Kara wakes at three-fifty-seven in the afternoon, for the pasts few months her life has been like this, just waking late, not hungry and being locked up in her room all day long crying and feeling stupid for crying all day long.
There were days when Jenna, Kara's sister, drag her out of the room and forced her to have some fresh air. Even though that Jenna is just two years older than Kara, she plays the role of Kara's mother and the reason is that Kara's actual mother, Margaret, works 24/7 and her dad, Joseph, too.
They own a company which owns a lot of other companies, Kara has never been explain in what her parents worked, just once her dad explained Kara but she didn't understood and she never asked again.
Her life hasn't always been like this, there was a time when Kara used to hang out with her friends every day and had lots of fun. And it was Jenna who forced her to stay inside, what an irony right?
Kara misses those days and wants to go back to them. Back to the days where her only problems were what outfit was she going to wear and not how to stop loving someone that cannot love you anymore? She has been asking herself that question since the day it all started.
She remembers being in History class trying not to fall asleep. The History teacher Mr. Yank talked so slow that most of Kara's classmates brought a pillow to his classes, but Kara had a trick for not falling sleep.
At the same hour she had History, he had soccer practice so every class she watched him through the window and saw him played soccer, fall down and laugh with his friends. But that day he wasn't at practice and she knew something was up because Austin never missed a soccer practice.
She sends him a message when she realized he was missing asking him where he was and why did he miss soccer practice.
She waited a few minutes for an answer but she didn't have a respond.
She remembers planning to ask Mr. Yank permission to go 'to the bathroom' and called him. But before she could get up of her chair her phone vibrated and she checked it and Austin was calling, so she asked permission to go out and she stood on the hallway as she answered the call.
"Austin, are you okay? Why did you miss your soccer practice?"
She waited for an answer but she didn't have one, she just heard a voice of someone crying and asked "Hello?? Are you okay?"
She waited for an answer and the voice started to calmed and she heard "Ka... Kara... it's... Aus... Austin's mother." Austin's mother was trying to stop crying and say a sentence without choking.
"Hey Anna." Kara said trying to be nice and then asked the real question "Is Austin okay? What's going on?"
There was a moment of silence in which Kara felt it was an eternal and she doesn't remember how did Anna told her that Austin had a tumor in his brain, but the next thing she remembers is crying so hard on the hallway that Mr. Yank and other teachers stopped their classes because they heard Kara crying.
Mr. Yank asked her several times what happened, but she couldn't say a word. It was like if suddenly she couldn't speak and it didn't matter how hard she tried her voice didn't come out and she also couldn't hear anyone. She knew they were talking to her because she saw their mouths moving but she wasn't able to hear or say anything, she could only manage to cry. Kara was in shock and couldn't believe it.
That day she was sent home early and Jenna asked her if she wanted to talk, but Kara head straight to her bedroom and cry. She threw everything on her table and on her bed, and she grabbed her pillow and pressed it to her face and screamed "why" several times. It was a simple question that no one could answer.
That happened a month before classes ended and for the rest of the week she didn't went to class, she didn't have out of her bedroom. She didn't talk to anyone. She didn't have appetite to eat. Austin called her several times and left her thousand of texts, but she didn't answer him. She couldn't see him at that time. She didn't even believe that he had a brain tumor. She couldn't handle truth and couldn't even imagine the fact of losing her boyfriend/best friend soon.
Everyone visited her on those days. All of her closest friends and some of her classmates she rarely spoke with but she didn't talk to anyone. She couldn't see anyone and talk about how she felt because on the moment they bring it up she knew it would be when it all turned real and it was something she was afraid.
After a week passed she was ready to talk to someone, she knew that the only person she wanted to talk was Austin. He was always with her in everything. They became best friends before they were born. Their mothers have been best friends since high school. So they always saw each other on holidays and they went to the same school. They knew each other better than they knew themselves and everyone knew that their destiny was to become boyfriends and probably be together in the future and get married and have kids and grow old together. But for him to die before any of this happened was not a part of the plan.
And it hurt her to face reality. She knew she needed to talk to him because he was the only one that knew her like no one else did and he could make her smile on her worst days.
Saying nothing to anyone, she grabbed the keys off her car and drove to the hospital to see him. Anna told her a few days ago what Austin's room was so she could visit him when she was ready. She went to the fourth floor and search for room 284.
