365 Cups of Coffee

Seventeen: Caffè Americano

    Day after day, I wake up, hoping the sinking feeling will go away.  But it never does.  Every piece of me knows in my heart that eventually, they will find out, find that I killed Landon, and even though it was self-defense, the whole world will never view me in the same way again.  I haven’t been able to tell Dylan.  I can’t bring myself to answer his calls, knowing I won’t be able to tell him the truth.

    We have school off.  Obviously.  The school is filled with blood, bad memories, bullet holes.  And so all I can do is sit around my room, drink my daily caffè americano, and write.  I’ve deleted my Skype, my Facebook.  I can’t bring myself to keep in contact with Ryanne, or Dylan, or any of my friends.  I need time to think, need it badly.  And the only way I can get it is through my writing.

    And yet, I can’t escape this sinking feeling, every day.  The moment I place down my pen, take my fingers from the keys . . . It’s all I feel.  Guilt.  Guilt that I didn’t save Luis.  Guilt that I killed Landon.  He could still be alive today, one less life that would be taken from this tragedy.  And sure, he’d be in jail the rest of his life, but what if he wanted that more than death?  I know that I stopped him from killing any more people, that his rampage would have just continued on, that he would have killed me, too, if I hadn’t acted.  And yet, a piece of me knows that I didn’t have to shoot to kill.  A shot in the foot and a threat, and he’d be down.  But I didn’t.  I killed him.

    Sometimes, I want to kill myself for that.  No.  Sometimes would be a lie.  Not a day goes by that I don’t wish I were dead.  Because this, surely can’t be living.  Can’t be the life I had just begun to create for myself.  Twelve people died on May 18.  Eleven.  Two of those eleven were freshmen: Luis and Jessica.  One was Landon.  And I can’t help but wish I had been killed in Luis’ place.  Why not me?  Why not?  I’m just a murderer.  That’s all I am.  I killed a boy, a seventeen-year-old boy.  And maybe the world will never know, maybe they’ll all think it’s suicide, like all the official reports say, but I know differently.

    Dylan has been over my house once.  We cuddled up on the couch for an hour, didn’t say a single word.  My mom brought us hot chocolate, and I drank up his scent, his skin, so happy he was alive.  And that was the last I saw of him before my family decides to move.  I don’t do anything all day, just sit around, writing, screaming, crying.  I can’t stand to go outside without feeling boxed in by the smallest crowd.  I collapse at the idea of human contact with anyone but Dylan. 

    The nightmares are the worst part.  I can’t go by a single night without seeing Landon or Luis or even Dylan covered in blood, dead, from a gunshot wound.  Sometimes, I almost get hit in my dreams, but I always wake up beforehand.  Sometimes, I wish I didn’t, just so I’d know what it feels like, even just in a dream.

    My mom brings up the idea to move after I tell her I can’t go back and finish school with the rest of the kids, even if we will finish out the year in a different district.  I have to finish my year out over the internet.  My teachers give me my assignments and tests through the end of the year over the internet, and somehow, I’m able to concentrate enough to finish out the year.  But my mom knows.  She can tell.  It’s all over here.  My life is over here.  When I stop talking to even Dylan, she knows I’ve shut myself out of this world already.

    They propose it to me one night before I go to bed.  Tell me I can pick any place in the contiguous United States, hand me a map, ideas, lists of cities.  They’ve done research, highlighted cities, places we could go.  But I don’t want to go to any of them.  They’re all too busy, too similar to Savannah.  I need a place slightly out of the loop without being totally out of the way.  Somewhere I can drive for a few hours and find an escape, but have a city nearby in case I need to escape again on an airplane.  Somewhere that’s not flat land, like Savannah. 

    I pick New Hampshire.  It isn’t a hard choice, if I’m being honest.  My parents research different towns in New Hampshire and make a list of a few for me to pick from, based on money and location.  I pick Granite Falls, New Hampshire, because it’s close to everything: mountains, lake, ocean, city.  I don’t tell anyone I’m moving.  We just . . . Go.  My parents go to get the house ready, and I stay with my aunt in her house, in a town just twenty minutes outside of Savannah.  At first, it’s nice to have a change, even if it’s just slight.  But I know I have to get out of here, if it’s the last thing I do.  I begin to feel trapped, like my secrets have created a box around me.

    I make a vow to myself.  I tell myself that I’ll forget.  That I’ll try to believe that they say on the news: that I didn’t kill Landon, that it was suicide.  That I’ll try to start over.  And the only way I can do so is by writing it all away now.  So that’s what I do.  I write about it, from every perspective: Landon’s, Luis’, Dylan’s, Ryanne’s, mine.  I rewriting, changing one aspect each time.  In one, Dylan really dies.  In another, Ryanne is the shooter.  In multiple, I don’t kill Landon.  Sometimes he kills me and then goes on to kill more people.  Sometimes I still hit him with the chair, knock him unconscious and bring him out to the police, like I should have done.  I can’t stop writing, and yet, no matter how hard I try, I can’t form the right words to tell Dylan I’m moving.  So I don’t.

    I never tell Dylan anything.  I allow my phone to ring, over and over, until Dylan eventually just gives up on trying to contact me, to find me.  I allow my phone contract to run out and make sure my parents don’t get me a new phone, make sure they stop paying.  I don’t want a phone anymore.  I want to forget this life completely when I move on.  I don’t want anyone to know what really happened. 

    I am Aspen Laurent.  I am fifteen years old.  I am running away from the past.