A Matrimony of Memories 6

I sink to the floor; emotion drowns me. I find refuge under my bed. I crawl with tears streaming down my face. I shake and shudder at the thoughts and memories that come to me, Autumn, she whispers. No, I call back. Tears fall and fall as if there was no end to it.

My father drags me out from underneath my bed. He picks me up and places me under the covers. I lay alone in my bed staring at the unfamiliar wall, wondering, imagining in the darkness. I let my mind wander and let my eyes exit. Tears stain my dry eyes.

"You know I think I love him." She was lying on my bed, as she told me her day story.

"Ha! I would hope you do," I joked with a smile.

"No, no, I mean like I really think he is the one. I really love him, love him." She twirled around with joy.

"Yeah? Good," I said, looking up from my book.

"So, did I tell you that he asked me to marry him?" She waited for me to be in shock, but I didn't hear her the first time.

"What? Who’s getting married?" I stared at her in confusion.

"Are you even listening, Jaz? I AM GOING TO GET MARRIED TO CHATT THURGOOD!" She talked slowly as if I was a child.

"Really? You’re getting married? That’s awesome!" We were jumping up and down on the bed now, something I never was allowed to do as a child. But, this occasion called for it.

"Yeah, we were thinking August eighteenth." She shook her head with a smile, as her blonde hair flowed.

"Can I come live with you?" I stopped jumping.

"Yeah, of course. I can't leave you alone with daddio here ha-ha." She winked.

"You know he will not be very happy about you getting married at such a young age. You’re only just about to turn twenty-one." I pointed out the pink elephant standing in the closet.

"I know, right. But you think I would be able to make my own choices now." She rolled her eyes.

"So, tell me how he asked you? Was it romantic, candles, roses? I bet there were roses!"

"Well, he had some old fireworks, so he suggested we use them. So, we go out to his field and he starts lighting them off and everything. So, I start playing with sparklers and stuff. And then, for some reason, there were these little sticks sticking up in the ground, which I thought was weird. But, I just kept swinging my arm away. Chatt goes out to these little things and lights one on fire. He runs back and says let’s get on the roof. So, I'm thinking a whole field of sparklers, best idea ever." Her hands express her excitement.

"Yeah, sounds like a freaking miracle."

"Anyway, so we’re on his roof, and by the time we get up to the top they are all lit, and they form letters that say, MARRY ME? I was so amazed and speechless I just sat there and started laughing like a rabid elephant."

"Wait, what? Rabid elephant? How does that work?"

"You don't want to hear it...it was pretty awful, and by Chatt's expression, he thought so also. He had this scared look on his face. So I just kept nodding up and down, yes, yes, of course."

"Ha-ha, that is so cool! Were you surprised?"

"Well, we had talked about it a couple times before, but I thought we were just talking, you know, nothing serious." She shrugged.

"Well, I'm sure you two will have a wonderful marriage, Winter." I smile and give her a grateful hug.

Wednesday for Winter, Thursday for Thurgood

Voices lingering around town. The school halted scheduled hours. Everyone in disarray, no one safe from being taken. If Winter was the first, who would be the next? If bad things came in threes, shouldn’t I have been the first to make the sequence complete?

She was classical. I was a more modern pop. I replayed the lyrics to my favorite song expiration for the beauty. Honest to only wanting to follow her spirit into the absence of light. Picking through dresses as many as I collected shorts. Her make up in perfect order, obtuse to the chaos that lived inside my room.

My cousins came to visit, at least make an appearance at the funeral; we all expected to be presentable and hold our heads up with respect we had learned from our grandparents, beaten down to the knowledge of obedience from our parents.

My father figure gave disgrace on my absolute questions on morality and chances of survival. He looked not down upon me, but beyond. Through the vanishing wisdom. I so eagerly earned. For every day was a chance to teach and learn about the alphabet of the livelihood she escaped from.

One aunt stands to the left with a son on her left and another to my right with another nephew on her right. Briggs Byington and Noah Adler, both born the same year as I was graced to the earth. I would shift my eyes and take in their appraisal, trying to see what the years have done to the young boys I would chase around open fields with and splash at foreign beaches with.

Briggs usually lived in Salt Lake City with our youngest aunt, eight years older than we were. She currently had him placed at the Mormon college 20 minutes from the house I rarely exited. He graduated a year earlier than us because he was a smartass. At least that’s what Noah called him, who was dating some pregnant beach bum out in California where his mother Madeline smiled down on the good people of Huntington Beach.

