Alone With Ross

•73•

"Sometimes loneliness makes the loudest noise."

Her books were still in piles in the closet when I had returned home after a long doctors visit and an eye opening conversation with Vi.

Each book was stained with yellow markings and I found myself reading through each, wondering how many hours she would spend letting these words swim around her mind.

The worst ones were towards the bottom of the stack. They were the ones that were joined with tear stains to go along with the yellow fluorescent markings.

"Terror made me cruel." Wuthering Heights.

"Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind." Don Quixote.

"History, Stephen said, is a nightmare from which I am trying to awake." Ulysses.

And the worst one yet that made me chuck the book across the room. "She had waited all her life for something, and it had killed her when it found her." Their Eyes Were watching God.

She had left these here on purpose. And I couldn't blame her, these were obviously from when she first got here but the last one, that was recent. Almost as if she had packed all her bags only to sit down with this book for a second and highlight this passage for me.

I closed my eyes remembering the last 48 hours, and on how I had spent three fourths of it crying.

I fixed my car, it was a simple fix, of course I didn't figure that out until hours later when I had some sense in me, the drive back was a bitch mostly because I couldn't last more than two minutes without breaking down again. The pain in my hand only increased my sorrows by ten fold. When I walked through the door I had expected the loudest lecture of my life but I was taken aback when Vi had just simply hugged me when I had walked through the door and I had broken down again for the umpteenth time.

I was scared shitless about having to leave, but when I had brought it up to Vi at the hospital she silenced me. When we got back home she led me up towards her room and went into her closet to bring out a deposit box. It was ancient, and when she had found what she was looking for she handed me the papers with shaking hands.

Certification of Guardianship

My fried brain couldn't make sense of it at first. Until I had read my parent's small signatures on the bottom along with Vi's bigger one. I looked up at her in disbelief.

"You're not going anywhere." She promised. I was too stunned and exhausted to react. So she had lead me to bed, telling me she would explain everything after I had gotten some rest. But I couldn't sleep. Even as I grabbed her pillow from under my bed, which I had stolen before I had left, even as I smelt the scent of her shampoo I could drift off, not even for a second. So here I was, sitting in the back of the closet, reading through this pile of books. Alone, because the kid that used to be in here was removed because he was having withdrawals.

I picked up one of the books that were at the top of the pile.

"I know. I was there. I saw the great void in your soul, and you saw mine." Birdsong.

•••
Caspian

"Here take this." Ashley handed me water and some Advil tablets. I took them graciously. Gulping the water down under her stare.

"I'm sorry about your dress." I said quietly. Only a handful of memories coming back from last night, all of them were horrible.