this chapter is a littttlle depressing so dont say i didn't warn you;)
DECEMBER 2008
"AMANDA!" Noelle shouted, the rest of the world fading away as the walls around her turned gray and blurry. No color as she looked down to her hands, she cried as she relived the pain of the knife, screaming when she felt the blood in her veins run freezing cold. "MANDY! WHERE ARE YOU?!"
She spotted a silhouette, and heard a shout. "NOELLE!" A voice creaked out, and she ran as fast as she could towards it. The closer she got, the more she saw of Mandy's colorless face. They stood a few feet away from each other before throwing themselves at each other, squeezing into a hug. They wordlessly cried as they held each other, worried the other would threaten to let go.
"She did this, Mands." Noelle shook her head. "It's all my fault. If you had never met me..."
"If I had never met you I would've been a miserable abandoned foster kid. Don't talk like that." She rubbed Noelles back. "We are in this together, alright? It's you and me like always."
She nodded. They finally pulled away, still holding hands. "They're gonna fine my body." Noelle looked away. "Whoever comes to tell me that you..."
Mandy nodded. "He had a coffee run and I kicked it. How dumb is that?" She laughed. "Jim refuses to leave me alone and then the second he does, I die. But, Noelle, how did you..?"
Noelle lifts up her shirt to a giant laceration in her chest. "She stabbed the hell out me. While Dari was in therapy, the sick fuck did it so she and Brian could find my body."
Mandy looked around to the blurred grey blobs that once was the world around them. "How did the guys get their foot in the mortal world? The first time all those years ago."
"Well, they could always tune in as spectators. Zack always said it was kind of like finding the right radio signal. Twisting the knob til you got something. They never really explained it to me fully I guess because they never assumed we would end up here." She ran a hand through her hair.
"So how did they make contact with you?'
"Something about children being more in tune to the paranormal." Noelle said. "I guess it's trial and error from here."
"Uh, okay, well shit, lets try something." Mandy shrugged exasperatedly. "Umm... take my hands." They held hands, and closed their eyes. "Think really hard about your apartment and your dead body."
They tried that for a good ten minutes to no avail.
They finally pulled away. "God, how are we gonna fucking figure this out." Noelle said, taking deep breaths and trying not to panic.
Mandy sat on the floor, feeling her hands slowly sink into it whenever they pressed down. "Oh god, what the fuck is this place made of?" They were quiet as Noelle paced slightly. Mandy emptied her mind. "You know, I saw my life flash before my eyes. Like they always say it does. I just felt everything go past me. I even saw my mom, holding me when I was a baby baby. I saw all our friendship. Relived my wedding."
"I just saw white," Noelle shakes her head. "I don't think I'm going to a good place Mandy."
"That's not true and you know it." She said. "We have no time to pity ourselves right now. We have to make some kind of connection, and we have to start by spectating."
Noelle put a hand up her shirt, sinking her thumb into the wound, wishing she could feel something. And feel something she did because she felt searing fucking pain, but saw the world's sharpness and detail begin to turn up. "Holy shit, Mandy, that's the way!"
Mandy saw the world around them turn back too. "Stop! Only one of us has to do it then, right? Let it be me."
"Fuck that." Noelle sunk her thumb deeper as her apartment became clearer. They stood by her body, silently.
"So we have to hurt ourselves where we were mortally wounded," She nods. "What the everloving fuck."
"Zack. He... he was the one who had to tune in." She felt awful imagining him sinking his fingers into his split wrists. "He took the fall for everyone."
They heard a knock on the door, and Noelle's heart dropped. "Fuck, no, not like this. Please just take her home with you Brian, please." She begged the air. She crouched down to her body, first nudging it, then shoving it, then trying to hit it to get it to move, but it stayed still and stiff. "God, fuck!" She screamed.
Mandy pulled her arms around her from behind to take her away from the body, and they sat on the floor while Noelle sobbed. The door swung open as she briefly saw Dari and Brian laugh about something, before Brian locked eyes with her corpse in the middle of the floor.
It was like it all happened in slow motion. The second Dari saw it Brian grabbed her and pulled her face into his chest to avert her eyes. He called 911, stuttering and screaming that it was urgent, before running to her clearly dead body. He tried pulling the wound shut, he tried CPR, And it wasn't until he checked her pulse that he started sobbing. He made Dari get the neighbors, and in the last moments before the emergency responders came through the door, he just sat there and stroked her hair, emotionlessly with tears falling onto her body.
The world started to tune out again, and Noelle let it. She felt like she was gonna throw up. The world around them blurred again as she hyperventilated, Mandy squeezing her tightly.
"I died," She bursted out through choked out sobs. "You died!"
"Yeah, we did." Mandy said, taking a deep breath of nothing. It didn't even feel like oxygen was entering her. "We died."
☼
Easy enough to say the apartment became a crime scene as soon as the body was taken.
But the worst part was that there was no DNA. Not even a piece. No dead skin, no fingerprints, no sweat, no hair. Whoever killed her was so tactful that they managed to do it without even the slightest trace of proof. Which completely solidified in Brian's mind that it was Thellessany.
But there was no purgatory anymore. So there was no getting back. In a span of a day he lost his sister and his girlfriend.
Darien was safe. She would be going back with David. Making the call to tell him his daughter died was so far the worst part. David wasn't the crying kind of guy, so when Brian heard him break down over the phone as he told him how it happened, it was truly one of the worst moments of his life. David hadn't even considered the possibility of his kid dying before him. God, Mandy died too, that's like losing two children in a day. He always looked out for her.
