A Life Rewritten

Danielle - Closure

"Ok. sorry dear. I wish that it hadn't come to this. XOXO" the text read. The time sent was five years ago. Danielle sat at her apartment table, crying.

Five years ago, her boyfriend had told her he wasn't sure he was ever going to be able to see her again. Almost like he'd had a prophetic instinct, he'd tried to cut her pain off before it had started, and he'd been right. Five years ago, her boyfriend had died, silently.

Like a fool, she'd gotten angry at him. His apology had been the last thing he'd ever said to her. His final words being ones of love and pity, and she'd told him he could go to hell for all she cared. She'd felt betrayed in the moment, not realizing he had genuinely been telling her he was about to die.

"Go to Hell, Josh," her final words to him read, "you didn't even bother to break up in person. You don't deserve me."

Tears rolled down her cheeks as she wished she could go back in time and fix it all. She'd been fine to never see him again in the first few days, before she'd gotten the invitation to the funeral. 

A closed casket was all she had seen when she arrived. A closed casket and many weeping relatives. She remembered Jake attending, eyes swollen red, mourning his best friend. She remembered the bleary-eyed parents, the aunts and uncles. She remembered a small redhead girl, Josh's cousin, she'd been told, crying in a corner. Josie, her name had been, and she'd supposedly idolized her cousin. When she'd seen Danielle arrive, she'd burst into tears, unable to be consoled by the mourning parents of the boy who'd passed.

"I didn't deserve him," Danielle whispered to herself. "I never did."

She'd tried to stay in contact with Josh's parents, feeling as if she owed it to them to be strong. She'd always felt a parental connection to them, even before Josh had asked her out, and they always treated her like their own daughter. But, after his passing, the only person Danielle had maintained contact with had been Jake. She'd been too scared to talk to her would-have-been in-laws, after Josh's death.

So she'd been to Jake's wedding, and talked to her old friends. She'd been surprised when she realized that Jake's new wife was none other than Josie. He seemed to have been able to finally bring back the girl's smile, after so many years of what Danielle had been told was nonstop grieving.

She stretched, pulling out of her thoughts, and looked at the clock. 8:30 AM, it read, and she did a double take. She'd promised Jake and Josie that she'd meet them for coffee and talk. She wouldn't keep her friends waiting, even if it was for her to process her grief.

She stood, leaving her apartment and finding her car in the parking lot she called a front yard. It was time to pretend everything was okay again.