There is a gaping, hollow ache in my chest from the loss of my dad that sucks the breath out of me. I am broken inside, and terrified of living my life without his loving guidance.
I feel gypped that he was taken too soon and without any warning at all.
It's not fair.
It's not fair!
I got over Mom's death, but I don't know if I can get over his, I don't know, I don't know, and it drives me insane.
I still need his advice.
I still need his hugs.
I still need assurance that he loves me, that I'll always be his little girl, that I'm normal despite everything.
No one can make me understand. What's to understand? God's will, or the hand of fate, or what-the-fuck-ever people have told me, doesn't make any damn sense.
I'm so angry at you, Dad. Why did you have to pull over that car when you were off the clock? Why didn't you just drive home like you were supposed to?
Who cares about a broken taillight?!
But he's gone, and I can never ask him anything again.
It's just me and my thoughts and my questions that go unanswered.
Should I feel grateful that I never had to tell him about my relationship with Edward?
Would he have forgiven us? Would it have broken him?
Which is the lesser of the two evils?
That he'd have broken over me and Edward, that he'd never have forgiven us?
Or that he's dead now?
And should I be ashamed for feeling even a smidge of relief that he never had to find out about us?
I hate myself.
I'm sorry, Dad.
And I miss him.
I wish I had at least one more day. To do what, I don't know, and it probably doesn't matter … but it all hinges on the fact that I wasn't ready to say goodbye.
I never got a chance to make him proud of me.
And I always thought I would.
. . .
A lot of people come to Dad's funeral service. Sue and Teresa, Grandpa and Grandma Swan, and Edward and I sit in the front row in a room at D. O. McComb & Sons as the bearded pastor talks about Dad's life as a father and a public servant, how he was taken too soon, but that we should rejoice because he is home with Our Lord and Savior.
I glare at him for that, but if he feels my stare, he ignores me.
A few moments later, Edward, my brave Edward, gets up to say a few words.
"Lately everyone's been saying how sorry they are that we lost my dad the way we did, but it's also made me realize that my dad—he was an officer of the law—and every day, he was prepared to give his life if need be. When I was a little boy, he used to tell me how it was his job to help keep us safe, and sometimes it was dangerous, but people needed him to stay brave. And that I should feel lucky because I had his genes, so that meant I was naturally brave."
There is a smattering of laughter. Edward takes a breath and swallows.
"I learned what it was to be brave because of my Dad, not because I have his genes, but because I learned by watching him. He was the first to admit he was sorry if he ever made a mistake, the first one to stop traffic for the dog that was hit on Coliseum Boulevard, the one who gave a homeless man a new suit and a ride to a job interview. He always had a soft spot for you, Lee Perkins. But … I think maybe Dad was the most brave when he decided to start dating again. He was just lucky to have found you, Sue."
I'm laughing through my tears now.
"Dad's last act of bravery may have cost him his life, but his memory and his examples of how he lived his life, will live on. The world is a better place because of Charles Thomas Swan. In our hearts, he is not gone."
Edward doesn't cry until he sits back down again. I squeeze his hand and rest my head against his shoulder.
"That was beautiful," I tell him.
Jasper and Alice find us before we leave for the cemetery. I'm surprised to see that her eyes are red from crying, much like mine and Edward's. She grabs me up in a hard hug.
"I'm so sorry, Bella. About everything."
Everything everything?
I catch Jasper's gaze over Alice's shoulder. He nods and gives me a small smile.
Alice isn't letting go of me. If anything, her grip only gets tighter.
"Alice?"
"I've been so unfair," she says and sniffs. Finally, she releases me and sniffs into a tissue.
"Forget that letter I sent," she says. "We'll talk later."
"She doesn't want you to lose someone else," Jasper whispers as he gives me his own hug.
The relief I feel at his words is indescribable. For just one moment, I almost feel like the sun peeks out and warms the top of my head.
"Rose and Emmett?" Edward asks Alice.
She makes a face. "They're sorry, but they're not coming."
Edward's face almost crumbles.
"We don't need anyone who isn't on our side," I tell him. "Especially now."
He nods, he knows this is true, but I hate seeing this hurt on top of the other one. Damn Emmett anyway.
"We're here," Jasper says and clasps Edward on the shoulder.
"Thanks, Jazz. Alice. It means a lot."
I cry again when Alice wraps him in her arms, but these are happy tears. It is possible to accept.
It is.
. . .
It's raining in the house I grew up in.
