Moving On

Twenty-six

Twenty-six / Sandra

Carly told me everything: her childhood, Blaine, seeing me and my mom in Columbus, her plan. I asked her if she thought she was doing too much for something that wasn't neither my or her fault. She said yes, but she also felt like it was already too late for her to stop.­ I told her that if there's one thing I've learned since all the fuckery in my life, it's that it's never too late for anything.

I've convinced her doctors to let her leave the hospital today. At first, they were so against it as if Carly was going to die if she sets one foot out of the building. But they finally stopped being to paranoid after Carly told them that she was going to die no matter what she does now, so she might as well make the most out of her time left breathing oxygen. That shut them up.

Carly did have a point, though. She was right. And as much as it hurts me to admit it, she does need to make the most out of her remaining time here with us.

And I think that's the most painful concept to grasp: time.

No one knows how much she's got left. If we're lucky, she could be with us for another year (which I highly doubt, looking at her right now. She could be with us for another month or another week... Maybe even for just another day.

That's what urged me to spend her last moments alive to make her feel loved. I want her to die knowing that she had me, she had a sister who loved her from the deepest part of her heart. No matter what she did, she's still a person. And everyone deserves to be loved.

"It's weird," she says from the passenger seat.

We were on our way to see our father's grave. From what I heard, he was a dick when he was alive. But I couldn't hate him anymore because a.) He's dead, and b.) Well, he's my dad. But it's nice to know that he's the link I have to Carly. His genes run in both our bodies. He's the connection that tethers me and my sister.

"What's weird?" I ask her.

"You're not mad at me?" She questions. "You were pretty pissed at Hawaii when you found out I was pregnant and you thought Luke was the culprit, but now you're just... calm. It's freaking me out."

I sighed and smiled. "Let me ask you something. If you found out that you had a sister, and that she's dying, what would you do?"

"That's a hard one," she laughs. "I think... I think I'm going to give her all the love she didn't receive from me all those years."

"There," I said. "You just answered your own question.

We arrived at the cemetery just before lunch.

Dad was buried in Columbus instead of Indianapolis because that's what mom wanted. Or at least, that's what I thought I knew. I'm guessing now that mom chose him to be rested here because of Carly's mom. Which made me think...

"Is your mom's name really Geraldine?" I asked her. I just wanted to know if that was faked too.

"Well, it was Geraldine," she corrected me. Right, past tense.

Dad's gravestone was fairly far from the start of the cemetery, so it was quite a walk. Dried, fallen leaves crunched underneath our shoes and the cold air was harsh but tolerable even though it was before noon. That's October in Columbus for you.

"Nice name," I remarked.

"Yeah," Carly shrugged. "I just wished she was nice like her name was."

I was confused. "Didn't you like your mom? When you were talking about her you seemed pretty attached to her."

"Are you kidding me?" She scrunched her nose, as if it was disgusting her that we were talking about her mom. "As much as I hated dad, I hated her as well. She wouldn't shut up about Samantha and you!" She exclaimed. "Maybe that's why I did what I did. Maybe her evilness and negativity rubbed off on me."