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HER BLACK dress waved at her knees as she looked in the mirror. She looked terrible, like a zombie. Her skin was still covered in cuts and bruises, her cast and neck brace were thankfully off though.
"Are you ready to go?" Clay asked from the door, in a suit that he'd borrowed from their dad. She nodded, picking up the artificial white rose she bought that was next to the red one Jeff bought her. She was going to put the rose on his grave because her feelings for him would never die.
"Sure. Let's go." She mumbled, walking past Clay out of her room, but he grabbed her arm at the top of the stairs. "You sure you wanna do this?" Asked her, seeing her bottom lip quiver. "No. But I have to." She said walking down the stairs seeing her parents ready to go, dressed in black. "Come on, sweetie." Her mom said comfortingly, leading her to the car. Chrissy go in the back with Clay letting out a short sigh. She wasn't ready for this. She wasn't ready to say an official goodbye.
She walked into the church that was already filled with people, many just from school who sent her a small smile. She let her head fall as Jeff's parents saw her entering. "Hey Chrissy." Mrs Atkins said pulling her into a hug to which Chrissy returned it. "Hey sweetheart." Mr Atkins said resting a hand on her shoulder. Chrissy smiled holding back her tears as she saw the coffin up at front, she found herself dazed as she walked up to it, not even replying to the mourning Atkins.
The coffin was white with a bunch of roses on top. Real roses. Jeff wouldn't have wanted that, she thought whilst fiddling with the artificial white rose in her hands. A big picture of Jeff was on a stand of Jeff, he was smiling brightly, his eyes squinted and nose scrunched up. A tear rolled down her cheek slowly as she realized he was inside the fancy box in front of her.
Everybody's eyes were on her, Mrs Atkins joined Chrissy at front, squeezing her hand gently. "We should sit down." Mrs Atkins said, pulling Chrissy along with her to the front row, her eyes catching her friends, the ones she'd rudely pushed away when they wanted to comfort her. At the moment every single thing she'd ever done was eating her up with guilt.
Chrissy sat there for hours listening to the priest, listening to Jeff's distant cousins and some friends say nice things about him. Everybody had a different relationship with Jeff but Chrissy didn't think it was as strong as hers with him.
Everybody arrived at the cemetery, Chrissy choked back a sob as they lowered his coffin in to the ground. She moved herself away so she could cry without causing any attention to herself. She put her head in her hands and ran them through her hair, along with the rose that she forgot about. She twirled the rose between her fingers before going back over to the mourning people gathered. She pushed past to where the headstone would be, it wouldn't be there for a while but he needed something symbolic there in the meantime.
She bent down and set the rose there, staring at it until her eyes blurred with tears, she didn't know everybody was yet again looking at her with sympathy. If she knew they were it probably would've pushed her over the edge. She didn't want sympathy, sympathy wouldn't bring back the thing she wanted the most.
Clay walked over to his sister and pulled her up, spinning her body so her heads was buried in his chest. Clay's shirt was immediately damp as his little sister cried into his chest. She really didn't know what to do, how she'd be able to carry on.
