Alex's Nirvana

Nirvana

8.2
I watched him as he slept so peacefully and so innocently, his face was so calm and he mumbled words that were incoherent and made no sense to me. I slowly removed the pillows between us, one by one, I had a clear view of his face but there was still so much distance between us.
I lay there silently, not making a single sound, afraid to wake him up and disrupt the peace, when Alex mumbled something again, but this time I understood what he said.
“Nirvana,” he said clearly.
I lost it, I pushed through all of his pillows and blankets and hugged him, and I looked up at his face and noticed that tears were streaming down his sealed shut eyes.
“Alex?” I asked, he didn’t respond.
Alex started crying louder and louder and louder, his whole body shook as he kept on whispering my name on and on and before I knew it, he was screaming.
I sat up quickly and grabbed his shoulders and started shaking him, waiting for him to snap out of it and wake up but he didn’t.
He then said another name, one I didn’t recognize, “Elliana!” he screamed and cried even harder, I tried to remember if I knew anyone called Elliana but I didn’t.
Suddenly, Alex jumps out of bed, nearly throwing me off, and runs into this room where the door is locked.  I’ve always wondered what was in that room but never asked, I just figured that not every door was meant to be opened in this mansion of secrets and pain.
I rushed to Alex’s side and tried to help him but he wouldn’t calm down.
“Where is the key, where did mom and dad hide the key!” he yells, ignoring me completely.  His green eyes may be wide open but his mind is closed shut in a sleepy haze.
“Alex, calm down, please.” I place my palms on his face, forcing him to focus on me.
Alex stares back at me for what seems like forever, I hold his gaze and get lost in his eyes that have now become my favorite color. I never really liked green, but after seeing Alex’s eyes, I could never find the exact shade in my surroundings. I spent so many nights googling ‘green eyes’ trying to replicate his eyes and print it out so that I could always have his gaze around me whenever I felt ignored, but I could never find it. His eyes were always  far too unique to be duplicated, only his mother possesses the same shade and even then, the thick, black eyelashes that surround his eyes and his black eyebrows, they add an intensity  to his eyes, a mysterious aura, that his mother doesn’t have.
Alex closes his eyes and exhales deeply, it’s like his body was throwing out all the negativity and fear he had been harboring along with carbon dioxide. It’s like all the sadness and grief, which I knew he felt, that was seeping into his veins just disappeared without a trace from his bloodstream and was replaced by a cold emptiness.
“It’s my sister’s room,” he explained, still asleep, I could tell because he was looking at me but he wasn’t looking at me. I just shut up and listened to him as he let go of some of his demons.
“she was seventeen and I was thirteen when she got into that accident, she died and I lived, cliché right?” he asked rhetorically, I tried not to hug him or cry, I had to hold myself together, he needed to let  it go. “I still remember that night, we snuck out of our home at midnight because we had a tradition that we never broke. Every year on my birthday, we would drive out to our house down by the lake with my parents and we would do a huge firework display and spend the night outside, we’d make a campfire and roast marshmallows and drink milkshakes from the diner I took you to.
My parents met in that diner, it’s also where they had their first kiss, and my mom always told me that when I found someone truly special I should take her there, so yeah.” My jaw dropped, he just stared up at the ceiling and continued ranting on and on, I had my hand covering my mouth sadly and subconsciously, he didn’t bother looking at me, and he kept his eyes glued to the ceiling.
“my parents were both busy that year, they both had important meetings and couldn’t drive out so elliana got the keys and waited till our butler was asleep, then she drove us out to the lake but it was raining that night, another reason why my parents refused to go, and so she lost control at some point and crashed into a tree.
After that day, my parents locked up her room instantly and went on as if she were never born, they also went on as if I never existed too, it was their way of dealing with the fact that their eldest, and only, daughter died and I don’t blame them, I refused to visit her grave, she’s in a cemetery that is only ten minutes away.” He stopped talking and looked back at me now, I don’t know what he expected or what I was supposed to do but I couldn’t stop myself from doing this.
I leaned in closely, placing one of my hands on his cheek, and I kissed him. I knew he woke up then because he kissed me back and his body responded to mine, he wrapped his arms around me and held me closer to him. He kissed me so passionately, so urgently, so roughly, and so sweetly. It was like he was thirsty and had been parched for days and when he got water, he started drinking it quickly at first, recklessly, without any consideration but then he closed his eyes and savored every single remaining drop. It’s like we were two colors morphing into each other, we blended together so beautifully well, just like milkshakes and fries.
We just sat there, making out, right outside his dead sisters room for a while before I decided to fix him.
I get up and pull him up with me and we then run down the stairs together and I grab one of his numerous car keys and he follows me to the garage.
I climb into the driver’s seat and buckle up, he climbs in next to me and does the same, and then we are on our way to the hospital.
It doesn’t take me long to find the cemetery on my GPS app since it’s the only cemetery that is close to us and ten minutes away, every other cemetery is at least two hours away from here.
When we reach the cemetery, Alex turns to look at me, his sad green eyes sadder than I’ve ever seen them before.
“I know what it’s like losing a sibling, well I don’t really, but I do.” I paused and put my head against the steering wheel. “I had a twin; her name was savannah, nirvana and savannah. She died the week she was born, she had a heart defect, but my parents took a picture of us when we were just born, we were both wrapped up in blankets and we were sleeping peacefully next to each other, then she died. They framed that picture and they keep it in their room, I personally avoid it because it just saddens me to wander what it would have been like to have a sister. ”
Alex doesn’t stare at me anymore; he hugs me and gives me this look that tells me he is scared but ready.
“Why are you doing this, how will seeing my sister help?” he asks, clearly doubting my coping with a dead sibling mechanism.
“My parents buried savannah in a cemetery near their hometown here, then they travelled back to Africa where I was born and pretended she never existed, too. I made up scenarios in my head and it felt nice to imagine and to think about who she would’ve been. I still talk to her when I’m upset, she’s like my guardian angel and I doubt that your sister appreciates you avoiding her all the time when she’s the one buried underground. I felt liberated when I saw her grave when I first moved here, I felt at peace and you deserve some peace too.” I say strongly, Alex doesn’t argue now, he just nods and climbs out of the car.
We walk hand in hand into the cemetery and put together a bouquet of flowers before we pay his sister a much deserved visit after so many years of procrastination.