Cricket: Ember's Story

Two Hundred Percent

These days with West are a kaleidoscope of color and beauty like I've never known, each blending with the next to form this lovely work of art that I will cherish forever. No one has ever treated me the way West treats me. I don't have to be strong for the first time in my life, because he is strong. I'm off the hook. I'm free. I don't have to take care of anyone but myself.

A lot of stuff comes up during those days, and I cry a whole lot. I grieve for my lost friends and since I don't know if Jesse is alive, I grieve for him too. I grieve for my mom and the childhood I didn't get. I grieve for Cricket. The tears are running over the crusty coat of pain like tap water running over dirty dishes, washing and washing and running until my heart is clean with no traces left, just a deep and sore scar.

West and I don't know what to do with ourselves. We are friends, yet he holds me at night and brushes my hair off my face and kisses me when he thinks I'm asleep.

Tonight we are sitting on the floor propped up against his bed as we sift through a box of West's old pictures. We both wanted beer but held each other accountable, so we settled for root beer floats that we made in the kitchen. I'm mostly done with mine, and I'm halfway through a sip when I break into laughter and spit it everywhere.

"Oh my God!" I cry as I come across a picture of West and his twin sister when they were both kids.

I can tell it's Halloween, because they're both wearing Teletubby costumes and holding buckets of candy.

"That's embarrassing!" West says, trying to grab it from my hand.

I hold it away from him. "Nope! This is mine!"

"My dad made me wear it!"

"Sure," I say sarcastically.

"No, really! My grandma made those costumes and he forced us to wear them! I was so embarrassed!"

I laugh until there are tears in my eyes. The good kind of tears. When West gets the picture back he's still laughing too. Then he smiles fondly at it. Then, this look of sadness just washes over him all at once. I feel it. I feel him sinking like a flooded ship.

"Are you okay?" I ask.

"Huh?"

He's so lost in this memory I don't think he's even aware of me.

"I'm really sorry," he whispers under his breath.

"It's okay," I say.

When he doesn't acknowledge me, I realize he wasn't talking to me. He was talking to the little girl in the photo. Her smile is so big on her freckled face. Her eyes say that nothing is wrong or will ever be wrong, and joy is all there is.

I see West fighting tears and I don't know what to do or say. Minutes pass in silence. I don't feel like I have the right to continue looking at the pictures. I don't even feel like I have the right to speak. This silence is so deafeningly loud.

"I... miss... her..." he says slowly.

Each heavy word seems tugged and pulled out from deep inside himself. He's trying so hard not to cry it makes me cry. Telling me this is taking all he's got, and seeing that means a lot to me. I don't feel like it's time for me to respond, though, so I don't.

"So much."

I take his hand and hold it.

"I used to dream..."

He moves the hand I'm not holding to his face, and it's shaking, and when he blinks I see three or four tears spill out at once.

"Dream that she was drowning and I was on a boat that was sinking. She would grab on and the boat would tip and fill with more water, and I'd be fighting her and peeling her hands off the boat, because I wanted to live! Then her head would go under, I'd realize she was gone, what I'd done and... the regret."