Never in a million years did I imagine that this is where this story would go. It's been mediocre for the most part, but I'm finishing it. I'm determined AF. Less than three chapters left. Hang in there my friends.
...
It was raining outside. Celeste was playing on the living room floor with the new Barbies she got for her birthday. Sharpay sat frailly with her knees tucked against her chest in the chair by the window, watching her. Celeste talked in high pitch voices and she changed their accents occasionally. Sharpay bit her lips, the heaviness in her chest worsened.
How in the world was she going to explain it Celeste?
She had spoken to Lucille over the past couple of days. It was not their natural routine to visit Troy's home day after day. But with Celeste getting older and Troy remaining the same, they agreed. Celeste's image of a daddy was a man that didn't exist. Troy's body was the only thing that she knew, it was no different than a lamp or a rug. They weren't sparing Celeste heartache; they were prolonging it. Sharpay felt like she wasn't allowing her to know the difference between what was real and what wasn't.
"Sissy."
Celeste didn't react to her mother's voice, it was obvious that her toys were more interesting than her mother sitting in the window in deep thought.
Troy's family. His poor mom and dad.
Troy's father remained silent throughout the conversations. He agreed with them both, but it was hard to say the words out loud.
"I love my son more than anything in the world. He's the only baby I ever had," Lucille explained, "but this selfish. This isn't right. He's not at peace. He needs to feel peace. He wouldn't want this for Celeste."
Sharpay agreed, there was never any peace at Troy's house. It was a calm and relatively quiet environment, except of course when Celeste came to visit. But there was always an ominous and dark temperature that seemed to hang in the air.
It wasn't fair.
"Celeste," Sharpay said with no response again. Sharpay slid off of the recliner and crawled next to her daughter.
"Celeste Evangeline Bolton. I am speaking to you."
The six year-old looked up, her big beautiful blue eyes…goodness gracious, Troy's eyes… They looked back into hers with attention and reception. Sharpay's body trembled with fear.
"What's wrong?"
Sharpay's arms reached out, Celeste stared at her until Sharpay sniffled, then she dove into her mother's arms.
"I'm really sorry, Sissy. I need to talk to you about something. It's not about something good."
"Something bad?" Celeste asked with worry, she was an empathetic child. Sharpay was able to recognize this when Celeste was just a few years old.
"We're going to let Daddy go to sleep now." Celeste's expression continued to unfold, as if she was waiting for the big news. Then Sharpay remembered, to Celeste, this was nothing new. "Forever," she continued.
"But he's already asleep."
"No, angel. He's been in a coma, since you were a baby. It was just easier for us to tell you that he was asleep because when he had the accident you were too little to know what was going on."
"The accident that made him fall asleep?"
Sharpay nodded her head, "Except he doesn't sleep like we do. We wake up, he doesn't. When he had the accident he hit his head really hard. It put him in a coma and that's why he doesn't wake up."
The little girl pulled away, she looked up, visibly thinking.
"What does sleep forever mean?"
Sharpay's heart ripped apart. She had been rehearsing in her head all day how to word it, how to get inside the child's head what it meant to die. Until now, she had never experienced death.
"Well, it's really sad," Sharpay said quietly. Celeste was now completely concentrated on her mother's words, she sat listening, almost like she was about to hear a story. Your family puts you in the ground, in a big casket. We'll put flowers all around you. And we'll bury you. Then you'll go live with the angels.
"It means that you get to go up to live with the angels, in the sky. And you don't come back down."
"In Heaven?"
Sharpay smiled and nodded her head. She felt like her insides were going to come up through her throat. It wasn't supposed to be like this. She wasn't supposed to have this talk with Celeste, all by herself. Please, like she was supposed to know what to say.
"But what happens when I want to go see him? If he's in the sky, how do I talk to him?"
You can't.
"It's really easy, Sis. It's even easier than it is for you to talk to him right now."
Celeste's eyes lit up, Sharpay wondered how she was supposed to carry on.
"You just close your eyes like when you're going to bed. Then you put your hand over your heart. He's in there. That's where he's always been, and in your heart you'll always be able to hear your daddy's voice."
"In my heart? How is he in my heart if he's in the sky?"