I thought I was an adult. That I knew enough, that I knew what I needed to know to make it in the world. I remember feeling almost invincible at times. I remember wanting life to be fast-forwarded a few years, so that no one could have the power to hurt my relationship with Edward anymore, because it all depended on what Dad might have done in the end.
But as I stare at the unmade bed in his room, I realize that I am still a child and I'm terrified. I don't want to be grown up, I don't want to decide what to do with Dad's recliner, his guns, or his Beatles collection.
The half-used bottle of Old Spice is something I can never get rid of, nor the awful singing neck tie that he used to wear every Christmas Day. And this outdated, ugly, nubby sweater, the one he wore that time I fell asleep crying against him? It's coming with me.
I keep expecting him to appear and ask us what the hell is going on. These are his things … his things.
I want to keep it all safe, just as he left it. Here and untouched. But … I can't. Either we use our inheritance to buy the house, or we sell it. And … I don't want to have to make up my mind whether or not to sell this house. I don't even know how to begin weighing the pros and cons. I want my daddy.
I want his plaid shirt with the patches over the patches.
Grandma Swan, who is dressed to the nines even though we are going through the house and deciding what to keep or give away, sniffs when she doesn't agree with a decision I've made.
But that's okay. She can't hurt me. We've never been close, so it's awkward having them here now. Because Dad is her son, I swallow a lot of the resentment I'm feeling. Although she doesn't show it, I know it has to be difficult for her. Grandpa Swan is never without his hankie in his hand—it's visibly hard for him losing Dad.
"Have you decided yet if you're going to sell the house?" she asks me.
The house isn't paid for, but Dad's paid more than what is still owed, so we could make a small profit. But Edward and I are torn. We know we will sell eventually, but right now it would feel like a betrayal of sorts.
Or maybe we'll let Sue take it over, if she wants.
"No," I sigh.
"You shouldn't drag your heels on this stuff, Bella. Time is money and the bills are going to keep coming."
I know. I've cancelled the cable, and his car insurance, and reported his passing to Visa and MasterCard. He owes less than five hundred dollars total for both, and owns the SUV, so there's just the mortgage, the electric, and the taxes to worry about for now. Dad was frugal. He didn't need much more than a sports show on the TV and a can of beer.
"We've got it handled, Grandma," Edward says from the doorway.
"We're going back to Jacksonville at the end of the week, you know that, right?"
He nods and sets an armful of shirts from Dad's closet on the bed.
"We know. We're still discussing what to do."
"What's to discuss?"
"Eleanor," Grandpa says in his deep, wheezy voice. "Let it be. It's their decision."
Grandma wrings her hands. "They're just kids. They don't know how to do these things yet."
"We'll learn," Edward says. "That's how everyone starts."
"I just think you should take advantage of our advice while we're still here, Edward," she says.
I wish they'd all go. I want to lay my head on those shirts and fall into an oblivious sleep where there are no questions to answer, and no decisions to make.
Edward's close to losing his patience. "We'll handle it. Please let us handle it."
She throws her hands up as if in defeat. Grandpa grabs one of them and begins towing her from the room.
"Let's make tea," he says.
After they're gone, Edward and I just look at each other.
We are both lost and found.
. . .
Sue decides not to take over Dad's house.
"There's just too many memories," she says. "It'd be too painful."
I know what she means. Every corner I turn in the house, I'm expecting and hoping to see Dad.
"But can we really sell it?" I ask Edward with a cry in my throat.
He sighs and tightens his hand around mine. "This isn't our home anymore, Bella. After we graduate, where are we going to go? Not here, I don't think."
"I hate this," I sob. We can't stay here, but how can we sell the house we grew up in?
"I do, too," he says. "But it's either sell the house, or rent it out."
I'm shaking my head before he even finishes. No. No renters. Renters won't care about the house, won't care about the tree with the swing, won't care about walking the same paths Dad did as he mowed the lawn.
So we'll sell.
In December, we go the auction route for all of the furniture, getting rid of the old hutch Mom used to love, selling the roll top desk that Grandma and Grandpa didn't want, and saying goodbye to the old house that saw us through the best and worst of everything so far.
Goodbye, Daddy.
At the end of it, we have a check from the auction company and a check from the bank. With that and Dad's life insurance policy, as well as Mom's, we won't have to work for the next few years while we're in college. Thanks to Dad, who is still looking out for us it seems, we could even move to a better apartment and buy another car.
We keep the same place, the same hodge-podge of furniture that Dad helped us find and carry in here, and Edward reclines in the chair that used to be Dad's. We buy a used Toyota Camry for me, while Edward drives the truck.
