Better Than Any Ride

Chapter 2

I sat along the rocks for what would be the last time. This was my spot. My safe haven. The one place I could go to get away from everyone and everything and just be me. It was a quiet place where all that could be heard was the quiet chirping of birds, the wind blowing through the flowers and trees, and the gurgling of water as it ran down a small waterfall. I was still uneasy about what happened with my father. But, who could blame me. I mean I'm seventeen and that's the biggest fight I've ever had, let alone with my father. Yet, when I sat here all my pent up anger and frustration flowed out of me in steady waves till I was calm again. Just sitting here let me feel connected to her. It let me feel like a part of her was still with me. And now they were just expecting me to pack up and throw all that away. To throw it all out the window. To forget and move on. But I knew it wouldn't be that easy. Because I was the only one who had actually accepted that she was dead. That she was gone and never coming back. Which made it all the more harder to leave knowing that the last connection I have to her is here. In the very town where she died. In the very town where some of the worst moments of my life were. And yet, somewhere deep down in my heart I knew that if I left I would probably never be able to come back and face my past. Or even a part of it. I looked down at my iPhone to see that it was already eleven o'clock and I only had two hours left to pack. I got up and was about to start walking back to the house when I spun on my heels and sprinted to the tree across the creek. I ran as fast as I could and jumped the creek in one fluid movement. With the wind blowing through my hair and the sun shining down on my back as I ran to the weeping willow tree and ducked under its low hanging branches and leafy vines. I sat at the roots of the tree and stared up at the simple carving in the bark of the old tree. A heart surrounded the words that hurt me most. The words that brought it all home.

C+A

Sisters forever

Friends forever

Forever and ever.

I looked at the words cruedly carved into the wood. That was all it took. I broke down into a weeping lump as I lay beneath the old tree. As I stared at the words. We said forever. We meant forever. And yet we hardly even got thirteen years together. There were so many IF scenarios that I went over in my head. But there was no IF. There was only IS. And I would never be able to change that. No matter what I did. No matter how hard I tried. I sat up slowly from lying on the ground and started wiping away my tears. I sat there sniffling for a few minutes before the tears finally stopped and I was able to control my breathing. But by then I only had one thought going on in my head.

It wasn't supposed to be like this. It wasn't supposed to be like this.