Forwards // Book Two

Chapter 7.

The headlights of the car flood the road before us. The rain has stopped since we left the restaurant and the weather has grown surprisingly calm. The air outside is cold, sending a constant chill to shoot through my thin body. I don't have a lot of muscles to absorb the cold. I've always been a small guy.

I still remember laughing with Charlie about how thin I was, even back then. I asked her why she didn't go after a guy who was more muscular and her response was that she preferred someone who was mentally strong over someone who was purely physically strong. I joked by saying that I saw things in the opposite light. That earned me a hefty slap across the back of the head.

As hard as I've been fighting the memories, they never stop. I can think of something as simple as "milk" and I'll remember the time that Charlie accidentally cooked us a meal with spoiled milk. It was awful. We ended up dumping it and going out to eat to her favorite Italian restaurant instead. I still think that the spoiled milk dinner was only a ploy to get me to take her to that restaurant.

I would love to go back to that Italian restaurant and sit in the same booth that we sat in that night. It's not there anymore though. It burned down about a year ago. Charlie was really upset about it. In fact, when I told her, a small tear literally rolled down her face. She refused to eat at any other Italian restaurant after that. Stating that Italian food would never taste as good to her.

"Alright, we're here..." Daniel announces as he stops the car and flicks off the headlights.

Darkness consumes the area that we're in. Only a small amount of light peers down from the street lights overhead. I take a deep breath and step out of the car into the cold air. As I breathe in the air, a sharp pain pierces my chest. I grimace and look over to Daniel who's getting out of the car as well.

"What are we doing here?" I shrug, looking at him.

"You know what we're doing here..." He whispers, walking over to the sidewalk.

"I don't want to be here..." I whisper, shaking my head.

"Well that's too bad because I'm not taking you home until you spend at least five minutes here..." Daniel says, shrugging his own shoulders.

"Why does this matter so much to you?" I ask, shrugging again.

"Stop asking questions okay? Now, get your ass over there..." He says, pointing forwards.

"Fine..." I groan, beginning to walk into the vast amount of graves.

Many of the graves are new and have a nice amount of flowers towering over them. I slowly make my way over to the tall headstone with a small photo of a newborn baby and a pile of thick white flowers. The ground is wet beneath my feet but I lean down onto my knees anyways. The water seeping through my dress pants.

This is the first time that I've been here since her funeral. I didn't ever want to come back here again. It only reminded me of all that I had lost. I didn't want to accept that she was buried six-feet beneath this very headstone. Actually, the idea could potentially throw me into a full panic attack. This is all that's left of her. There's nothing else.

I still haven't accepted that really. When I remember a memory with her in it or have a dream about her, it's like I gain a false hope. A false hope that she could somehow be alive. A false hope that maybe all this is, is a bad dream. No, a nightmare. I don't see how this could be real. This isn't what I want my life to be like.

"Charlie..." I whisper, placing my hand onto the cold headstone.

Silence.

"I didn't want to come here..." I whisper, shaking my head.