Minutes later she founded it and the door was closed. She was going to go back to her house and forget about what she was about to do. But before she could go the door opened and a nurse came out.
"Oh, Austin you have a visit. You can enter now darling." the nurse said and let the door opened for Kara to enter. She took a deep breath and walked in the room, it had lots of balloons and the television was on with a soccer game in which she didn't recognize either of the teams.
Kara couldn't say a word, her voice just disappear.
The hospital bed made everything more real. But he still looked like the same Austin watching soccer and even his hair was messy like always although he did looked somewhat tired but his cocky smile was the same.
"I thought you will never come." Austin told Kara smiling.
She tried to pull out her best fake smile possible trying to make it look real, but instead she grimaces and Austin knew her and he knew how to difference her fake smile with her real smile.
"Hey, I don't want you to treat me any different okay?" Kara nodded with her eyes full with tears and she was making her best not to let them fall, but Austin continued "Promise me that Kara." he said holding her hand and Kara answered "I promise." kissing him on the lips, trying to prove him that nothing would change. When she knew that everything changed and would not be normal again.
That day they talked about everything that popped into their heads. They didn't talk about what would happen next, or how did he felt or how did she felt about the whole situation.
They just talked like they always did, like nothing had changed. Like he was in the hospital because he broke his leg and not because he had a brain tumor and she was thankful for that because at that point she wasn't ready to have a serious conversation with him.
She had that talk with him two weeks later when in the middle of the night she received a called from Austin's mom saying he was at the emergency room and that he was having an emergency surgery because he was walking downstairs and he passed out and fall off the stairs.
Kara ran to the emergency room as soon as she got the call and she stayed there all night and she slept on the waiting room.
She saw him in the afternoon and she cried for two minutes and he said nothing.
"I thought you died when your mom called me... I was freaking out!" she said when she calmed down and he only managed to nod "God Austin I was scared with the thought that I might lost you and I didn't got a chance to tell you so many things... I was-."
He caressed her cheek with his hand and said "I know and I'm so sorry that you've to pass thru all of this. I don't want you freaking out because of me. You know I love you and I care a lot about you and I would never want you to be hurt in any way; especially if I am the one that's hurting you-."
"Don't you dare to push me away now... I. Am. Not. Going. Anywhere. I'm not hurt, I'm scare of losing you but that would not make me go away when you need me the most. I'm not going anywhere, so don't ask me to do that."
"What if I die, there is a chance and you will need to accept it. I'm scare of it, but I need to make my peace with it... and you too. Because if it happens I need you to be prepare. Okay?" she nodded, and they stood together in the room for a while.
That was the first time she finally admitted to herself there was a possibility. It was the first time when she woke up and realized how serious it was.
Kara realized she had to take every opportunity she had with him because maybe one day he wasn't going to be with her and she would only have the memories.
That day was when it all started but also when everything ended because after that day Anna decided to take Austin to Spain. There they were one of the most excellent doctors that specialist in brain tumor treatments. Anna wanted that the best people took care of Austin so he could have the best chances and there they had the support of the only family they both had left, Anna's sister. Austin's father died when he was ten and his two grandmother and two grandparents had died too many years ago. His father was an only child, so as Austin but his mother had one sister that had moved to Spain years ago.
The day she had to say goodbye to him was one of the hardest days she has been thru. She walked him to the airport, and she didn't cried when they said goodbye or when she saw the plane leave. She cried the entire way to her house and that night too.
They talked every day and each day Austin sounded better. He didn't sound tired anymore and he was the same Austin. For a moment she thought he would come back healthy, but the afternoon of May 31 she received a call from Austin's mother.
Since they left Kara hasn't gotten a call from Anna so she knew what was coming. She picked up the phone with tears coming down her face and she said "Hello?"
She heard someone sobbing on the other end of the line and that made more tears to come out "Kara, darling. I'm so sorry but... he was in a surgery and he didn't handle it. I'm sorry." Anna said and Kara couldn't response she couldn't say anything, she cried and Anna hung up the phone leaving her crying.
Jenna came running upstairs when she heard Kara and just when she saw her she knew that Austin had died "Oh sweetheart come here." she told her and hugged her hard.
