SHAWN
6th of December, 2013.
"How?" I whisper, the edge in my voice sending a chill down my spine.
No one answers.
I shift in the stool, my eyes closed as I try my best to make sense of the situation. But I'm running on one hour of restless sleep, and my mind is a complete clusterfuck. "Dad?" I urge, a little louder.
He looks up at me, his hands numb against the steaming cup of coffee in his palms. "Son," He stops, a shaky breath leaving his lips.
"How?" I repeat, anger spreading from my pounding chest to the tips of my toes.
He shakes his head again, words unable to form.
I breathe out, my teeth clenched as I try my best to trap the tears. "Mum's gone and you won't even fucking tell me why!" I shake my head quickly, eyes squeezed in frustration at my dad, "Fuck you, honestly."
And I leave. I walk upstairs to my bedroom, no feeling in my toes, no feeling in my heart. I shouldn't have said that. I shouldn't have left him. I bury myself in a pile of pillows and throw my face into a pit of darkness, hot tears falling from my eyes before drying on my cheeks.
I sleep, two more restless hours of dreamless unconsciousness. And I'm awake now so I write. I'm writing because I'm alone and cold and sad and so confused. So damn confused.
Yellow hangs from my shoulders. Cotton in a shade so happy that it feels disrespectful, but I don't care. Mum liked yellow.
You're supposed to wear black, right? To mourn, to form into the crowd at funerals waterlogged with rain that blends into tears as miserable people stand around someone that now ceases to be. It tears apart at my brain, the idea that someone can be alive, breathing, existing, and then suddenly they're just a name on the 7 o'clock news.
There has to be more to it, right?
HANNAH
Shawn never texted me.
I wondered if perhaps he'd forgotten - too caught up in his rising fame to remember girls he had pointless late night adventures with.
And I knew it meant more to me than it did to him.
"Do I text him first?" I asked Noah, my voice quiet so my parents wouldn't hear as we crept past them and down a flight of stairs to the basement.
Noah shrugged, his tongue scraping his bottom lip as he opened the door to a downstairs games room. He eyed the room, a table tennis table stood proudly in the middle, lights and artwork covering the walls. "Fucking sick!"
"Noah!" I groaned, "You're not listening to me."
He spun on his heels, his attention now on me. "Right. Look, I don't know who this dude is," Pausing, he ran his hand along the edge of the table, "but he seems nice. Honey, I'm sure he's just got school or something."
"Of course," I nodded, "I forgot about school."
School. We'd have to move to a new one; to meet new people and to make new friends. "Mum and Dad like this place," Noah went on, signalling with his thumb upstairs, to where our parents were talking to agents, "do you like it?"
"I love it," Chloe butted in, her blonde hair bobbing as she jumped up and down. "It has a pool! Han, have you seen the pool!?"
I nodded, my lips pressed firmly together. It was nice, I couldn't object. The brick facade, though boringly similar to every other house in the neighbourhood, gave it a sense of coziness.
We walked back up the stairs, the faces of our parents both plastered with joy and shock.
"Do you guys like it?" Mum asked, her hands spread as she gestured to the kitchen around us.
All three of us nodded.
"Good," Dad laughed, his hand reaching for my mums, "because we just put down a deposit."
And I had no idea what that meant at the time, but it sounded promising. The walls around us were no longer owned by strangers, but instead they were ours.
Although fairly mature, at aged 15 I wasn't the most logical of them all. I should have been excited about the house, the neighbourhood and the fact that there was a freaking horizon pool in our back garden; but all I could seem to think about was the fact that we'd just bought a house near Shawn.
Boy crazed.
SHAWN
7th of December, 2013.
I refuse to be miserable. I need to stop, to think and to analyse.
I shouldn't have yelled at Dad, because this isn't Dad's fault.
This is not anyone's fault. And I will not cry.
I will not let Aaliyah cry, and I will not let the world around me fade.
I will not cry.
I want to make Aaliyah and Dad breakfast. The fridge is empty, completely stripped of food, nothing left but a jar of jam and some homemade peanut butter.
In the pantry is a loaf of bread and Apple Jacks.
I thought maybe I could make cereal, but then I see that the milk is in the pantry too.
Dad isn't thinking straight.
So I make PB and J sandwiches, wondering when the last time either Dad or Aaliyah ate was. I wonder how long Mum had been gone for whilst I was away, and I nearly throw up.
I carry them upstairs, the house quiet, movement only from me and Jasmine the cat.
"Hey," I whisper slowly, pushing the door to Aaliyah's room open. She's on her bed, awake, a bear pressed between her face and her lap.
Jasmine pads into her room, oblivious, purring as she jumps up onto the bed before rubbing herself against my sister's small frame.
"Go away," Liyah mumbles at me, her head still buried in her bear.
"Oh-okay." I pause, looking down at the plates in my hands. A sickening pain stabs the back of my throat as I take in the situation. I will not let Aaliyah cry.
I don't leave, instead, I walk towards her bed and perch myself beside Jasmine. "I made you a sandwich."
She removes her head from the bear, looking up at me. Her hair is a mess, a matted sea of brown that no longer matches her eyes - now a sickening shade of red. She eyes the plate, the cat and my face, before sitting up and crawling towards me.
"Come here," I whisper, pulling her cold body towards mine. She obliges, wrapping her arms around my waist before placing her head on my shoulder. "Breathe, Liyah," I add, watching as she struggles for air between hiccups.
"Please don't yell at Dad," she stutters, the sentence flowing from her mouth incoherently. "You're angry, but he saw it happen."
Her eyes avert mine immediately, the realisation hitting her that I'm going to ask what happened. I shift, swallowing a lump in my throat I didn't even know I had. I don't want to ask my 10-year-old sister how my mum died. I shouldn't have to.
"She was Christmas shopping with Dad," Aaliyah sighs, her eyes now on Jasmine, "I was at school and my teacher pulled me out of class and told me she wanted to talk to me. There had been an accident, a truck slid on wet roads and a grey BMW was hit from the passenger's side."
She doesn't cry, but instead she pauses, anger almost replacing sadness. She pushes Jasmine off the bed, her teeth trapping her lip as she captures frustration. "She told me she would drive me to the hospital if she could, but she had a class to teach. I sat in the hallway and waited until Dad picked me up in a taxi. That's when it was real."
Tears sting in my eyes, catching themselves on the ends of my eyelashes. It burns to blink. I hug Aaliyah tighter, allowing myself to cry with her.
She takes the sandwich, it's sweet filling spreading a light smile across her face as she wipes the remainders of tears from her eyes.
I push the door to our parents' room open, eyeing my dad hunched over a pillow as he stares at his hands.
"Dad," I say quietly, the plate shaking in my hand. He doesn't reply, his eyes still focused on his palms.
I gulp, taking a step closer, "I made you a sandwich," I pause, watching as he blinks at my words.
"I'm sorry for yelling at you." I go on, tilting my head upwards as I sniff, the reality that I'm probably going to cry again one that makes me frustrated. "I shouldn't have."
"Please say something." I plead.
I take another step forward, placing the plate in front of him. He shifts, brown eyes examining the food. "Come here," he whispers, patting the mattress beside him.
I oblige, crawling like a small child into the bed beside my dad. He turns his head toward me, the lines on his face enhanced, his eyebrows furrowed. He pulls me closer, humming into my hair as I hug him.
"She loves you," he sniffs, a staggered breath overlaying his voice. I know he forgives me. I know he understands. I can feel it in his embrace. "She loves you so much."
- A/N -
KachowWhat have I written oml I'm a terrible human being.
- N -