Shake my head back and forth, not caring who sees as the priest, pastor, or bishop, since we are in Idaho, lays his peace upon the dead body. It wasn’t the smartest thing to do as I looked back up at my father and saw his angry eyes flame with distaste. One sister touches his arm, and his first reaction is to brush her off, but then he remembers his place in the line of the family. She is the firstborn and he comes in second as I do.

Why are we the way we are?

Why do we consistently think that we have to fight everyone on everything?

Why, as I stare out this window tonight, do I feel the hate growing strong inside me?

Will things ever be the same?

Will I ever feel love, actual love?

Shouldn't life be better?

Shouldn't I be able to move on through this pain?

I don't know why I am here and she is not...

She was everything I couldn't be, everything I needed to be, but didn't have the power to become.

The world could have managed my loss.

Sorrow still shouted out for her.

I am nothing of that sort.

I am only an unfamiliar face in a crowd.

A fingerprint in society's records.

An empty soul among the fulfillers.

I am that beautiful face you pass by because you noticed my sister standing on my side.

I am nothing special.

I do not even compare to you.

You have friends; you have love and excitement.

I walk in the wind. If I could stand in the wind for hours I would. Wishing, hoping, and waiting for it to lift me up into an embrace.

Taking me away from sorrows and troubling times.

As it waves goodbye, gently caressing my soft face.

Leaving me abandoned once again, by an emotionless thing.

I miss you, I whisper to the empty air, watching my words blow away.

How do I stop this torturous war, this undying battle?

I want it to end.

I want this to end.

I don't want to be.

Why didn't you take me?

I slip in and out of a comatose state. Sooner than possible, Wednesday arrives.

I peek out the window for the first time since the rain has stopped. It's a warm afternoon, the sun is bright, and I squint at the sky. My stomach aches from emptiness. I let go of the heavy blanket, letting the dark curtain take its place, shading the room, separating me from the reality outside.

I walk to the bathroom. Avoiding seeing any images in the mirrors, I brace myself for the shower's cleanse.

The water starts pulsating, pouring onto my head, washing away the nightmares I’ve created. I crumple down in the shower, the water streaming over my frigid body.

Tears jog down my face splashing onto my knee caps. Fear and other unnecessary feelings and emotions seep out of the bottoms of my toes, so long, I push them away, drowning their memories with me.

I hold my breath, as my fingers linger upon my mother’s old clothing. Her dresses still hung in place, my father’s guilty conscience holding on tight to them. I guess he hasn't gotten around to coming to terms of her leaving him.

I manage myself into one of her old black dresses. It falls over me, taking the shape of my body personally. Staring at my reflecting self, my hair in a wavy tangle, I bring my fingertip up to touch my sorrowful shape. Disgusted and feeling unsatisfied I turn the mirror around.

Time has passed. Minutes, hours; her life is summed up in those short times. Weeks upon years, we grew up together. She never knew how much I loved her for being there for me. Or for being the person I never could be.

Their funerals' followed the next week; Wednesday for Winter's, Thursday for Chatt Thurgood’s. I slept through the motions each day, reliving each part of that reckoning day. Until I relived it once more in her wake.

The phone rang, but I merely stared at the flickering lights bouncing off the walls, the buzzing left ignored.

I haven't gone to school since I don’t know when. What’s the point anyway? School sucks, and people are incompetent. I have no connection to things in this world that are disappointing.

I can hear my dad breaking down the door. For me to live, to get up and move on with whatever life I still seem to have beyond that dark door. I can’t seem to find my balance, the gravity pulling my feet back to earth. I only find myself, wondering when the world will finally end.

"Autumn Jazmine, if you don't open this door, I'm going to drag you out by your hair," he demanded with a strong voice, jiggling the doorknob.

"I dare you," I whisper to no one. I sit in this dark closed-off room, a navy blue blanket covering the light trying to stream in through my balcony window. Surrendering myself to this darkness.

I stare at the walls, wondering what I am supposed to profess at these viewings. I imagine what people want me to say, how much my father would love to be glorified in her passing. How much he wishes it wasn’t Winter in that tomb.

I wrap my arms around my legs, cradling myself, keeping myself together for just a little while longer. Noah attempts to call or text me. I stare at the phone and will it to burst into flames. Even Briggs takes it upon himself to knock on the front door, one I don’t answer.

