Evergreens & Neon Lights

6

Its a picture of an airplane. A airplane crash. "Flight 305 as you can see has crashed it fell from the sky not 1 hour ago crashing into the side of the mountains. The cause of the crash has not yet been determined and so far no survivors have been found. Updates will come as soon as possible."

I drop the remote and scream. Pete was on that plane. I stare at the TV in shock. There is no way this is real. This can't be happening.

I rush to the computer and google it and articles and pictures already pop up.

'No survivors found'
'Burned beyond recognition'
'Rescuers can't get down to the area of the crash'

All these sentences pop out to me. I watch a video taken by a helicopter of the burning plane on the side of a mountain the fire traveling to the forest of evergreens below. I feel tears running down my face and my hands shake but I feel numb.

Pete. He's gone.

I spend that night on the bathroom floor clutching at Petes shirt he left there from his morning shower. I spend the next day there as well. The phones ring and I can hear people leaving messages. Im missing work. I was going to meet Brendon for coffee.

But I can't move from the floor.

On the second day Brendon barges in my house and finds me there. Starving and dehydrated gripping the shirt and he doesn't ask why because he already knows something happened.

"What is it?" He asks and its such a simple question he helps me up and to the bed and then brings me water and food. Forces me to eat and drink because I can't.

"Pete." I whisper my voice hoarse and I see the colour drain from Brendons face.

"That plane was it his?" I nod numbly and Brendon pulls me into a tight hug and rubs my back.

"Hes gone Brendon." I cry. He cries. Whoever he calls later that night they all cry and the next day people flood my house with flowers and chocolate. I don't move further than the bedroom for a week. For the next month I dont leave the house. I hope that someone will call me telling me they found him. Beat up and burnt but alive.

That call never comes.

After 8 months my life is still in shambles. Brendon convinced my boss I needed time off but this is stretching it thin. So one day Joe comes over and asks.

"Why don't we have a funeral for Pete?" I stare at him long and hard and throw a vase of dead flowers at him screaming that Pete isnt dead.

But the thought slowly starts sounding better because maybe, just maybe I can try to let him go.

So on the year anniversary of the plane crash we fill a coffin full of flowers and reminders of Pete and bury it.

It didn't help because the next day I sit in the bedroom looking at everything Pete left behind and I cry. I grab boxes and shove everything in them down to Petes toothbrush. I tape them closed and shove them in the basement.

I want to move but I have no where to go and no money to try. I go and get my job back only less days because I keep having break downs at work and people get worried.

I go home to an empty cold house and I cry. I sleep alone in our bed and cry. I can't stop and I wish I could but it feels like half of me has been ripped away. Thats when I get a phone call.

"Is this Mr. Wentz?"
"Yes." I say numbly.
" Sorry this has taken so long but the plane crash from around a year ago flight 305 has finally been cleaned up. I am calling to say the remains of Peter Wentz were never found." I drop the phone and stare at it for a long time.

Never found? So does that mean... No even if he survived its been a year he would have died in the forest. I cry again because thats worse than how I thought because a plane crash is fast and painless but being lost and starving is slow and painful.

When I pick up the phone again they already hung up.

Another year passes. Brendon tells me how they searched the forest in the areas they thought he might of fallen but never found anything.

"Probably eaten by an animal." I stated and Brendon gasps and tells me not to think like that.

I spend my days back at work trying to get enough money to move.

Another year passes.

I paint the kitchen because I can't stand looking at Pete's favourite colour anymore. The chocolate brown being covered with an ugly beige. I decide I wont move because I can't let what happened control me.

Or maybe I am just to scared to forget.

I try to reconnect with my friends but all of them remind me of Pete. I find them slipping away even Joe and Andy my friends since highschool leave me. Brendon never does.

He comes over with his dogs sometimes and tells me about his girlfriend Sarah. I nod and smile and try to be normal because no one likes a freak.

At the end of that year Brendon proposes to his girlfriend and both of them spend all their time together so I am alone.

The fourth year I try to find someone. I spend my nights at bars telling myself I am here to find a hook-up but instead I spend the nights drinking.

Brendon finds me in my room scattered with empty bottles things thrown around the room. He sits at the foot of the bed and sighs.

"Patrick I know it still hurts. I'm sorry I cant always be here for you but do you remember a long time ago you and Pete broke up? Remember how you told me this is exactly what he did before trying to kill himself? Patrick this isn't healthy and trust me when I say I only want whats best for you. You need help Patrick." I laugh when he tells me this and the laughter turns to tears because he's right.

Thats how I spend the entire fifth year in a mental hospital. They teach me how to cope and healthy ways to remember. I leave feeling like a new man. I go home and a thick layer of dust coats everything mail is piled inside the door and I spend the next few days cleaning.

I try again that sixth year to find someone. I try online dating but I soon realize no one will be able to replace Pete. I look at profiles and sometimes its their hair or their eyes or something that always makes me compare them to Pete.

I cry because I know I will never be able to love someone like I loved Pete. But I still try and move on I start working full time and call up my old friends. I spend that sixth year not trying to find someone new but reconnecting with old friends. I get my life back slowly and keep busy with work and friends it isnt until Brendon comes to me a newly married man and asks "Are you trying to be normal again or just keeping yourself busy so you can forget about him?"

I cry again because maybe he is right. I still try and that takes me another year.

On the seventh year anniversary of Petes plane crash I visit his grave for the first time since we put it there. I place flowers down and take away the old ones which are practically just piles of dirt at this point. I tell him everything that has happened since he was gone.

I visit him every month after that because I dont ever want to forget what Pete was to me. I still wear the wedding ring for god sakes.

I come home after the ninth visit to a phone call. I had to go early this month because I have a business trip next week.

I pick up the phone.

"Hello Mr. Wentz. You may not believe this... But we have your husband."

This time I don't drop the phone.

A/n this chapter is soo long holy smokes. So this is all what Patrick did while Pete was gone. All a giant flash back but there is still snipets of things that i didnt mention that will come up in the story later.

So who liked the linking of Underneath to this one?