Yours Truly, Ramona

chapter thirty nine | begin again.

Death is something we know nothing about.

Our heart stops, our mind dies, and yet our bodies remain. But where do we go? Where does our soul go?

Maybe if I believed in heaven, I'd be able to live with the thought of my brother cracking open a cold one with God. But I don't believe in an afterlife. I believe that people want to be comforted and not afraid of dying, so they tell themselves these lies about where they will go after death.

And maybe they're right. Maybe heaven is real.

But, like I said, death is something we know nothing about. And I don't mind the not-knowing. I don't think I'm afraid of death. I'm more afraid of being lonely forever.

Loneliness scares me more than death, mainly because I've lived with it for years upon years. Loneliness isolates you, and it makes you believe these tragically painful lies about life after death.

Loneliness is bittersweet. It's peace and it's pain.

And when my eyes fluttered open to the bright fluorescent lights of the quiet hospital room and I saw that I wasn't alone after all, I almost felt okay for a few seconds.

Almost.

"That's true, but..."

The ceiling above the hospital bed is paneled and white, and I can hear Jean and Owen softly talking from across the room, both unaware that I'm awake.

"How is she going to..."

Their voices float in and out of my foggy head as I stare at the ceiling, my body not even attempting to move or comprehend their conversation. In a strange way, I feel a sense of relaxation over my body, like the emotions I should be feeling are absent.

I don't even remember anything after Owen left to go work. I know I what I did, but I don't remember it.

"And I think we should..."

I let out a deep breath in a moment of exhaustion. I clench my fist around one of the white linens and feel the fabric begin to ground me into the hospital room that I'm in.

"Oh, you're awake," Owen beams, my sudden movement accidentally attracting his attention.

Within seconds he's at my side, looking down on me with the same warm smile he always seems to hold.

"What happened?" I croak through dry lips.

The sun outside the room is brighter than I could've imagined, and as it peeks out from behind the clouds it begins to shine more light into the room that my eyes are not adjusted to.

"You don't remember?"

Owen sits down in a hospital chair and I turn my head to follow him with my adjusting eyes.

"I mean, I know what I did," I mumble as I bring my hand to my face. It feels like such an effort to move any muscle, and just rubbing my eyes is exhausting. "But I don't remember doing it."

Owen leans toward me and looks down on me in the hospital bed with a smile that's somewhere between pain and relief. But for some reason—for some inexplicable reason—I feel like there's something more.

My memory feels hazy and unsteady, and I almost feel as though something happened between the point when I tried to kill myself and now. I feel emotions that I have no business to be feeling, things like fear, and the sudden urge to ask Owen something that I've never asked before.

"Are you okay?"

The look on Owen's face drops. He looks at me with some kind of confusion that I've never seen in him before. It's the kind where he's suppressing a laugh and looking at me like I'm absolutely crazy.