Drip. Drip. Drop. Splash. The melody of a gloomy world echoed around Rainshine in a random off beat rhythm. Rainshine tapped the chewed on nub of her yellow Ticonderoga pencil against her desk, which resided in the corner of a candle lit bedroom. She moved the pink nub to the beat that the falling rain played against her window; mid stroke she pulled her trusty paint brush out from behind her ear and ran over to the open window to fetch her painting mug she had left out to gather water. Rainshine was always a spontaneous girl with a free spirit and had from a young age taken great interest in the world that existed around her, always acting on her heart before her mind. With a quick flourish of her newly dampened brush, she cast a stream of color onto the pad of paper under her palms. She enjoyed painting more than anything because it was only her in control of the brush, and what ever she managed to produce was hers and hers alone. She rolled back in her cheap purple swivel chair to admire her work as a somber tear rolled down her face. In the center of her desk was a black journal covered with elaborate paintings and the name Cole scratched longingly into it. This was his story, and the one time in her entire life she failed to take action.
Portland was a strange place filled with even stranger people. A person could not maneuver fifty yards without coming across a street performer or a tattoo-covered man trying to make an easy buck off of the tourists. To add to the misery that strangers could adopt in Portland was the constant bombardment of rain the locals had to learn to cope with daily. Rainshine and her soul mate Cole saw though the veil of depression that the rain brought and loved nothing more than spending afternoons, soaked to the bone, sitting on park benches people-watching. The girls hair was blond streaked while a dark chestnut wove its way through the messy hair of the boy: these two had more in common than peas in a pod. Rainy and Cole were always the talk of the town as the two took over local coffee shops with their acoustic duets. The two spent every waking moment at the other’s side and no matter what had the other’s back. Even at times they were making pacts to keep the other’s deepest darkest secrets; and that was where the trouble began.
The two were curled up on Cole’s couch watching an old rerun of a popular show Portlandia when Cole decided to have a heart to heart with Rainy. He took her hands, slowly bringing them to his lips, he kissed each and every knuckle with a gingerly placed whisper. Rainy loved this quirk of his more than anything, and could never stop a happy giggle from escaping her lips.
“Rain, I have something I need to get off my chest,” he said with a somber tone. Rainshine was taken aback, sorrow and pain was never something he let her see. She grabbed his cold bony hands and looked into his midnight blue eyes. Once his cold eyes met her spring green eyes, she let a soft whisper escape.
“I’m always here for you. I’m sure it is not a big deal.” She looked up at him, kissing his fingers back.
“Oh but Rainy-Day it is.” That’s when the first tear came as he rolled up his shirt sleeves and slowly pulled up his shirt. What Rainshine saw made the air she had in her lungs make a run for the hills. “Look what I have done to myself,” both arms were covered in a maze of paper like cuts that Rainshine knew only too well a cruel razor blade could bring. Her eyes darted to his chest and saw that she could count all of his ribs and then noticed the methodically dug in scars there as well.
“Rainy. I just need someone to know. I promise I am going to get it all figured out soon, I just can’t do it without you.” That was the trigger that allowed the flood gates of tears to escape down his face. “My parents just can’t know. If they ever found out, if they knew how much of a weak, loser I was. Oh, they would never love me. They must not know.” His eyes caught hers in a harsh, but needy embrace.
“I promise.” She sobbed as she buried her face into his clothes that she now realized hung off of him like ghosts. “I... I…I promise.”
The next few days at school were a living hell for Rainshine. She dragged her Vans across the dust covered hallways as she mulled over the options at hand. In one case she had the power to save the life of her best friend. If she told the counselors or his parents, they could send him to an institution to get him the help he needed to overcome his serious illness. The image of Cole’s concentration camp survivor-esque body flashed in her mind. Cole was starving himself at an unreasonable rate; she had later found out that on top of having problems eating food, the food he did ingest he had a difficult time keeping down, and ended up getting sick in between class periods. Cole’s battlefield of scars took center stage in her mind. The little droplets of fresh blood lingered in her mind. She found the nearest trash can and got sick. It was her responsibility as his best friend to get him to help, to help him live. But then it was also her duty as his best friend to keep all of his deepest secrets until the end of the earth.
“Rainshine, you do know you just vommed in the recycling bin?” It was Cole’s melodic, charming low voice. He hovered over her adorned in a light brown and white sweater and thick framed glasses. His hair was a dark brown and damp from this mornings rain; he let if fall without a care across his midnight blue eyes. Rainshine let a faint smile creep across her face. She loved him.
“ ‘Ope, sorry, just feeling sick. You know what tech week can do to us,” She whiped off her face and took a few steps back, letting out a massive sigh. She ran her eyes over his body and nicely chiseled face. From a strangers perspective Cole would come off as a happy-go-lucky kid who was on the skinny side. Never would the innocent stranger dream of the truth hidden under the folds of his sweater. “We have to get to Chemistry, love.” She entwined her fingers in-between his and pulled him along through the hallways. It was his secret, and she trusted him to get better. For now she was going to keep her knowledge on the down-low, Cole did not want her to expose him, so she thought she was doing the right thing as his best friend not to tell.
Two months since Cole told her about his situation, the two had put the ordeal out of mind. It was early December and the two were getting ready to play a set of love songs at a coffee shop that night. They were sitting adjacent from each other on his maroon couch with their guitars at hand. “Rainshine. I’m feeling a bit sick. I will be right back.” Cole whispered through his lips as he stumbled out of the room. His parents were not due back home for a few hours and Rainshine was hoping she could finally get that kiss she wanted since the day she met him.
That’s when she heard it. A solid thud followed by a chorus of bone crunching falls. THUD. SMASH. The house shook, and then she saw him. Cole was at the base of the staircase, his neck and legs at strange angles. Rainshine ran over the wooden floor and dropped to the ground next to his body.
“Cole. Cole. Cole.” She shook him gently; the shakes grew in intensity as the panic set in. “Cole. Cole, wake up, you just fell down the stairs wake…wake up… you can’t…” She buried her face into his sweater, and cried until his parents came home. She had lost her best friend in the blink of an eye. The doctors later reported back to the family that he must have passed out from lack of nourishment and blood loss, which explained why he plummeted down his stairs.
“It is all my fault,” Rainshine wept as she hugged his parents.
“Why would you ever say that? He loved you with all his heart. There was no way you would have known anything about his eating disorder.” His kind mother told her. That was when she lost it. Rainshine knew she had made the wrong choice, she should have told his parents that he was in trouble, had she done the right thing the love of her life would still be alive. This one choice would prove itself to shape her and torment her for the rest of time.
Rainshine was back in her room. The rain began pouring down against the windows, begging to break in and ruin everything in her room. The truth was everything was already on the verge of ruin, but Rainshine thought she found the cure. She had began writing down every memory she had of Cole down into a little black book that had his name carved into it. It was the journal he saved to write his music in when he grew up, but that was no longer an option. Rainy spent many sleepless nights retelling their tales of falling in love, from paint fights to bike rides; no detail was left out. She put the paintbrush back behind her ear and picked up the painted book. It was perfect. She curled up with it on her cold, uninviting bed, and cried her eyes out. The true power she discovered that day was when she put the book under her bed, picked up her guitar and began to write the music her other half would never get to write. It was her lack of action that led to his death, but she could make him immortal through music. The sun came out from hiding at that moment, love had a funny way of making things bearable, even in the bitter end.
*This one is dedicated to my best friend. He is the boy in the story, who even though death is not his fate yet... he is cole in everyother way.
