At twenty-seven, YouTube sensation Ben Leonards is married to his work. If he's not whipping up lasagna with a side of science experiments, he's running statistical analysis of bitcoin during explosive behavior periods.
When a friend asks him to org...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
Dead. I've heard these words twice before. 'Your Nonna is dead.' That was the first, but not the hardest, unexpected but not my worst one. Dead. 'Your father is dead.' That was the second and the hardest. I should've been prepared. We knew it was inevitable. I woke up at night worried that he died and I wasn't there, but I was there. Dad died in the ambulance with me by his side. Dead. 'Tall is dead.' He died without me, or Ben, or anyone who loves him. I should've made them take me to him—he didn't deserve to die alone. I could've lied and said I was his granddaughter, niece, someone who they'd let in. All the possibilities of how I could've duped them come to mind, but I didn't. I sat in a stupor and waited for someone to make it all better. I missed my chance. It's gone. Tall is gone. Tall is dead. Dead.
The room is a stage of a TV drama that's playing out on mute in front of me. I see Linda's lips move; I see Ben shaking in the chair across from me, his Mom by his side. Mike is up and waving his hands in front of Linda, Mr. Leonards sits slumped on the chair next to me. Angie is typing something on her phone. I move my head and the picture shifts like in a kaleidoscope. Linda is by Ben's side. Mr. Leonards is my Marguerite. Mike is crouching beside Angie. On my third round I'm dizzy and the people are a blur.
Waves of nausea take hold and I jump up, hand to my mouth, and run out of the door. I spot the bathroom, shut the door behind me, and empty my stomach into the toilet. Coffee smelling bile is all that comes up. Its stench brings on another wave of nausea and then another. When the last one passes, I hoist myself up and wash my hands, my mouth, and my face in the sink, careful not to look into the mirror. Dull throbbing headache in the back of my head matches the beating of my heart. I shudder.
What am I supposed to do now? I want to go to my room, crawl into my bed and fall into the oblivion where none of the tonight's events happened. Can I? Should I? I'm not the only one who lost someone dear. Every person in that room is impacted, hurting, but I don't want to go back there. Another wave of nausea comes at the thought of returning to that room and observing the grief take hold of them, turning their familiar faces into masks. I take out my phone. Ben has his family. Angie and Mike have each other. They'll be fine. I need to take care of myself. I pull up the group chat with Angie, Mike and Ben:
Angie: Where are you? Are you coming back?
I force my fingers to hit the right buttons, hit backspace more times than there are letters in my reply and stare at the words on the screen:
Me: i'm going home
I hit backspace fourteen times and put the phone away. No. I'm not running away this time. I'm not going to my room, I'm going back and be there for Ben, because I've been through this before and I can do it again. I sit down on the rim of the toilet and take a series of long breaths. The room spins less and the resolve to go back into the thicket of grief hasn't left me. It's time.
The room's quiet, and not because of my overwhelm, but because there's only one person there. Linda is sitting on one of the chairs, typing away on her phone. Two deep wrinkles separate her eyebrows and her face is stern, the ever-present smile gone, and I'm not sure I've ever seen her this serious.