"He was better... he sounded better Jenna. God I don't understand... I didn't even know that he had a surgery coming. I thought that he was going to get pass this... that maybe he was coming back." she cried in Jenna's shoulder for thirty minutes until she felt sleep.
She took a while to accept that he died.
For the first weeks she didn't wanted to believe it.
She called him to his phone until it hit the voice mail and she heard Austin's voice saying "Hey it's Austin. Leave a message and I'll call you back."
But eventually she accepted that he was gone and never coming back, although some days she dreamed that he was coming back like nothing had happened but she knows now that will never happen.
She grabs her pillow and presses it toward her face trying to stop thinking about him. Sometimes she wishes to never have met him, never had fallen in love with him but she remembers that if it wasn't for Austin she wouldn't be who she is. He taught her so many things that at the time they didn't seem helpful but now they were.
He taught her never to hide her feelings if she felt like shit cry all day long. He taught her how to deal with her feelings and how to overcome a hard moment. Now she only cries. But she knows that soon she will overcome this and it will be her past, but that moment isn't now.
She remembers all the amazing things they went through and the memories she shares with him, or well she will no longer share with him.
That's a thought that has been through her head these days. How you've memories with someone and then suddenly you're the only one that remembers them and knows about their existence. She hated that. She hated not being able to share their memories with him any longer, not being able to see him, to talk to him, to be with him, but what she most hated was to love someone that isn't capable to love her anymore.
She wished more than once to have the ability to move on, continue with her life.
Summer was coming to its end, and she passed her entire summer in her house.
She sometimes leaves her room and goes to the backyard and sits there staring at the mountains and listening to the cars and the airplanes passing thru. Because sometimes her bedroom was too silent and when there is silent the only thing she thinks about is Austin and when that happen she needed some noise to silence her thoughts.
Jenna has told Kara several times that if she wanted to move on she will have to live her life again like she did before.
"You know, I've got a question for you." Jenna said the day before going to New York a month ago "Do you remember that day you came home feeling like everyone was trying to hurt you? Four days before Austin's death." Kara nodded remembering that party.
Everyone asked her how Austin was doing and she tried to be nice saying "he is trying to get better but he is good."
And even if she did believe he was better she just wanted to scream at them saying "How do you think he is doing? He has freaking cancer, you idiot!" Of course she never said those words out loud, but she got tired of answering the same question with the same answer so she went home early and locked herself in her room. When her brother and sister came to her room to ask her what happened she told them that everyone was trying to hurt her.
Finally she answered to Jenna "I remember worst party ever."
"Yeah well, you want to remember just the party." Jenna said sitting next to Kara on her bed and then continued "But I remember what you told me before the party. Do you remember that?" Kara shook her head "Well-." Jenna looked at Kara with a worry look and continued. "I asked you where were you going and you told me to a party and I told you, you were in a good mood and you denied and said that Austin forced you to go, that he told you that you needed to continue with your life without him because he was trying to prepare you for the worst scenario.
Austin wanted you to move on, he told you to continue with your life. I understand you have to grief, but you have past practically the entire summer in here. Deep inside you, you know that that's not what he will have wanted you to do. You know you have to move on but you don't find a motive why. The thing is you have plenty of motives but you are so blind grieving that you cannot see you have a whole life ahead of you, full with choices and adventures. Think it while I'm gone."
She thinks of that conversation with her sister and she knows that her sister is right. She doesn't have a motive to move on.
When Austin was alive she moved on and acted like everything was normal for him. But when he died she lost the motive to move on and her fight is worthless without a motive and she doesn't find the strength to move on.
Her thoughts get interrupted when she hears her phone and she grabs it and sees Lucas is calling.
Lucas, a good friend of hers, has always called her since the day she found out that Austin had brain tumor.
Before Austin's death he called Kara to ask her how she was doing. On the first week after finding out that Austin had brain tumor she never answered his calls. But after visiting Austin she talked to him some days for hours and other days for minutes, it depended on her mood.
But after Austin's death a few weeks later he called her several times to invite her to a party or to the movies or the beach but she always answered the same thing "I'm not in the mood today." After a month Lucas calls became more infrequent and now he calls her once a week to see how she is doing.