"He's always with you, Celeste. You don't have to be outside or looking up at the clouds to talk to him. His soul is in you. It's the same thing as when he was asleep in grandma and grandpa's house. You never got to hear his voice, but he was always there right?"
"Yeah."
"It's the same thing. Only now, you can talk to him anywhere. At school, in your tree house, in your bedroom, in the kitchen. He'll be with you wherever you go."
"But he's going to go to Heaven with the angels?"
Sharpay grabbed Celeste's little hands, she kissed them and cupped her face.
"Your daddy's been an angel for a long time. So he needs to go be with the other angels now."
It sounded so serene when she put it that way. In terms to where a six year old could understand. The truth was Troy wasn't going to live in the sky. He was going in the ground.
In dirt. With the maggots, and the worms. His body, what color would it turn afterwards? What kind of doctor would be there when they let him go? Or would they even need a doctor, couldn't a nurse just do it? Don't they literally just "pull a plug?" Would his body bloat? How long does it take for a corpse to ripen and fester before it dries up and leaves nothing left but a skeleton and some dust?
"Mommy?"
"What baby?"
Celeste was such a happy little girl; it was a rare occasion to see such a somber look on her face.
"Can I still go to grandma and grandpa's house?"
Troy's mom and dad. This was going to rip them to shreds, they would need Celeste more than ever now.
"Every day. If you want."
"Is everybody going to cry? I don't want to see everybody cry."
Sharpay held her child's hands in her own. She squeezed her eyes shut as the tears were finally released. She held Celeste tighter than she ever had before.
"It's going to be okay. We're going get through it together," and she pulled Celeste into her chest like she did when she was afraid or upset. She stroked her head and ran her hands through her hair.
She sang to her, like she did when she was a baby. God, Celeste was the best thing that had ever happened to her. She was a miracle. She often thought about the day she was born, and how different life would be without her. Except she couldn't imagine it. She couldn't imagine a life where they weren't together.
"Don't be afraid. Remember, daddy's right there with you, always."
"Anywhere?"
"Anywhere."
…
His body, it was just there. It just laid on the bed like any other pillow. His skin, it was like plastic; looking at it you wouldn't know that there was a person deep down in there…somewhere. Or at least once there was.
"She's six now, you know this. You know that her favorite color's purple. She likes to dance, God…she loves to sing. She loves to play basketball with her grandpa. She loves to wear your old t-shirts to bed."
Troy wouldn't miss out, she would not let him not know his own daughter. She would use her last breath to make sure that no matter what, Celeste and Troy would not ever be strangers. Not even a coma would get in the way of that.
"We eat a lot of pancakes," she half-cried, half-laughed. "Probably too much but…what can I say, she has your eyes. Can't say no."
As usual, he didn't reply. He just laid there.
Sharpay lowered her voice, "I was wrong Troy. We never should have done this to you, not this long."
She grabbed his hand, his cold hard hand. It was like holding a bar of soap or something, it had no feeling, ever.
"We're going to be fine. Okay?"
"Mommy?" she turned to find their daughter standing in the doorway.
"What is it, angel?"
"Grandma and grandpa want to talk to you." She said this while staring past Sharpay, to the man she knew as Daddy. That's what they told her he was, "Daddy." It broke Sharpay's heart each and every day that Celeste didn't get the chance to know him the way she was supposed to.
That man…he was so much more than what Celeste could ever dream of. He would've been the best father to her, he was the best father to her. It wasn't fair.
"Okay, stay here. Keep him company."
"Okay, Mommy."
Sharpay left the room while Celeste stood quietly in the doorway. She was six, but she knew that she would have to say good-bye soon. That's what they came over to talk about. They all had to say good-bye soon. No matter how much it was going to hurt.
"Hey! Where's my kiss?" Sharpay yelled as Troy ran down the driveway. "Text me when you get home," she called.
"Love you!" Troy said running as fast as he could to the car, and mumbling stupidities to himself for not getting that kiss. The rain was coming down so hard his mind was solely concentrated on getting inside the car. Oh well, he'd see her in the morning. Though he probably should've just asked to stay the night.
He turned on the car, the engine roared and the lights lit up. When the wipers swept the rain he could faintly see Sharpay waving from the door, he waved back but she probably couldn't see.
