Once You're Gone

Le Prologue

Prologue

Alexandra Fisher

                I squeezed my eyes shut, letting a tear run down my right cheek. This was nothing I’d ever expected. I opened my eyes and pursed my lips together, looking to my left at my now broken family, who was also crying.

                My mom. The strongest person I’d ever had the pleasure to know had died… today. 

                My father, my two brothers, and I were now at the church, listening to the priest go about the wonders of God and how death was not something to mourn over. To be honest, it did relieve me a little to know that my mom would be in a better place now; I knew that she was struggling with her life down here, for she had pancreas cancer.

                I really didn’t know that until now. My father had broken the news to the three of us after calling to Mason’s and my boarding high school and Tyrone’s college, and after gathering us inside our house. Turns out that the malicious disease Mom had was detected in time, but she didn’t want to stall things if the doctors knew she was going to die anyway, which meant she didn’t get any treatment or medicine. Now that I thought about it, I remember seeing her quite sick last time I saw her….

***

                 “Mom, need some help there?” I asked her as I saw how she attempted to pull herself up from the stool in front of the piano.

                 “No, honey. I’m all right, really,” she answered, now standing steadily on her feet. She then proceeded to walk over to the staircase that led to our first floor, for we were in our basement. A few steps before she reached her destination, her legs wobbled wildly almost giving up, and I rushed up to her, asking if she was all right.

                 “Lexie, stop worrying. I’m getting older is all,” she smiled at me that warm smile of hers that indicated that everything was all right. I smiled back. However, I still wrapped my arm around her waist, helping her up the stairs just in case another ‘incident’ happened.

***

                “… Mr. Fisher and family, would you like to say your last goodbyes?” The priest asked, snapping me out of my thoughts.

                My father sniffled and nodded once before standing up along with us. I looked behind us at the people dressed in dark colors already leaving. The Mass had already ended.

                We walked up to the coffin in which my mother’s lifeless body was lying and kneeled in front of it. My father took my hand, as well as Mason’s, who took Tyrone’s. Like that, we recited a little prayer. We then proceeded to get up and plant a kiss on the coffin, saying our last goodbye to our mother and our father’s wife.

                Right after that, two men came into view from the right side of the altar. They held on to either end of the coffin and pushed the cart beneath it, dragging it right into where they came from.  Just by seeing that, more tears spilled over, and I could tell the same about my family, because my father just pulled my brothers and me into a tight group hug.

                After a few moments, we pulled away. My father wiped his tears and looked at us. “Hey,” he said, “I’m sure your mother would have been honored to see how affected we are by her death, but— “ he sniffled— “I’m also sure that she would have wanted us to move on and keep on enjoying our lives to the fullest. “

                Even after his comforting words, I still felt tears cascading down my face. He must have noticed because he almost instantly glided his thumb across my cheeks, wiping my tears away. He then enveloped me in a hug, without saying a word. We stood like that for a couple of minutes, me staining his shirt with my nonstop tears.

                After we pulled away, my father, Mason, Tyrone, and I started to walk down the hall that led to the exit. Before exiting the church, we turned around and bowed simultaneously. Tyrone opened the door, letting me get out first as the gentleman he was.

                The first thing I felt when I stepped outside was an arm thrown around my neck. My attacker hugged me close, and I rested my chin of her shoulder. Yes, it was a girl. Closely, I examined the attacker, or at least what I was able to see: One of her arms was around my neck, and the other was around Mason’s. I mentally shook my head and rolled my eyes, already recognizing who this was. Typical Kat. I would have laughed hadn’t I been feeling so broken.  Mason and I hugged her back and the three of us cried on each other’s shoulders.

                The rest of our friends must’ve seen us, for the next thing I felt was being crushed by a lot more people. It was good to know that there were still people who cared about me other than my family. We stood like that for what seemed like forever but was only a couple of minutes, our bodies trembling from all the sobs that engulfed us.

                I was getting a little claustrophobic, so I managed to wriggle out of their grip, patting Mason’s and my friends’ backs and thanking them for their support. I excused myself and then went to greet and thank the other people who had come to my mother’s funeral. They all gave me this sympathetic smile and squeezed my shoulder: They pitied me.

                However, even though my mother had died just today, I still felt very lucky to have the family and the friends I had. Plus, everything happens for a reason. Perhaps God was saving something really good for my family and me…

                …Yeah, that must have been it.