Just Two Miles

Healing- I

12th May, 2016.

A new president had been appointed. The diving operations had concluded. People were slowly moving on from the Ferry disaster. But for Henry, his mind simply refused. He was on a standstill in his life. He didn't go to school. He didn't laugh or play. He barely talked. Coach dropped in to check on him every day to take him out if he was ever in the mood but Henry didn't want to leave the house.

It had been three days since the funerals and he hadn't been a part of it. In a graveyard just a few blocks away from his house his team's remains lay six feet beneath the ground but Henry had not been able to bring himself to visit them. The guilt that weighed him down was so heavy it choked him and he came off with panic attacks nearly every day.

He couldn't think of any of them without breaking down. It was clear that the adults expected him to visit the graveyard though. Hell, even he wanted to. Fin and Cassie were buried somewhere there as well. Their smiles, their laughs, the teasing, the pranks, the annoying music in the middle of the night- every memory hurt.

It wasn't until Coach's visit that day that anything in Henry's life started moving again. Henry sat outside on the steps of their porch, staring unseeingly at his mother's neatly kept flower beds. On a normal day, the other kids who passed by the house would tease him and throw things at him and generally just try to annoy him but now they all steered clear of him. Every gaze directed at him was laced with sympathy.

It's not sympathy I need, Henry thought furiously, it's my friends!

Coach's red minivan pulled up at the curb and Henry looked away, trying to forget the hundreds of times the team had ridden in it, cramped one on top of the other to fit in. Tony, Nate and Brian had even stolen it once he remembered. Coach jumped out of the door, locked it behind him and slowly walked over to the boy.

"How are we feeling today?"

Henry scoffed. "You ask me that every day."

Coach shrugged, settling down beside Henry on the steps. He glanced down at the plate of cake and biscuits. It hadn't been touched. "Not hungry?"

"No appetite," he replied monotonously.

Coach picked up a piece of cake, studied it carefully and tossed it into his mouth. He swallowed the whole thing in a few seconds and smacked his lips. "Mwah! That was delicious!"

"Amanda said she made them."

"Probably ordered then," Coach decided, already reaching for another piece.

"I thought so too."

"Still delicious."

"I wouldn't know."

"You would if you tried one."

"No thanks."

"More for me."

"I guess so."

"I'm sorry I sent you on that trip."

Henry paused. Carefully, he turned his head in the direction of their Coach. His blue eyes were wrinkled at the corners from smiling but his eyes were sad. Henry sighed. "It wasn't your fault, Coach."

Coach shook his head despondently. "Every night, I keep thinking- would things be different if I had kept you lot here with me instead of sending you off? It's driving me mad, kid."

"It wasn't your fault," Henry said again, more firmly.

"But it was yours?" the Coach challenged, raising an eyebrow at Henry. "Do tell me Henry, if I am not to blame when I am the one that sent you on that trip how are you to blame?"

"I shouldn't have listened to David," Henry muttered, picking at a blade of grass. "I should've stayed with them till the end."

"And what would that have accomplished?"

Henry faltered. For the past month, he had been pondering over whether things could've gone differently if he had stayed with the others. Every time he looked back, all he could remember was a foolish thirteen year old boy naively believing that he was off to rescue his friends and setting out, leaving them to their doom. But with Coach's question, his mind prodded him agitatedly. It was the one question he had always avoided.

"I should've died with them," Henry said at last. "I shouldn't have survived."

Coach let out a deep breath. "David was a smart young man. He's a natural leader. Don't question his last choice, Henry. Him and the team gave their lives for you to make it out safely so don't let that go to vain. You left that cabin, alright. But did any of them stop you? No. They all knew you could make it to safety."

Henry's lower lips trembled. "Kallum was crying. Kallum never cries. And I heard Tony shouting once I had left the room."

"Henry." The Coach's tone was gentle. "Of course they would cry and shout. They may have been selfless but they were still children. Of course they would be terrified."

Henry wiped his moist eyes. It was all still surreal. None of it felt real. "I wish I'd died with them."

Coach regarded him with sad old eyes. "In a way you did, Henry. The old you sank with that ship. You're not the Henry any of us knew. You're older now. More mature; you've lived through a crisis." He leaned back on his hands and stared up at the sky. Henry was surprised to see a single tear trickle down his cheek. "We're all going to miss them Henry. Don't forget, I knew them longer than you did..."