When (he)arts Prevail

8

After Nate's death, everyone got a hard time moving on from it, her parents and his friends. Everyone was grieving, shocked by the sudden event. However, Kaylee did not crumble like the rest of them, mostly because she did not want to believe Nate was truly dead.

She refused to go to his funeral, refused to see the digging hole her brother was going to be buried in, the coffin sliding down that cold, earthy grave.

For a while, Kaylee pretended that life was as it always had been. She continued to go surfing in the mornings, teach kids in the afternoon. She started to prepare for her departure to New York the next month.

Alyssa often asked her if she was okay whenever they hung out, confused at Kaylee's behavior. In the beginning, it didn't bother her much, those questions. Kaylee would dismiss them as if people were crazy for even asking.

Brian, too, tried several times to talk to her about it, first to check on her, see how she was coping, and later to share his pain with her, to find some support. Yet, Kaylee would rapidly change the subject, usually to mundane things that didn't really matter to anyone.

To her mother, however, things were way different. She had completely fallen apart. Anne-Marie didn't leave her bed for at least two weeks after the funeral, only getting up to go to the bathroom, or to eat when Kaylee's father forced her to. He, on the other hand, buried himself in work, leaving early in the morning and only coming home late into the night.

So Kaylee began to take charge of things around the house. She cooked all of the meals, she cleaned the house, she went to buy groceries. She would not acknowledge that her family was broken.

But, unfortunately, it was broken.

And it didn't take long for Kaylee to start feeling overwhelmed with everything.It was on one night, when Kaylee had arrived from a three-day event she was hired for as a photographer, tired, hungry, with a massive headache, wanting nothing more than to just slip into bed, that the bubble she had been living on popped.

She entered the kitchen, found dirty dishes piled up in the sink, the fridge devoid of any leftovers or anything edible, the trash can full to the brim, and she lost it.

She'd been away for only three days!

She had the biggest fight with her parents, especially her mother, and it was the first time Kaylee actually cried over Nate's death.

The reality of Nate's death sank down like a rock and grief finally hit her.

It was a turning point.

Kaylee shut off from everyone after that.

She gave up on New York.

She was months without speaking to any of her friends, including Alyssa and Brian, even knowing they were hurting, too.

So it shouldn't had come as a surprise when she found out much later that Brian and Alyssa were dating. But it had, and it felt like her whole world was crumbling around her.

She confronted Brian at his house then.

—

"What was I supposed to do?!" Brian laughed sarcastically. "You didn't speak to me! I was hurting, you know? Nate was my best friend! I was fucking hurting and you didn't care!" Brian's words shot like arrows through Kaylee's heart, but the betrayal she felt hurt much more than that.

"Oh, my God, Brian, are you serious?"

"Yes, I am. I was hurting and she was there."

Kaylee rolled her eyes, a humorless laugh bubbling past her lips. "Of course she was!"

"Alyssa was a friend to me when you weren't—"

"I was hurting—"

"We were all hurting! Goddammit, Kaylee!" Brian's voice broke at the end, tears filling his eyes. He angrily rubbed at them with his sleeve so as not to let them fall. His tone was calmer but didn't hide his disappointment as he said, "I tried to be there for you, Kaylee, but you didn't let me. But the worst part is that you didn't even care about me."

Kaylee had left Brian's apartment shaking, feeling sick to her stomach.

—

It took Kaylee another few months after that to finally get back on her feet and make peace with herself, with Brian, with Alyssa, and partly with Nate's death.

She took advice from her parents and started seeing a Shrink. Despite her initial reluctance, Kaylee eventually began to trust the process and did whatever exercises were demanded of her, until finally, results started showing.

It was one of the very few times Brian had seen Kaylee cry, when she showed up at his doorstep to apologize and make things right.

Five years into the worst day of her life, Kaylee fared much better, but she still didn't feel fully like herself.