ever asked for a better friend, then, she stopped gasping. I called for her doctor, but when he got there, she mustered all of her strength and nodded her head no. She was gone about fifteen minutes later, the wires had been disconnected, the machines unplugged, except for her heart monitor. Right before she passed, I grabbed her hand, squeezed it, and kissed her forehead. Then all I heard was that long beep, like in the movies, you know?"
After Matt's long revelation reflecting Melina's death, no one spoke for quite a few minutes. When everyone in the room had finally taken in all of the information that Matt's speech had given them, Gordo, Lizzie, and Miranda had all realized one thing.
"Hey, Matt, I know that you probably feel a little overwhelmed right now, but there's one thing that you left out. You had said that you had been expecting Melina's death, right?" At Matt's slow nod that affirmed the question, Gordo continued, "Well, if it was expected, then what was the cause? Why had she been getting weaker and fainting and all of that stuff, and why did you two become glued to each others sides?"
"Well, Melina never wanted people to know that she was going to die, she never told anyone. Well, anyone but me. And she made me promise not to tell anyone at all, not Lanny, not Mom or Dad, not even you guys. At the end of sophomore year, when you three graduated, Melina had to go to a neurologist, that led to a CAT scan, and that led to an appointment with an oncologist. She was diagnosed with advanced stages of a malignant brain tumor. The CAT scan also showed that with the position and growth rate of the tumor, it was inoperable. She knew she was going to die, but I didn't. She told me she had a tumor and that she was taking meds. She also said that it was in her brain at a spot that, when there was applied pressure, from the tumor of course, she would loose consciousness momentarily but would wake up with any of the usual remedies. When the fainting spells got worse, the doctor gave her some smelling salts, for school and stuff like that.
"After I lost Melina, I decided to keep them around. Knowing Lizzie, when she came home from school, she'd trip and hit her head on the kitchen counter, so I kept them around for safe keeping. Anyway, that's what really happened with Melina. I never actually knew that she'd die, but over the few months that she had, during junior year, I saw her getting worse. She never complained, never said she was scared, never did anything to let anybody know. She just wanted to be remembered for being who she was, not why she wasn't. To this day, no one outside of us or Melina's parents knows. I want to keep it that way, out of respect. There was one thing though. After I went home from the hospital, I got a call from her parents. They asked me to come over because they had something to show me. I said okay, and I went." During the explanation, Lizzie and Miranda had started to cry, Miranda just holding Matt closer than she had been and holding his hand tighter.
"Melina had left me and each of her parents a letter. Apparently, she knew that she would have been gone sooner than any of us were ready for. When I got to her parents' house, they ushered me in with little or no words and her father led me right into her bedroom. When her dad said to take my time and that there was no rush because they loved having me there, I had to ask what there was no rush to get done. That's when I got it. Her mom, who hadn't said more than one full sentence since it had happened, pulled a white envelope from her back pocket and gave me a hug, pushing the envelope into my hand as she grasped me in a bone crushing hug. I knew what it said before I even read it. She had asked her parents to have me go through her stuff. She left it all to me."
After Matt wrapped up his last little bit of the story, he let go of the emotions that had been ripping at him since he started talking about his best friend that had died, in his opinion, all to early in life. Miranda saw how much his monologue was affecting him, but wasn't sure what to do for him. Never having actually been in this situation before, she let instinct take over. Moving her hand out of his and onto his shoulder, she put her other arm around him as well, moving to sit directly in front of him, she pulled him closer until he was sitting in her lap, his head cradled in the crook of her neck, tears dropping onto her shirt. Lizzie watched with Gordo as her best friend and her brother just sat there. Miranda was rocking him back and forth as if he was the little kid he had been when the events had taken place.
"Watching Matt like this, Gordo, it has such a sobering affect. I mean, I knew that Melina's death had changed him some, but it seems like her being gone caused him to grow up within a matter of hours. He skipped all of the stages that the two of us are still finishing up. Miranda, I have no idea how you know to do that, making him calm down like that. Our mother can't even get him to calm down that fast. You should show us how to do that for when we're all roomies, you know, in case you have to go somewhere and he gets all worked up."
"Umm, sweetie, sorry to disappoint, but I'm thinkin' it's more of a girlfriend trick than a comfort trick. I'm pretty sure you don't want Miranda teaching either one of us how to do that. Do you, Lizzie?" At her nod of confirmation, a smirk appeared on his face as well as Miranda's.
"Matt, sweetie, come on, you need to calm down. Close your eyes and take a deep breath, then exhale slowly. Okay?" Miranda just felt a slow nod against her shirt, and then heard Matt take a deep breath. "Okay, sweetie, look at me. I find it incredible that you got through this without help from anyone. I couldn't even begin to go through that, and that would be like me loosing Lizzie or Gordo, wouldn't it?" The slightly younger man in her arms answered with a simple nod of his head. "Okay, that was a rather depressing story to hear the day that my life finally turns into something worth living. I mean, come on, Matt and I get together, Lizzie and Gordo finally get over the barrier of SOOO many years of denial. It's good. Now then, are you three ready to pick out our apartment? I for one can't wait to see what we end up with, after starting with the idea of a four bedroom and then coupling off like we did."