Not Me

chapter 13

I shakily get off the bus. My breaths come in quick paints, I'm sweating up a storm, and adrenaline spiked blood pounds through my veins. I've never really thought about what I'm about to do until now, and honestly, I'm scared to death. Every noise I hear makes me jumpy. I guess I just keep hoping Levi will come to stop me, telling me all the things he said weren't true, but he never comes, and a part of me knows he never will. However silly my hopes are, I won't give up on them until the end.

Even though I'm walking slowly, barely moving forward at all, my old house seems to get closer and closer, and I can't help but think I'm walking closer and closer to my death.

As I approach the wrought iron gates, I decide to take a last minute look inside what once was my sanctuary, where my family and I were happy and together.

I walk into the nursery, originally made for Ara, and what for a few short weeks was home to Eva. I wonder where she is now. It hurts knowing she won't remember me when I'm gone.

I enter Collins' room. It's a very bland room, with white walls and a rusty mahogony bed. The only thing he's hung on the wall was an old, crusty picture of dad, with his name, Robert James Evans, scrawls underneath. So this is what Collins was staring at all that time. Tacked to the wall next the the photo is a sheet of yellowing paper. I squint at it, trying to make out the fading words scrawled messily onto it. The only legible sentence reads: My dad is gone. Violet is gone. Mom is gone. There's no one left who cares.

I wonder why he wrote that. After dad died, before mom met Joe, Collins refused to talk, so he would sometimes write questions he wanted to ask me on a piece of paper. I always answered his questions, but he never answered mine. Only asked questions when he needed to.

What if he was talking to someone? Though he's never written statements before, but it may have been necessary at the time.

Why was I so stupid? Why did I leave my brother all alone? His life was no better than mine. Why didn't I take him with me?

My mom's bedroom confuses me. It's decorated with pictures of me and Collins, and even a picture of Eva. I thought she was too drunk to care about us anymore. If so, why does she have all of these pictures of us? I scan the wall, and find the most puzzling question of all. No pictures of Joe. Why? I thought she loved him, but why would she have pictures of us instead of pictures of him?

I think I know what would answer my questions.

I pull out the top drawer of my mom's dresser and dig arround until I find her diary. I flip through it until I find her last entry. It says:

Violet has left. I feel I am to blame. I know she has hated Joseph all of these years, for abusing her and ridiculing her, but enough to kill herself? That's definately not the Violet I know. Collins will not talk to me. Ever since Joseph and I married he hasn't spoken or written. Eva is making a racket, for she is desolate without Violet. My world is caving in, erupting in a shambles. Joe has not been good to them, but he helps me forget. Forget about love, which is good and bad...

Sometimes I forget I love my children. Sometimes I forget love exists. Without Robert, I am not an ample parent, but a brokenhearted woman who is so busy forgetting, she isn't remembering.

I've put their pictures on the wall to remind myself that I love them, but I fear they will never forgive me. Violet certainly didn't, and Collins blames me for her death. The one thing he wrote to me will haunt me forever: You're the reason Violet's dead. You didn't love her.

Collins is sobbing almost as hard as Eva now, and hurling plates at the wall. Luckily Joseph isn't home, or Collins would be punished. I don't have the heart to tell him to stop.

Eva won't let me pick her up. It's as if she knows I'm the reason Violet's gone as well.

I will never forgive myself. I will be joining Violet soon.

Maria Evans-Brond

I'm crying harder than I've ever cried before, choking on my tears, the salt stinging my lips. My eyes are red and puffy, my nose is running like crazy. I run to the bathroom and begin to vomit. When I'm done, I wash my face in the sink. I'm shaking so badly I can barely stop the water. I run outside, through the garden, over the back fence, and into the cemetary, until I find the tombstone marked with her name. Ara Elizabeth Evans-Brond.

With trembling fingers, I lift the knife and point it at my chest.

I look up for one last time, taking in the world around me.

But as I'm about to press on the knife, something hits me hard on the back of the head. I fall and black spots begin to cloud my vision.

The last thing I feel is the knife being pried from my fingers.