Normal Things (Tate Langdon FanFiction)

Chapter Twelve:

                  

Tate pulled to a stop, looking over at me in the driver's seat, eyeing the small bouquet in my hands.

            I knew what he was thinking: What does my girlfriend want to do at a cemetery, at five in the afternoon, with a small, sorry bouquet of flowers, on a Thursday? I gave him a smile, and opened the passenger side door, stepping out.

            The cemetery was small, family-owned, the tombstones clean and the plots neat. I stepped along the worn-down path, walking to her plot, stepping through the tiny opening in the tiny metal fencing that ran the circumference of the gravesite. Over the years of me knowing about Drew, I was the sole-person keeping up with her gravestone and plot of cemetery. Mom never visited anymore; she used to when I was little, but once I aged up into my teen years, she stopped coming altogether.

            I could hear the sound of car locking and the distinctive creeeeeck! of the old, rusted gate. I looked over my shoulder, watching as Tate walked through the maze of tombstones and plastic flower bouquets, making his way over to me and Drew.

            "Penny, who is this?" he asked at the same time that his eyes fell on the name inscribed on the headstone. His voice dimmed until there was no more him speaking—only the sounds of the birds and crickets and cicadas and the far-off sound of vehicular life flitting to our ears.

            "This is Drew," I answered, even though he already knew who this was.

            His arm went to slipping around my waist, pulling me closer, his mouth near my ear, his breath warm compared to the chilly, winter air. We were quiet again, the bird sounds becoming overwhelming enough that I began to speak again, just to hear something different.

            "She was eighteen. Carl wasn't the best father, ever really. He would put her down immensely. To the point that she never wanted to be anywhere around him. She'd always hide in her room and then she'd get in trouble for it." I shook my head, and looked down at the flowers wrapped in clear purple plastic wrap.

            "It was her birthday, Tate," I said, my voice becoming thick with tears. I cleared my throat, looking away from her headstone, "The night before...Carl—he had said something horrible to her, and Peter was there to keep her company and make her feel better, but it didn't last long. He had to leave around ten-ish, from what Mom said; she told me that he wanted her to check on Drew every once in a while, because she was really beating herself up over whatever her "dad" had said. Mom said that she told him that she would. After that, he left.

            "Drew told me what happened next. I know this sounds crazy, and you don't have to believe me, but Drew told me about what happened to her after she left. She told me a few years ago..." I swallowed and stopped, trying to pick the right words. I shifted the flowers from one hand to the other, listening to the plastic crinkle.

            "She had cried herself to sleep after Peter left. Drew said she woke up around eleven-thirty the night before her birthday, and knew what she was going to do. She Googled how to tie a hangman's noose, because she had a length of rope she kept in her closet for whatever reason—I guess for this very reason—but she tied herself a noose and hung it to the ceiling fan in the center of her room. After that, she pulled out a notebook and wrote her suicide note. I remember what it says, because after she wrote it, she hid it in her diary, and after Mom read it, she returned it to her diary, and put the diary away.

            "It says:

            Dear reader,

                        I don't feel human anymore.