Her Absolution

Chapter 1

    It was the same nightmare every night. Red. Heat. Smoke. Fire. A blazing fire. Screams. Him. That’s all I dream of. It has been exactly 6 months since the fire. Six months since the school burned down. Six months of pain, memories, guilt, grief and denial. Six months of loss. After the fire I was in the hospital for two months. From then on, I hated hospitals. I always saw them as hope because even though death occurs in them it’s also a place where people heal and leave alive. After that for me it was a prison, it became my prison for those months.

            For those two months I was in the hospital I miss and gave up a lot, especially his funeral. It was something that pain me. I haven’t talk to my parents that much ever since they wouldn’t let me go but I also blame the stupid doctors who wouldn’t let me. After the hospital I went home, a house where the laughter and happiness you no longer see or feel, it vanish. After that fire something broke and not only in me but in everyone, it took a precious person, someone everyone loved.

            I started going to therapy, counseling, group counseling. But let’s be real nobody can feel my pain just like I can’t feel their pain or grief. I don’t talk as I used to, only when necessary. I know my family misses my ramblings especially mom. I want to make her happy to see her before everything happen. And I know she wants the same for me. Let’s be honest that’s just a hopeless dream, nobody can go back to the way they were. I know we are all hurting and trying to find a new normal.

            My new normal is being quiet, distant, and overprotective more than I used to be and that’s saying a lot. They are two people who I talk constantly, and you can say like the me before the fire, my therapist, Elaine Cambridge, and my little sister, Ruby. Ruby, my heart, the one person who keeps giving me hope. Hope that it can get better and hurt less. Because she is just a child, she is not grieving like the rest of us, she was sad for a while. To our dad Ruby was his little miracle, but since the fire he is just like me distant, quiet. My older siblings are living their lives, but I know they are hurting just like us.

            Every person grief’s differently but we all go through the same stages. They are currently in the stage of denial, their thinking that everything at home is normal, the fire it didn’t happen. But it did. The fire happened. I was there. I could never forget it even if I get amnesia. I guess that for the rest of my life I’ll never like February again. February will always bring pain and bad memories.

            As I lay in my queen size bed thinking of the last 6 months of the fire, and my family, my mom opens my door looking at me as it may be the last time, me but also telling me to get up or I’ll be late for school. Blue Ride High was still under construction or renovation I don’t know so I must attend Crestfall High 33 minutes from my house making me to drive my car. Blue Ride used to be an 8-minute walk from my house, it was a good exercise and a way to feel the warmth of the sun. Now I won’t have that for this year.

            Mom went into my room and gave me a kiss on my forehead, then pet my hair and cheeks. I want to stay here with her, in her arms giving me motherly warmth. But then she tells me something that I know is true and must do.

“Don’t give me that look. My precious girl it’s time to face the world. We can’t live this way it’s time to move forward, all of us.”

            As I look into her glazed yellow eyes with my own green eyes, I started to cry and hold unto her. She’s silently crying because she is being the strongest of the two and it’s time for me to be strong for her. So, I stop crying and I let her cry, we have cry to much this last months and for the rest of our lives we will cry more, maybe not from this but other moments, other tragedies.

            I guess our cries were loud because the rest of the family were standing in my doorway, looking at us. I signal them with my hand to come and we all hug. It’s hard going back to school without him being there. This was his day; he always love it. When the first day of school came, he used to say “Happy new Year” because this was the start of something good, new. Now that he is not here it feels weird and dark.

            As we pull away from each other we also stare at each other holding on and giving comfort for this new day. I got up and go to my bathroom and close the door. I hear them getting out to go downstairs and eat breakfast. I leaned on the sink, taking a deep breath, count to 10 and look at myself in the mirror. My black hair was all over the place full of knots. My face is puffy, cheeks red of all the crying and hugging. I open the faucet and splash some water in my face trying to calm down.

            I went to the toilet, then back to the sink and brush my teeth. I strip from my pajamas and underwear and as I went to the shower, I saw my back in the mirror, the reminder that the nightmares are true. On my right side of the back, I have a second-degree burn, where the wood stick landed, nothing compared to what landed on him. Seeing the burn brings back the screams, his. I hurry to the shower and let the warm water calm me, sooth me.

            As I get out of the bathroom after my shower and putting a little bit of make-up, I saw that the sun was shining as in nothing has happen like it didn’t know. You can feel the warmth of the sun in the room even though the air conditioner is on. I decided to go with a light blue dress, knee length with straps, my black converses, a black jean jacket to cover my back and a black baseball cap with the capital letter A in white. His baseball cap, with his initial, it’s a way to feel that a part of him is here with me.

            After I left my room in the hall you can see our family’s photo throughout the years. Would we ever smile like that again? I hurry towards the stairs not wanting to feel guilt and hurt. When I enter the kitchen for breakfast everyone turns to look at me. The only thing that I have with color was my dress everything else including my hair was black, my skin tone is between white and a little bit of tan. But I know they are not looking at me because of all my blackness but because I was wearing his baseball cap.

            For the first time in these months, I saw my dad smiling, like he was proud of me. His smile was a real one not those he has been giving to his employees. It made me realize that I miss it more than ever and I want to see him smile more, he was a happy person and a proud dad. I saw mom looking at dad and she too smile it wasn’t a big one but a genuine one. And that made me happier, maybe just maybe this will not be a crabby day. As I approach the table my phone rang. My dad’s smile already left his face. I look to see who it was even thought I knew already. It was Sarah, my best friend. She also lost him, he was her boyfriend, and he was my brother, my twin. Asher, his name was Asher, and he was my everything, my other half.