Nightwalker

Thirty Two

Riordan

It was something I wasn't ready to let go of.

I don't think I'll ever let go of that memory. From time to time, I'd get a reminder—a little glimpse of her blonde hair through the window of a bookstore, or her hiding in between students in the hallways.

I'd done a good job of not talking about her for years, just to have the Incubaré make everything flood back into Thor once her name was mentioned.

His mother, Alice, did a wonderful job of acting like he'd been the only child, and I didn't think it was because she'd truly forgotten about Hya—it was because she needed to act like things were normal to be normal. To be sane.

Thor's Dad never took her passing well. Hya was a daddy's girl. He gave her everything she wanted and more. And I could tell Thor wasn't mad at the fact that she got most of the attention.

He was the able-bodied twin.

The twin that could run until his legs burned. The twin that could participate in sports without having to worry about their heart betraying them.

Despite being bound to a wheelchair most of the time, she tried to be just as energetic as any girl her age.

Multiple Sclerosis was rare in kids, and in Hyacinth's case, it gave her irreparable nerve damage and cardiovascular dysfunction.

She was constantly tired and her legs would go numb, or as she described it, her legs would feel like 'TV static.'

On a day when the TV static wasn't too loud in her body, Thor and I would help her stand, with her holding onto us for balance.

Thor told me that Alice blamed herself for going to their holiday cabin on winter break as none of the kids would've have had access to the lake if they'd just stayed home.

I'd seen kids play hockey on frozen bodies of water around town before, but that afternoon, it had gotten warmer and the ice had gotten weaker.

Minutes later, Thor is waterlogged and nearly hypothermic as his mother's hands press on his chest, causing him to vomit.

He may have not slipped under the ice, but Hyacinth wasn't as lucky.

My screaming was shrill as I pounded my bloodied fists into the ice, trying to break it with all my might.

Hyacinth's gurgled screams eventually subsided as her body drifted under the lake, the current leading into the community's river.

I'd never felt a sense of dread so potent in that moment, knowing that I'd been too late.

I'd dreamt of a sheet of ice separating both of us three nights before, with me getting there just before the ice had swallowed both of my best friends whole.

The ride to the hospital was blank. One minute, I was severing my fingernails by scraping the ice as fast and hard as I could and the next, I was lying in a bed connected to a beeping monstrosity in a fluorescent lit room.

As if my erratic behaviour at the time wasn't creating enough of a divide between me and my mother, my Dad was not the slightest bit elated to hear I was at the scene of a potential homicide, they called it.