Minutes later, the headlights shone against the blacktop of the road but it was still difficult to see, even with the wipers going at the fastest speed possible.
Troy ran over a slippery spot on the road, he immediately eased on the brakes. Damn rain.
His puppy dog heart began to ache. Couldn't they live without one kiss for less than 12 hours? He gritted his teeth, fighting reason with his feelings. It was just one kiss, of course she could live without it.
His fiancé. He had a fiancé. She said yes. She gave him a daughter and then she gave him a brand new life. They would be graduating and getting married, they were going to be a real family.
He couldn't do it. It would keep him up all night long. Troy couldn't go home without kissing his two girls good-night. He eased on the brakes slowly and turned around. He should've just turned around when he was still at the house. It was just rain.
The tires spun uselessly for a second, the road was really wet but he was able to get turned around to head back towards Sharpay's house.
It rarely ever rained in Albuquerque, it was practically a desert year round. Maybe it wasn't such a good idea turning around, because at this point he could barely make out the road. He made it a little ways further, his foot on the breaks and the wipers swiping the glass frivolously.
He could almost see the lights to Sharpay's house, maybe if he could hurry up and get off the road-
It jerked. His heart leapt and his eyes opened to the max.
Time slowed down for a moment. Troy saw everything happen as if it were under a microscope. He could already hear the stillness that would set in after the impact. The smell of coolant from the cracked radiator. The whistling in his ear, it pierced.
All of these things he could see and hear before they happened, and they did happen, when he slid off of the slick blacktop and flipped four times as the vehicle rolled down the cliff. There was a cliff. It hit the bottom and cracked like an egg.
"I will always love you," he heard her say. He heard every word she ever spoke.
His eyelids moved. Just a twitch at first, and then they opened a tiny bit to the brightest light that he never thought he would see again. He made a noise.
"What?"
"Daddy?" he heard a young voice. "Daddy? Are you waking up? I mean your coma? Are you quitting your coma?"
The father of the child struggled to open his eyes completely. He squinted at the afternoon daylight; it was daytime, which meant that was the sun. And it was brighter than he remembered.
"Mmmmm," he accidently groaned trying to open his mouth. "Onnn," he fluttered his eyes and moved his lips up and down, trying to make a word. The child, it was her.
"Onnnnn, ga…"
"What?" Celeste said, walking closer towards the bed.
"Celeste! Come here, we need to talk to you about something important." It was fuzzy. He knew that voice, the one who said his daughter's name. Celeste was his daughter, he knew who was staring right back at him.
"Daddy? Are you finally quitting your coma? For real life this time? One time there was activity on your brain machine and they thought you were going to quit, but you didn't. This isn't like that is it? Mommy will cry again."
Celeste. Sharpay. Why didn't he kiss her? Why did he leave them? Celeste was practically grown, had he really been gone that long?
"How come you won't talk to me? Aren't you tired of keeping your mouth closed? Aren't you sick of sleeping all day? I sure would be. I hate it when I'm not allowed to talk."
He understood every word she was saying. In this moment, Troy would've given anything in the world to be able to pick that beautiful little girl up, and lift her high into the air. If he could've just spun her around and around and toss her up like when he did when she was a baby. But he couldn't. At that moment, he couldn't even feel his own body. What happened? What took him away? What stole them from each other?
"MOMMY!" she yelled loudly, Troy's ears popped. He could hear hissing, suddenly he became aware of the wires and tubes attached and braided into his body. How did this happen? He was going back to Sharpay's house…but this room, it was familiar. It was his? How did he get back home?
"What's wrong?" a panicked voice shouted with footsteps accompanying. He would know that voice if he was deaf and blind, if the only thing he had was her breath on his skin, he would know who it was.
His eyes had become adjusted to the light, but his vision was coming and going with clarity. He couldn't move, or he would've shot out of bed when he saw her, standing there.
She met his eyes, they must've been as wide as his own. The beautiful blonde woman fell backwards. He heard a thud.
And all he could do was lay there.
…
UGH. I wish I was a better writer. I know that ending was abrupt, I did the best I could. If you want to leave a review...it would certainly make my day. :)