Last Chance Avenue [Ed Sheeran]

Swinging On

ALL OF YOU GUYS ARE GUILTY GO BACK AND READ THE CHAPTER CALLED PLEASE READ. NOW

Ed sent me a text message asking me to meet him at the park. He didn't say which park, he also didn't say what time, but I understood and found my way to Holly park, and sat waiting on the swings for him to show up.

I dug my feet into the sand, and pushed myself back. I was about to swing forward, but two hands grabbed the handles and stopped me. "Hello." Ed said. I turned around and looked at him.

"Hi. Is everything okay? You didn't answer your phone yesterday." I informed him of the obvious.

Ed pushed me forward a little bit, then stopped me. "Brooke, I feel sick."

I got off the swing and turned around and looked at him. "What's wrong?" I demanded. Sick? What kind of sick did he mean? I had seen way too many movies to know that sick always meant the worse.

He shrugged. "I was moving on, and I was getting over it, but it's not working anymore. You're not working anymore, you're making it worse." His face looked pale and his eyes were dark. He hadn't shaved and he probably hadn't showered either.

"What am I making worse?"

"This! Everything! God, you remind me of her, but you aren't her. At first it was great because you were filling the hole and I finally started to understand that even though you're like her in almost every way, you aren't her!" He shouted. I took a step back. "And it's sick. It's wrong using you like that. We'll be better off...not together. I was in love with her, and I didn't even give myself time to get over that."

"Ed, I'm Danny." I spit out without thinking of the consequences. He looked at me, his blue eyes blown wide.

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"Ed, I'm Danny. This sounds crazy--"

"Stop talking." He held his hands up as a shield to protect himself from my words. "Stop talking now."

"Ed, listen. I'm Danny, and I went into Brooke's body--"

"Stop! Stop! Brooke, I don't want you. I want Danny, and you aren't Danny!"

"Would you listen to me?" I screamed at him. "Why do you think I know everything about her? The junk food she ate? The songs she liked? Her favorite movies and books and foods? Because I am her, Ed."

Ed backed up. "You're fucking crazy. Stay away from me."

"Ask my mom, Ed, even she knows! She'll tell you!" I reached around the swing for him, but he turned away and began to hightail it away from me. I wanted to chase after him but it felt useless. It felt like nothing but a lose lose situation. He didn't want Brooke, and he didn't want to believe that Danny was ever in Brooke's body. I wanted him. He was why I was still here! I was too afraid to leave without telling him how I felt, and now he didn't even want to know.

I sat on the swing, trying to compose myself enough to walk home. When I finally got it together, I stood up and wandered aimlessly, and my feet brought my to Last Chance Avenue. I stood near the sign that they made for me. I almost wanted to knock it down, in denial of my own death, but it was true. I had died. Danny, the body of Danny, could no longer sustain this soul. Just like Brooke's soul could no longer sustain her body. I was really gone, and I
had to accept that.

I looked at the sign and found it decorated with stickers and flowers. I assumed the yellow flowers came from my mother because they were her favorite color, and the sticker came from Ed, because they were musical notes and other things. It felt sad and bleak, and I understood why Ed was so miserable looking at it. It was a reality check.

"Well," I say, "reality isn't exactly what the world thinks it is."

I walked away from the sign and began towards my house, then to find Ed.

~

I grabbed my guitar and headed up to Ed's dorm. He left his spare key jammed between the loosened wall panel on the outside of his door, so I dug through to it and pulled it out, then unlocked the door. Ed was hunched over, playing his guitar, looking quite shocked.

"How did you get in here."

"The key." I said, tossing it into the bed. "You out it between the wall panels, and what did I say? Someone it going to find it and break into your dorm. And what happened? Someone stole your speakers."

"Get out."

"Listen to me."

"Listen to what? Your crazy bullshit? No! Get out before I call the police!"

"No! You have to listen to me Ed! You have to understand--"

"Understand what? That you are so crazy that you would pretend to be whatever it is you're pretending to her just to be near me? Are you obsessed with me?"

"No, you fucking idiot, I'm in love with you! Jesus! That's why I'm still hear! I understand this is hard for you to understand, but god damn, Ed, have you ever seen a single movie? I mean, have you seen Ghost Whisperer?"

Ed sat, staring at me with with unreadable eyes for a minute. "Fine. What was it that Danny wanted to tell me before she died?"

"That she was in love with you. That I'm in love with you. That's what the song was about. The song I sang, right before I left to work, was about you, Ed. And I was suppose to come back and tell you that I love you, and we were suppose to kiss, and be in love, but apparently it didn't turn out like that."

Ed sat speechlessly for a moment. "No."

"No?" I repeated in denial.

"No, this isn't true. Any of it."

"Fine! You're making my life really hard! I'm only here because of you, and now I'm here because of no one!"

"Stop pretending to be her!"

"I'm not going to stop pretending to be what I am, Ed!" I screamed at him. I went up to his walk and yanked my guitar away from the pegs it was hanging on. "This is mine."

I left his dorm.

Was it possible to feel jealous of myself? I did feel jealous of myself. Danny, I mean. Danny's soul in Danny's body. I just missed being me for the millionth time. Then there would be no more pretending. There would be no more convincing Ed that I was myself, or convincing other people that I was Brooke. I thought about whether or not it would have been easy to just move on.

But I've seen enough movies to know that people don't move on when they still have things to stay. They stay trapped between the two worlds, so close to the people they love, but too weak to even do anything about it. I got lucky. No matter how I look at it, I was still lucky.