Shadows of Yesterday

Chapter 33: When People Pleasers Go to the Spine Market

I waited five minutes before going after my brother. Five minutes of excruciating, awkward, crushing silence. My parents' faces were somehow even paler than before, their bodies rigid with horrified realization. I didn't blame them. I felt the same way. 

My parents had forgotten Ben's birthday. Who knew how long that had been the case. 

I had forgotten Ben's birthday. Four years in a row. 

How did this happen?

Even if that day had become synonymous with things none of us wanted to think about, it was Ben's day first. We should have at least remembered that, if nothing else. We should have tried to celebrate. 

Overwhelming shame turned my stomach and closed my throat. I was the worst sister alive. 

I have to apologize.

I scrambled out of my chair and was about to run out of the room, when I remembered that I had a guest. I turned to Liam and tried to come up with something, anything that I could say to even begin to explain or apologize for everything that had happened tonight. Nothing came. 

I stood there, frozen, for a moment, mind racing. My mouth opened. Closed. Opened again. 

Liam saved me the trouble. "Go," he said gently. "I'll find everyone something to eat while you're out."

I turned and speedwalked out of the building without looking back.

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I found Ben sitting against the rear wall of the hospital. He had his legs curled into his chest, and his arms were wrapped around them. His fingers loosely gripped a worn piece of notebook paper that looked as if it had been folded and unfolded so many times it was barely holding itself together. I had to swallow.

I know that paper.

I hesitated. Words suddenly seemed inadequate to convey the weight of everything I had to say. Everything I had to apologize for. I felt a responsibility to make up for everything my family had ever done wrong in that one moment, and nothing I could come up with was good enough. 

"I shouldn't have said that."

His voice was a low mutter full of regret. I sank down to sit next to him, mirroring his position. Since he was busy grappling with his own self-loathing, I could pretend that sitting down was intentional and not due to my legs giving out. "Which part?"

He buried his face between his knees. "Any of it. They'll hate me now." He clenched his paper tighter.

I sighed. "They won't hate you. They'll probably think of you differently, but they won't hate you."

He shook his head slowly, drawing tighter into himself. Something in my heart squeezed painfully. My brother looked so much younger than 22, and it hurt more than I thought it would. "They're not bad people," he rationalized. His words came out in a rush, like he was desperate for me to understand him.

He continued. "They're not. They just... they couldn't handle it. None of us could. And they had a good way to avoid dealing with it. If any of us had had a job, we probably would have done the same. I shouldn't have implied that they're terrible people. Especially since none of us are doing better than they are. I should apologize. I should explain. I should--"

I cut him off with a hand on his shoulder. I had never seen him like this before, and it scared me. I had to fix it. "You don't have to explain anything. I get it."

He raised his head to rest on top of his knees and opened the piece of paper he was holding. Several seconds of heavy silence passed as he scanned its contents, and then he whispered, "Is it terrible of me that I sometimes hate her? For picking that day, I mean."