She answers and there is an awkward silence before he talks "Hey, how are you?" he asks trying to have a normal conversation with her best friend.
"Can we skip that question? I don't know what to answer." she knows it sounded harsh and bitchy but that's the true. She is sad, depress, confuse, lonely, heart-broken and lots of other feelings. But telling him isn't going to help her.
Lucas clears his throat and asks himself if it has been a good idea to call Kara "Well I'll skip formalisms and ask you if you wanted to come to the Lake, we are having something like a small party. I'm already here if you want to come now, but if you'll like to come later I'll still be."
'I love the Lake and he knows that. But I don't know... what if everyone stares at me and looks at me wearily or if I start crying because I remember one of the thousand moments I had with Austin there? I don't know... I mean... Jenna is right if I want to move on. I have to live my life like I used before. The old me will have definitely go to the Lake because is her second favorite place in here... and Lucas will be there, he will not look at me weird... I should go," she thinks and before she starts over thinking it and regretting it she says "Yes, I'll be there as soon as I get dress up, okay?"
Lucas is surprise hearing Kara's answer, he was waiting for an "I'm not in the mood, but thanks anyway" kind off answered "Oh- well I'll be waiting for you."
"You sound shock...were expecting for me to say no?"
"To be honest yes, but I'm glad you agreed."
"Me too, well I'll guess I'll see ya later."
"See ya." she hangs up and stares at her clothe for a while trying to figure out what to wear.
She isn't in the mood of wearing a bathing suit. Since she has been on her bed the entire summer she can admit that she isn't in her best shape and she knows how people in her school are and the last thing she wants right now is to add them another item in their things they can criticize her.
Not that she cares about it. It's just that she doesn't want to think of the idea of more people looking at her than the ones that are already going to, just because she came.
Still she wants to pretend that she is still the same Kara, and that she wasn't all summer crying. Not for everyone to believe it but for her to believe it.
She really doesn't cares about what people things about her. So she puts on shorts that made her legs look kinda good with on a black t-shirt because black makes you look thinner and then she picks her favorite sandals and a pair of sunglasses.
She debates for a while whether to put or not make-up on. At the end she decides that she doesn't wants to get everyone's attention so she puts some lip-gloss and a bit of blush so she doesn't look like a ghost.
Before going down she looks at her reflection in the mirror and says out loud "I can do this. It's just a party in the Lake with my friends. This is the first step. Then I can go to other bigger parties and I will be ready for school when it starts. I will be the same-old Kara everyone knows, that I know. I need to do this." she grabs her phone and before she can think it twice she opens the door of her bed and walks out.
When she walks downstairs she realizes that she has eaten anything. She knows she needs to eat something because the last thing she wants is to pass out in front of everyone. She forces herself to go to the kitchen.
She takes out the bread, the lettuce, the tomato and the cheese and does herself a sandwich and divides it in half.
After ten minutes of forcing herself to eat, she manages to eat only one half of the sandwich. She couldn't eat the other half so she leaves it in the fridge and grabs the keys of her car and left a note saying that she was out on the kitchen's table.
Kara imagines her parents reading the note and that they will be surprise, but she remembers that her parents will work out until late and she will be back before her parents realized that she was gone. She shakes off the tears coming out and leaves her house.
Kara looks for her car in the garage and drives, trying not to think of her parents and their lack of ability in being parents.
But it didn't matter how much she tried not to think about it. Because before she realizes it she thinks how it bothers her that her mother and father are never home with her. Although they have spent more time with her since his death it still makes her think that they will only be around her when a tragedy happens and not when a celebration comes.
They missed her brother's graduation 'what kind of parents missed their first son's graduation?' Kara thinks and then answers the question saying it out loud "only mine of course"
This is why Jenna and Mike, his oldest brother, have played the role of Kara's parents since Kara has memory. Her brothers are her substitute parents. Jenna is more like her friend, who she tells everything and gossips with and Mike is more of the overprotective figure who has to know every single one of Kara's friend and he is the one that grounded her the first time she got drunk.
YOU ARE READING
Stay With Me (by V.A.R)
Roman d'amourWhen life gets difficult do you run away? Or do you try to make things better? For most people the answer is to run away, because it's easier to avoid your problems than to solve them. This is the story of two teenagers and how they...
