Annalise Starke had known her mother was going to die eventually; she just hadn't expected it to happen so soon.
At fifteen she had moved with her mother back to her home country of Australia with half a heart (metaphorically, of course) and her mo...
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The second I heard the click, I slumped against it and slid down to the ground.
I should be angry, I thought.
Angry at my Dad for moving on so quickly—if you could even call two years quickly. Angry at him for getting engaged. Angry at myself for still having not told him about her death. Angry at my brother for not seeing the signs of Dad's relationship. Angry at the universe for taking my Mom.
Anger was better than tears, than guilt, than grief.
But, grief and anger so often come together, hand-in-hand, to ruin your life. It makes you a shell of yourself. Someone so deep in mourning yet enraged by the unfairness of it all.
My blood should be boiling, my skin slick with sweat, and my vision vibrating with rage. But I wasn't angry. I was just...sad? Depressed? Filled with grief? Homesick—
Yes.
I was homesick for a home that didn't exist anymore, and for a life I no longer had.
I would never come home to the smell of her famous butternut squash soup simmering, or her laughter floating through the halls. I would never again hear her and Dad battling over Family Feud or carving the Thanksgiving turkey together.
These feelings had been carving hole after hole in my chest since the minute I found her there. And I'm not sure they'd ever go away, but rather I would carry them with me to my own grave.
I was sitting in my the bedroom I grew up in—the same one she used to tuck me into every night—and yet, it felt unfamiliar. Pain danced with the homesickness and battled the anxiety for the title emotion to most takeover Annalise's life.
Tears welled in my eyes, so many all at once, that I didn't stand a chance at blinking them back. They only brimmed by waterline briefly before falling down my cheeks in fat droplets.
They flowed, and flowed, and flowed, with no end in sight. Kind of like this situation. I mean, how am I supposed to mourn my Mom when another is moving in and trying to take her place?
You don't, the thought came quickly.
Then, I don't want to be like this forever.
I don't know how long I sat there, silently weeping, but it felt like ages before I heard the jiggle of the door knob as someone tried to push it open.
"Annalise?" Breck asked softly. "Are you in there?"
I hadn't even turned on the light, so he must have already checked the house. I wasn't trying to hide from him, so when he pushed on the door, I let him. He grunted as the door pushed me forward, creating enough space that he could step inside.