The guys didn't talk, if that's what you were expecting. There was no group meeting or game plan. Jim fucked off back to Longbeach with a few words about funeral plans, Matt was MIA, Johnny was off grieving without realizing the full gravity, and Zack had said something about needing time alone.
Usually Brian would go to Noelle about this. She would give him a shoulder to cry on, give him a pep talk, talk about moving on and the cycle of life and how it was okay to grieve. But Noelle was dead.
Usually he would go to Mandy about this. Mandy would tell him to stop being a little bitch, and how they would've wanted him to be happy and deal with it because life was too short and they were the prime example of that. But Mandy died.
He didn't have the guys to reach out too, and he didn't have the two people who would have his back through hell and back. He had no clue how to do this--any of it.
He didn't really think at all when he got home besides pawing through his cabinets until he found a bottle of benzos and his credit card from his wallet.
☼
"Look James, donthangup," Brian slurred out into his phone two weeks later. The kickoff of a who knows how long bender was great. He felt great. Technically he felt nothing, and he might have stolen some pills from Matt and isn't allowed in his house now, but he felt great. "We need to talk. You know we need to talk. You can't ignore me forever."
"I can try," Jim snapped. "And you can't show up like this to Mandy's funeral."
Oh yeah. That. Tomorrow night.
"Why not?"
"Out of respect for her, but you clearly have none of that, so let me motivate you. David is gonna be there. And if he sees you fucked up he'll give you something to be fucked up from."
"If I'm feeling better then why do I have to quit."
"We've had this conversation before."
"Yeah, and you never give me an answer. You can understand me, right?"
"Barely a word. You sound like shit. If I hadn't known you for hundreds of years you would sound like a crackhead. Look, Brian, my fucking wife died. My best friend died within hours of it. And I don't exactly see you jumping to help with the funeral. Get your shit together. It's what they would've wanted."
He didn't expect it's what they would've wanted to sting so much, but it hurt. Badly. He felt the numb high move towards a puking high and barely made it to the toilet fast enough before the contents of his stomach emptied into the bowl.
☼
Showing up to the funeral sober, with the worst migraine of his life, was a gigantic challenge. He was beyond grateful Jim had even shown up to help him out of bed, make sure he didn't sneak off to do a line in the bathroom, shove a Tylenol or three down his throat, and tie his tie. They didn't really speak much, and it made Brian feel like a huge goddamn baby, but it was the support he needed.
Noelle watched him from the other side as he stared into the bathroom mirror. "I wish he could feel me." She told Mandy as she rubbed Brian's back. "He's so alone."
Mandy sighed. "If you had told me a year ago I'd be attending my own funeral, god knows how I'd've reacted."
This made Noelle snort, but then quickly turn back to somber as she saw Brian rub his face with cold water and smack himself a few times not so gently. "How are they gonna do it, Mands?" Noelle said emotionlessly. "They know what death is like. They knew we were in pain. None of them exactly died of old age."
"They'll live." They watched Brian exit the bathroom. "They have to."
☼
"We are here to celebrate the life and journey of Amanda Enid Haner, who requested previous to her death that her last name be changed to that of her brother who survives her. We are here to celebrate her enduring fight with inoperable brain cancer, but also to celebrate her compassion, her love, and her light. I believe that her husband has a few words to say on her behalf?" The pastor said, gesturing to Jim in the front row.
"This is too weird." Mandy said to Noelle as they sat in a back pew.
Jim went up to the podium, cleared his throat and pushed up his glasses. "So, nobody prepares you for the speech you make when your wife dies," He awkwardly laughed out some air. "And I really don't know how to do it. I've had to be, uh, fuckin, strong for her, because I know if I had died instead, she would be pushing through a lot better than I am right now. Mandy was the strongest woman I had ever known. The first discussion we ever had was about outlandish conspiracy theories and why we don't trust the government, and if that doesn't speak volumes for our relationship, nothing will. She was the kind of person who could make a room full of people laugh just with her smile, her tone and her personality. She was funny. We were so stupid with the way we would crack each other up. I had never laughed so much in my life before I met her. And she would hate that I'm saying all this about her, she hated people doting on her. But I'd literally kill and die to hear her sarcasm, to have her scream laugh in my ear, to be woken up to share hot pockets and beer and a crazy conspiracy theory. I'm afraid I'll never see her again. But I just keep telling myself a love like this can never truly die."
"My burnt up body is in that box." Mandy's eyes widened from the back. "Jesus Christ why did I choose to be cremated."
"Oh my god Mandy shut up!" Noelle stifled another giggle as she shoved her.
"I'm bad at funerals okay," Mandy nervous laughed. "Especially my own. Laughing is kind of how I'm coping with leaving the mortal plane."
"Would anyone else like to say some words about Mandy?"
Noelle was deeply surprised to see Brian's hand shoot up. He was nodded up to the podium, and she gazed at him with a specific sadness she had never experienced before.
"Your little sister isn't supposed to die before you," He breathed out. She could clearly see just how exhausted he was. "Especially so young. Mandy was the craziest bitch I have ever met. That is severely saying something. When we first found each other we didn't know we were siblings, and she thought I was trying to sacrifice my now girlf--" He paused which equally broke Noelle's heart. "She thought I was trying to sacrifice Noelle to a blood cult. But her craziness when you become her friend becomes loyalty and devotion. I miss her, all the time, I find myself wondering what she would tell me if she were here with me. I fucking miss my sister. Every single day. I've been making choices I know she would hate me for. The world is a far worse place without her in it. It's been so hard, on all of us, to know we couldn't save her." He paused. "I really don't know what else to say, besides to hug the people you love a little tighter."
Mandy stayed silent, as Noelle took her hand. Tears slowly fell from her face as she tried to snap out of it, but she couldn't. The tears felt like ice.