Wearing My Smile | ✔

Wednesday, April 11th, 2007

Five days after your funeral.

There was a guy who kept throwing me a glance from across the school yard. I knew this because I thought I'd seen him at your funeral. I could've been wrong, of course, if I hadn't had a photographic memory, but I had and I knew I'd seen him there.

I didn't do anything to initiate contact. Instead, I waited. If I found out anything after your death, it was the fact that it felt more like someone had poured freezing water on top of my head than a wake up call. My split lip and bruising ribs should tell me something, really. I didn't realize how many of the fights you'd done was about me, and now that you were gone I was suddenly a fair game. Only more than two days had passed and already people had stopped giving a shit that you'd died. Somehow I found that to be hilarious, but laughing after getting beaten up never ended up well. I'm sad to tell you that I learned that firsthand, Sam, despite everything you'd done to keep me safe.

After days of sitting in the cafeteria with Penny and my other friends, I found myself feeling suffocated by the realness and how alive I was—how tragic that I was—so I started sitting alone under a tree in the school yard where we would have our lunch sometimes. Just the two of us, before we went to our separate ways again. Me, going back to the crowd and you, going back to the dark corner where no one could see your pain.

That day though, Penny followed me out, sitting beside me with sandwiches in her hand. I didn't know it yet, but she would start sitting there with me for lunch more often than not until the end of our school year. If she noticed my bruises, she didn't say anything. Not anymore, at least, because she'd stopped one or two fights of mine before and right when she'd started fussing over me, I'd yelled, Shut the fuck up, Penny. Just leave me alone! The way she had looked, Sam, how shocked and hurt she was, how she tried to cover that up, still, as though I didn't know her well enough to read it anyway. I still want to wince when I remember those times.

I think perhaps that's exactly how you felt like all those years ago you began to drift away. Loss could make a monster out of people and the worst part of it was that I could practically feel myself slowly turning into one.

But Penny, she'd always known and she stayed anyway. I knew why she was out there with me, not with the other kids inside. Part of it was her loyalty to me, part of it because she knew you, like, really knew you, at least until before you had your arm broken when we were fifteen. She said to me, tears in her voice, “I missed him sometimes. We never even really talked anymore. I mean, he hated me. I can't imagine how it probably feels for you.”

I ignored last part. “He didn't hate you, Penny.” I paused. “It's just...Sam divided people into only two groups: the ones he cared about and....”

“The ones he didn't give a shit about, I know, I'm in the second group.” When I started to open my mouth, Penny brushed it off with a shrug and a small smile. “Don't apologize for him, Roo, I'd known for a long time. I just—sometimes I wish it could be different.”

The thing about her, Sam, was that she would absolutely have stayed with you as your friend if only you'd let her, but you hadn't. I wondered what it felt like; to be mourning over someone who didn't care about you. It was painful to even think about.

“I'd tried telling him,” I started, “many times before but he didn't believe me.”

She let out a scoff but it was sad and tinted by anger. “Look at his parents, Roo. Who would ever trust anyone else with parents like his?”

I looked at her in the eyes, not saying anything.

“What?” She laughed. “You thought nobody noticed that? Everyone knew. It's a small town, for God's sake. Once or twice I'd wanted to call the social services, but you were there and I figured...” She trailed off as she noticed something on my face. For a second she looked surprised, then just sad. So much sadness that I couldn't stand it because I knew it was directed to me. “Oh, Roo...”

“Those people knew and they still gave him shit.” Rage vibrated in my words and I found myself shaking. I remembered the time you'd come home bloodied and bruised, cleaning up the wounds in silence. We would watch the television and I would kiss your face softly reminding you over and over again I was there because I knew some days you forgot and thought you were the only person in your world. There would be no more dinner dates, no more movie marathons, no more laughing and joking while cycling around the neighborhood. We were alone before but we would never be lonely.

Sometimes I still sat down on the steps of my front porch waiting for you to come out of your darkened house when I knew you would never, because you weren't there anymore. I'd walk around and found myself in front of Bright Night, still bursting with people, neon lights bright and blinding on the outside and I would leave before the music start because then I would be reminded if you were not there to play the violin then I didn't want to watch. I wanted the illusion that you were still somewhere around, only that you refused to see me, and that was okay. That was better than remembering how expressionless and cold you had been inside that casket.

We'd never get to go to the university the way we'd planned to, where I'd be taking photography major and you'd be taking music major the way we'd been talking about for years. We'd never get to travel around the world with just my camera and your violin, out and out from this town and your wretched house. There would only be me holding your hand in some other place that would accept us as we were and nothing else would matter. You told me once that you wanted to see Finland and though it was so far from New Zealand, I thought it was great, that you were great, that we were always good when we were together. Nothing else mattered. Nothing.

Suddenly, I wanted to scream. I wanted to scream at your parents, I wanted to scream at the other kids for all the stupid fucking slurs and mocking words and fists to the face, I wanted to scream at the world, I wanted to scream at me for not trying hard enough, I wanted to scream at you, Sam, for not giving life another chance. Over and over I played it in my mind, questioning why, why, why did you do it? Why did you decide to end it just then? Was it something I did, something I said? Was it because of our last fight? Was it your parents? Your arm? Your life? What led you to think that it suddenly made sense for you to off yourself? What led you to think that I'd be okay if you left me behind?

It was so hard to breathe. My fingers didn't feel like mine. Though I could feel Penny's arms around my shoulders, the scent of her light perfume at the crook of her neck, I was still trembling with the thought that I'd never get to sit on the couch with you again, looking at you wearing my smile.

Your pale chest under the moonlight coming from outside my window as you were lying bare and naked under me. Your eyes shining with love you'd only had for me. Your soft grin, your throaty chuckle as I kissed the length of your neck. Mussed hair, the taste of cigarette in your mouth, your arms around my waist. What made you think that I would ever be okay living without those, without you to tell me that I was your home to come back to, that I was the only thing in your world which made it alright? What made you think that I would ever be okay alone?

Sam, tell me because I didn't know, who would I be without you?

“I'm going out of this stupid fucking town,” I whispered to Penny when she pulled back.

I felt her hand tightened on mine before she took hers back. “I'm going where you go. I'll tell my parents. They love you, they'll be okay with it as long as I think hard about my decision.”

“Penny, you don't have—”

“Roo, look at me. Look at me, okay?” Her grin was wide and wonderful. She said, “I want to. You don't think I'd ever want to be separated from a brother I'd never had, do you?”

I hesitated for one second, but it was a very small thing. I smiled because for the first time in a very long time, something felt right.