“Wedding Crashers? I haven’t watched this in ages,” he sighs, stretching his legs up onto the coffee table.
Mom used to yell at him for doing that at home, but this is his place and he can do what he wants.
As if he senses my thoughts he slowly, one leg at a time, lowers his feet to the floor.
“Cheers.” He clinks our glasses together.
I wonder what he thinks about the fact that I don’t talk much an
ymore.
I used to be a chatterbox and he was always telling me to shut up—to which our mom would tell him those weren’t nice words and to say be quiet instead.
Sometimes, I miss that girl. I think I’ll always miss her. I might still be here, alive in the literal sense, where oxygen still circulates in and out of my lungs and my heart still beats, but who I was died on that bloodstained tile floor in the cafeteria.
I dip my half-eaten cookie into the milk, leaving it there for a moment before popping the last of it in my mouth.
Beside me Sage is doing the exact same thing. It makes me smile seeing the little similarities between us. He’s seven years older than me, which is kind of a lot of space in between kids if you ask me. Still, we grew up fairly close. He was always looking out for me even if I was his annoying little sister.
Clearing his throat he wipes the back of his hand over his lips, rubbing away crumbs. “Are you nervous about school tomorrow? Is that why you can’t sleep?”
I stifle a humorless laugh, flicking a stray hair from my eyes. “No.”
His head droops.
He doesn’t want to ask. To talk about that day, or mom, or what I remember from those final moments, which admittedly isn’t much. But even though the memories are foggy my body still knows.
“I’ll be okay.”
He winces, because he knows my words imply I’m not okay. Not right now, maybe not ever. I’d like to think there’s some mystical day in my future where I will be okay, but I’m also old enough to know this trauma isn’t something I’m going to forget. It’s simply something I’ll learn to live with.
Slowly, he turns to look at me. A cookie crumb is stuck in his scruff. Normally I would laugh and make fun of him for it. Not tonight.
“Maybe the counselor at school will help you.”
It’s such a naïve assumption, but I love that he has hope.
“I doubt it.” I want to be realistic with him. “I mean, this is a school counselor. They can’t be that great, right? Otherwise they’d be doing something else?”
He sets his unfinished cookie and glass of milk on the coffee table.
I finish mine.
He brushes a crumb off his sleep pants, but one is still stuck in his prickly stubble. “Do you want me to try to find a therapist for you? Someone who specializes in this kind of thing?”
I let out a snort. “None of the therapists helped in the hospital. They … they wanted me to talk about it. To relive it. Sage…” I close my eyes, blocking out the terrible memories. “I can’t do that.”
His brows furrow, lips drooping. “I wish I could take it all away. I wish none of this ever happened. I wish mom was still here, those kids, everyone…”
He doesn’t voice it, I don’t either, but wishes are nothing more than a figment of a child’s imagination.
“Come here, Dani.” He opens his arms, allowing me to dive in.
He hugs me tight, resting the side of his cheek against the top of my head.
I know getting stuck with me has been a burden on him. How could it not be? He’s a young guy and for the last nine months his life has revolved around me. Not dating. Not friends. Just me.
“I know this is rough,” he clears his throat, emotion clogging his vocal chords, “but you have me. You can always come talk to me, D.”