Chapter 8 And the way it used to be
A few days after their mother passed away, Aunt kate made the arrangements for the funeral, as Mike made a decision of his own.
Stephanie's POV
It was now the day of Mama's funeral, and as my Aunt, mike and cousin Clara dealt with the people who came by to pay their respects to our family, I on the other hand kept myself at a distance because I wanted to grieve in my own way without all kinds of people crowding around me.
Except for the occasional visits from Mike or Aunt Kate when she wasnt busy talking to someone, I was pretty much left alone. I guess my family finally understood that I wanted to be that way because in truth, being alone is exactky how I was feeling at that very moment.
With the house being full of so many people, I wound up sneaking out of the back door, and made my way through the grass and down to the broken fence where I sat down on the dirt road, hugged my knees and just cried.
I'm not one to really believe in spirits, but I felt something that day as if it was my mama telling me that she was in a much better place now, and that I may be angry and hurt right now, but I will get over all the anger and sadness, as time moves on.
Confused and yet at peace after that experience, the next thing I remenber is hearing the sound of my brother's voice as I felt a hand upon my shoulder. With my brother smiling down at me, I took his hand as he helped me from the ground and we walked back to the house together.
Since there were still people in the house from this morning, I decided to go upstairs and found my way to my mama's room which was the same as it was the day that she died. Taking a deep breath, I walked into the room and over to the vanity where a lonely perfume bottle sat next to a few small pieces of her jewelry.
Sitting down on the stool that was in front of the vanity, I picked up the perfume bottle and then put it back down as I told my mama how much I missed her, and I apologized for not sayin goodbye to her at the funeral.
Thinking that I was alone, I heard the sound of my brother clearing his throat as he entered our Mama's bedroom.
"I figured I would find you in here."said Mike
"I needed to get away from all those people, so I came up here."
"You don't have to explain, I get exactly what you mean."Mike sighed
"So what are you doing up here?"
"Probably the same reason you are except not to smell perfume." said Mike
" do you think it will be any easier to get through everything that has happened, or will it just get harder?"
" I wish I could give you an answer but I just don't know if it will be good enough for you to hear."Mike sighed
As much as I wanted to question what my brother had meant by whether or not what he wanted to give me for an answer not being good enough, it sort of seemed like he wanted to just give up, especially after he had promised that from now on we needed to look after each other from now on.
Choosing choosing not to think anything of it I decided to just let it go and then question him and another time. There is just something about what he said, which made me wonder if he looking for a way out, I don't know what it was but for some reason my brother seemed to be very distant. Maybe it was because we had just lost a mother, and he was just grieving in his own way.
I knew that I might have been thinking that something was going to happen, and that my brother would just up and leave, but then again maybe it was because we we're both grieving that, my judgement was a little off, and that things would not end up going the way my mind was trying to tell me.