Time to Survive

It Only Goes Two Ways

I felt him thread his fingers through mine, and I gave him a comforting squeeze.

"It might help him," Chris spoke after a moment. "He needs... Something."

"She was his other half, there's nothing you can do that will make his loss any better," I said, thinking of Chase. "It's just going to hurt worse and worse, and he'll either get over it or let it consume him so he can join her. There's only two ways it goes."

"Spoken like someone who's gone through it," Devin glanced at me.

"We've all gone through it," I muttered, stepping away from all of them. "We just handled it differently."

Honestly, losing Chase would have consumed me if I had been on my own.

If it wasnt for meeting the guys and them basically taking me in, I would have been like Kuza, wasting away somewhere nearby where I'd left him, unable to go on. I would have let my grief consume me, because I had felt like there hadn't been anything left for me.

All of my family was dead, all of my friends, and then I'd lost the last person that had meant anything to me, and I'd had to kill him...

I had wanted nothing more then to just die and get it over with.

But they had saved me, they'd kept me alive and kept me going and kept me with a task, and that had helped so much more then any of them would ever realize.

Any of them.

I glanced at Chris as he moved toward the fridge, looking weary, and then at the guys where they sat at the table, neither of their faces happy either.

We could get through this again, we could get Kuza through this.

He just needed a little push like I had.

I stepped by Chris, squeezing his arm lightly to let him know I was leaving, and he nodded, his dark eyes watching me as I moved out of the kitchen and toward the front door.

I quickly stepped outside, immediately feeling the heat and humidity.

I stepped off the porch, glad someone had fixed the screen door where I'd broken it when Charlie had bit me.

I walked over to where Kuza sat, and slowly knelt down beside him, not wanting to move too quickly in case I spooked him; he was in a very fragile state right now.

I glanced at his gray face, seeing his eyes bloodshot and skin red from his tears. He didn't say anything to me, he didn't even look at me, he just gazed vacantly forward at the mound of dirt.
He needed to know it wasn't her anymore, that the Francesca he knew wasn't the one buried beneath the ground.

She was still with him.

She would always be with him so long as he let her.

As corny as it sounded, she would always be in his heart, all their happy memories together and her laugh and her smile. She wasnt going to leave him alone, by himself, and none of us would either.

We would help take care of him for her.

But he wasn't ready to hear any that just yet.

So I didn't say anything, just looked over at the dirt.

It was just a mound right now, just upturned earth; there was nothing there to make it comforting, to make it any better for us living.

Was there anything I could do to make it better?

I frowned, then stood after a thoughtful moment, walking off into the field and picking some of the wild flowers. I stooped, making sure I only picked the prettiest ones.