The Innocents

Chapter Twenty-Nine

I can't say how I functioned.

It's a miracle I did at all. Something made me get out of bed each day and walk and talk and eat and shit and do all of the things any normal, living person would do except that I wasn't normal and soon, I wouldn't even be living.

The girls helped me through it. I told them once, the only time I spoke of it, that I would be all right. Poor Jo was having the toughest of times, clinging to me even more than she used to. It was as if she was afraid to let go for fear of me just floating away. I think in a way it did help to know that there were people who cared even when I tried my best to pretend that I didn't.

They still had "last meals" which, in my opinion, were no more than weak attempts to 'give you one final taste of freedom and deliciousness' but were no more than just a plate of food. As if on the last days of your life you say to yourself, man I wish I gotten the sweet potatoes.

Nonetheless, I went through the motions.

They set up the cafeteria to look like a fancy restaurant complete with ambient lighting and tablecloths. My father was waiting for me. He was wearing a gray suit with a salmon colored tie. He stood when I neared him and pulled out my chair for me to sit.

"Where's mom?" I asked.

My father sat back down and cleared his throat. "She left, Drew."

Left? I knew what it meant. It meant that she had finally hopped that ship to Hawaii. She wouldn't be back. There was nothing left for her. It was a surprise that my father was here at all

Or maybe my death was all the Sills family needs. I sure hope it was.

Our food was served. It's exactly what I had asked for. BBQ ribs, Macaroni and cheese and pineapple upside down cake for dessert. If it wasn't for the fact that I was still in my orange jumpsuit and they served the food on those shitty prison plates, I would have thought that I was really in a different place. We eat in silence and I try to enjoy the small sense of normalcy. It's short lived when my father spoke again.

"I love you," he said. To me it sounded more like a goodbye and I wasn't ready for it. I still had two more nights to not think about it.

"I love you too, dad," I said as if he were about to tuck me into bed.

"This world is going to shit."

"I know, dad."

"I thought I did everything to protect you. I did what thought was my best."

I know you did. It's not your fault, dad."

No matter what I said, it wasn't going to stop the onslaught of emotion from a father who was losing his daughter. Just like with Marla, there was no comforting that would ease this. Besides, my heart was already withering and I was holding onto the one last little dangling feeling of the love I had for Marla, Miles and my father. I was afraid that it would fall off into the pit of my stomach and be lost forever. I couldn't risk it.

We there in silence for so long that the ice in my drink had melted away. My father just kept staring at me as if trying to cement every feature of my face into his memory. I didn't want him to remember me this way, though. I wanted him to remember me like I was before all of this, when I had a future and smiling that didn't take effort. I think he may have been thinking the same thing because he began to cry and it was like watching a piece of paper disintegrate on an open flame. I went and held him. He tried to speak, but he sounded like a person drowning, gulping for air.

I couldn't think a straight thought except that this was all because of me. If I hadn't been selfish and thought about what my actions would be doing to others that we wouldn't be in this position. Still, I don't regret it. I just regret the outcome. I regret the effect it had on the people that I loved. I think the fact that I didn't shed a tear helped my father realize that I wasn't scared and that I was ready to accept that this was how things were. When I looked into his eyes, I felt like a monster even though he smiled a broken smile at me seeing something a little less hideous.

Our time was up and we hugged for a long time before we were forced apart. I couldn't find the words to say to him so I said the first ones that came to mind and that was that I was sorry. There was a look in his eyes that told me that he was thinking of some way to make this right. To maybe grab me and run for the door. To defy the laws of physics and fly with me in his arms and burst through the ceiling like Superman. Maybe I was the one thinking those things. Maybe I was one hoping they would happen.

I dragged my feet back to my ward. Everyone was pretty much out for the night except Marla who I saw lying on her stomach mouthing something I couldn't quite make out. I stopped at her bunk and leaned in.

"Were you reciting something?" I asked her.

"No singing," she said and rolled onto her back to face me better.

The song was by Pink Floyd and it was one that I didn't recall. The verses she sang went like this:

Overhead the albatross

Hangs motionless upon the air

And deep beneath the rolling waves

In labyrinths of coral caves

The echo of a distant tide

Comes willowing across the sand

And everything is green and submarine.

"Will you sing the whole thing for me?" I asked her and got under her covers. She agreed and began. My mind drifted off as I thought about my father and then about everything as her soft voice sang to me what I believe is to me the most beautiful song I had ever heard in my entire life.

Ms. Warren sat in the Fish Bowl with headphones in with her feet on the desk. There were no messages streaming across the doorway. There was peace.

Then my beautiful Marla sang the last few verses and sent me off into sleep.

And no one sings me lullabies
And no one makes me close my eyes
So I throw the windows wide
And call to you across the sky....