We invite Jasper and Alice up, and I reconnect with her. We grow close and she offers to share her mom with me and Edward.
"She wouldn't want to be," I say, and I ache for the lost possibility of Mrs. McCarty. "Not if she found out about me and Edward."
Alice mashes her lips because maybe I have a point, and when she hugs me, it stings a little less.
"You'll never lose me and Jasper," she says into my shoulder. "We'll always be here for you, no matter what."
After they leave to drive back to Chicago, I find a Sprock-look alike sock with a note pinned to it on the kitchen counter.
Call me Brock.
. . .
It takes a long time for the pain over losing Dad to fade to a dull ache, before my first and last thoughts upon sleeping and waking aren't of him.
Dad's death brings back the pain of Mom's. Although they died under radically different circumstances, I can't help feeling that sometimes life is just too, too unfair. I know part of life is about loss and learning how to deal with it, but I want a break. I want to be innocently, blamelessly happy without risk or repercussion. Otherwise, why am I alive?
I read John Green's book called The Fault in Our Stars.
"Grief does not change you, Hazel. It reveals you."
I end up throwing the book against the wall. I probably shouldn't be reading anything that includes character death right now.
Or ever, really.
Grief just makes me an ugly, snotty mess. It makes me scared and clingy. And then it makes me mad. It's not a good thing, so I guess I'm just a spectacular wreck. Not a good thing to be revealing. Who wants to deal with that?
Edward makes it a point to be gentle with me more than ever before, and I reciprocate. I read somewhere once that we tend to act out what we most want to receive. And so we hold each other in each other's hands. We don't let the other fall.
And the months pass.
Edward excels at fencing. By of the end of his senior year, he's ranked third in the United States, and that's good enough for him. In August, he'll be starting a new job as a sales engineer for a tool-cutting company in South Bend. I don't understand it, but he says he'll be making the tools that make things, like doorknobs or chess pieces, even complicated medical equipment.
As for me, I like graphic design. I'm having fun learning Photoshop, Illustrator and HTML5. Maybe I'll get to work at an architectural or interior design firm one day. Or maybe I'll have my own studio.
"Anything's possible, and usually is," Edward always says, just like Dad used to.
One day we found a starving black lab on the side of the road, and brought him home with us. He didn't have any tags, so we kept him. And while he has his own bed, he's always in ours. We call him Charlie.
Rose and Emmett moved away after Mike Newton was arrested for rape and assault of a girl in a similar manner to her own attack, and all of her repressed memories came back. Alice said Rose didn't want to live anywhere near anyone related to the monster who hurt her, and I don't blame her at all.
Mike is being brought to trial and while she's not looking forward to coming back to testify against him, she doesn't want him to go free to hurt another girl. I'm considering going to the courthouse that day to show my support. Rose might not forgive me, but I forgive her. I think she's worth it, and besides, I don't want to lose anyone I don't have to lose.
Against their parent's wishes, Jasper and Alice are planning to get married next summer. Mrs. McCarty says they're in too much of a hurry, but Edward and I are behind them one-hundred-percent. No one knows better than he and I that when love hits, you fall, and then that's it. And Jasper and Alice definitely have it.
Edward's going to be Jasper's best man and I'm going to be Alice's bridesmaid. We'll get to see Rose and Emmett, and I'm nervous with anticipation and dread. I'm still hopeful that they'll accept me and Edward one day. Alice says she can sense that the day is coming when they might.
Meanwhile, Edward and I have made new friends, people who believe we met as orphans and reconnected at college. We don't plan to tell anyone about our true relationship; some secrets are best kept as just that. Our past doesn't define who we are, and we look forward to our future together.
We take it all one day at a time, and we thrive because we're in love.
We love hard, we make it count, because we know how easily you can lose it.
I like to think that Mom and Dad, where ever they are, would understand. We might have lost them, but we didn't lose each other. And while it's true that we lost a lot, in a sense, it also means we're free.
Free to just be.
. . .
It always takes us a while to fall asleep at night. We like to talk about our day, to kiss, to make hot, dirty love. It goes by so quickly, but nighttime is our favorite our-time.
"So. What did the painter say to her boyfriend?" I ask Edward.
He tilts his head back on his pillow and groans, and I have to kiss him just because. "This is going to be bad," he says. "What?"
I wait until he meets my eyes again. "I love you with all my art."
# # #
Yes, that was the end. I didn't know it was coming up so quickly, but that's just how it worked out.
Thank you to everyone who showed their support during the writing of this story-it meant a lot to me.
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