Her Name is Memory

22| feel everything

Chapter 22

How do you turn off your heart? 
I'm trying to

~Nathaniel's Lyric Journal

"DAD, CAN YOU HELP ME WITH SOMETHING?" I asked, walking briskly into the kitchen. 

Dad was sitting in the kitchen, peering up from his papers scattered across the table. He took off the glasses to rub his eyes and run his fingers through his thinning hair. 

"Hey son. You're dressed nice. Are you going somewhere?" he asked, pushing some of the papers aside. He pushed an empty chair by him towards me, so I took it. 

I looked at my dark pants and white button down, thinking this hardly counted as dressing nice, but here, it honestly might be. I frowned slightly at his comment, considering it was usually him that wasn't home all day. I woke up for a run, had lunch, laid around all day until it was time to go to the barn party David and Sabrina are insisting I go to. 

"Just hanging out with David. We might watch a movie or grab food," I lied smoothly, accustomed to this when I went out in New York. I focused on the yearbook in my clammy hands, attempt to divert my thoughts to something else so it wouldn't look like I'm lying.

"At the theaters?" my dad clarified.

I nodded, looking at his papers. I finally asked, "What are you doing?"

At the mention of the papers, Dad blew some air out, lightly laughing and pulling the papers in front to show me. I looked at the random numbers with confusing. I gave him a questioning look.

He sighed. "Just some paperwork. After that, I think the boys want to do something."

I frowned. "The boys?"

"Old friends from my football team. Not a lot has changed here, " he commented with a happy smile. I looked at him, trying to recall the last time I saw him this happy, but I couldn't. "Anyways son, you said you needed help with something."

Remembering why I asked him for help, I pulled out the yearbook to open it to the bookmarked page. It was the cheerleaders page of the 1987-1988 yearbook with all the cheerleaders at different games.

"Yeah. What can you tell me about Rose Miller?" I asked, pointing to the picture of Mom, Rose, and two others standing together in a picture. I was looking through the yearbook, scanning each picture for Rose Miller. 

Dad's smile disappeared as he took the book and angled it towards him to study it better. Melancholy lines wrinkled his forehead as he touched the picture of Mom. Turning his face slightly, he looked at the picture of Rose smiling next to Mom.

"She was your mom's best friend. I never seen two people more close than them two. Both of them were cheerleaders in high school. Rose use to visit us in New York when you were a baby. We use to see her when we visited Alabama," Dad explained quietly, not once taking his eyes off the photo.

I looked at Rose with little familiarity, trying to recall her in our apartment. 

But I couldn't.

"I don't remember her visiting," I repeated this out loud.

"She use to until she died." Dad's voice trailed off before shaking his head. Dad pulled back a smile but it wasn't an easy smile; it looked very painful.He rubbed the bridge of his nose with his fingers before continuing. "It was in the past. She fell down and died from internal bleeding a long time ago."

Hearing how Rose died made me let go of my breath I didn't know I was holding in. When David reasoned Mom wouldn't kill Rose, that nagging thought never left my mind until I heard how she died until now.