Gone

Pretending

I sat, looking at up at her. Her hands lay neatly placed on her chest, rising and falling with her stomach.

I watched her hands, up and down, up and down, I watched until it stopped.

Until my heart began to break and the Walls spun and closed in. And then the screaming started.

Nurses and doctors fled the room once the heat they high pitched hum of the monitor.

I sat, hunched, I didn't cry, I didn't scream or try to wake her up. I knew that wouldn't get her to laugh again, to smile, to teach. No, it wouldn't. So I closed my eyes and pretended everything was fine.

I knew pretending wasn't going to do anything. I know it's hypocritical. But I've grown up pretending. To the spaceships, I flew in, the missions I took, to the yelling and table flipping.

But the one thing I didn't have to pretend, was her she was there when I jumped on the trampoline in a cardboard box, to fly to mars.

She was there when I ducked under tape in my living room to rescue my dog from my carboard "trap."

She was there when my father came home drunk with hickeys and lipstick stains all over his body. When my mother started yelling, when he flipped my desk while I sat there, doing math. She was the one to help me up and clean the cut on my cheek.

But now she's gone.