Every moment, I stand contemplating her and Chatt’s every move in this world. Thinking of ways to incorporate jokes and laughter, to make it a happy scene of celebration instead of mourning.

I jot down ideas and positive thoughts about both of them. The love they shared and how it will be remembered for the rest of our livelihoods.

Tears began to fill up the pages, making words I have written indescribable. Wet ink runs down the paper, streaking lines of the things I never thought would happen. Who would ever want that...who even thinks these things will happen?

I put all her belongings in a box. I take down picture frames of me and her at the circus, at the zoo, at the movies. I put them away out of sight, hidden like she never existed, like I wanted to be right now.

As I head for the door, I see notes and speeches that he thought would be appropriate for me to say at both funerals. I stuffed them in my purse and drove myself to the church.

I knew what I had to say, not what I needed to say.

I arrive an hour early and see people setting up. I search the vacant church rooms, looking for time alone before the ceremony.

I see the closed coffin through a small window, forest green with gold outlines.

Winter, I whisper.

I look around the hallways of the church, closing the door quietly behind me as I sneak in.

I slowly breathe.

I press my hand against the polished wood.

"Oh, Winter, why’d you have to go and leave me like this?" I let out a breath of frustration.

"I'm supposed to go out there in front of those people who claim to know you. They're expecting me to tell funny stories, maybe when we were little, chasing fireflies, instead of butterflies. Good times, happy ones. I suppose I should tell them what a wonderful person you are, how you took charge and brought us up. They’ll refuse to hear the bad times, when Josephine left us or when our father forgot to nurture and raise us. He was too busy anyway. How you were everything he wanted you to be and more.” I step to the side of the wooden box. "To tell you the truth, I don’t know what I will say, but I suppose it will go something like this..."

I press my lips together before I even begin to speak. Gazing through the crying crowd, I can’t seem to find a single person I know. I stand alone on that podium.

"My name is Autumn Jazmine Moion. People call me AJ or Autumn. Winter insisted on calling me Jazie…Winter was my...ugh, is my older sister. Almost two years apart, she was also my best friend." Deep breaths keep me constant, keep me going, and keep me focused on what needs to be said here today. I glance down at my notes, then begin to speak from somewhere in the heart.

"Winter Magnolia had a very unique lifestyle, a very strange view on the world around her. I believe she believed in the goodness no one else was able to see." I eyed down to where my father was sitting with his coworkers, holding one of the female’s hands.

"She was careless, but only when putting herself last, when she knew others were in need. She made her way through this world with an understanding smile and a welcoming hug. She was everybody’s hero; she could make you laugh when you were in tears. She gave you a lift when you were left stranded. She was an outcast, a choice she made on her own but a friend to all. She always stood up for the weaker person and she took a stand to be her own."

I went on to tell stories of how Chatt and Winter met and how they fell in love. How their romance never seemed to fray, how joy and happiness followed every step they took in this life and soon after.

I searched the audience for familiar faces, but they all looked the same.

"I have always admired her strength, her confidence, and her willingness to press forward when things got tough and we had to learn to stand on our own for the time being." My father tightened his jaw, keeping his eyes on me in a stare that said don't you dare.

"When we were little, as many of you know, our mother left us to become something more than a modern housewife or mother. We were left in the care of our full-time commercial businessman of a father.

“It was then where Winter took charge and helped raise me along with herself. I tell you this story, not to bring up bad trials Winter had to face, but the one’s she overcame. The one’s she conquered and so daringly fought to protect."

My eyes let out tiny teardrops, "She was everything you could ask for in a good friend and a neighbor. I assume she is smiling down on all of us. If she was here, she would express to us her gratitude for all of you attending today. I put together a slide show to express her life a little more clearly. I hope you like it." I point over to the projector.

"Before I go, I’d like to share a few more thoughts. What we keep in our memory is ours unchanged forever. No one can disregard the love that Chatt shared for Winter. May they spend ever after knowing how much we care and love for them both. She was the best friend I or anyone could ask for, the best big sister I ever could wish for. The best wife or mother anyone could have made if she only got the chance to be. She will always be in our hearts throughout our lives and our journeys.

“I hope wherever Chatt and Winter are that they have each other and they are both at peace, full of joy and have love. I know he loved her with all his being and with all his heart. He only had an eye for her and her for him. I am so grateful she was able to experience love before her and Chatt's accident. Thank you all for your support and love towards her and our family at this time. We'll miss her and celebrate both lives as if they were made together."

"I love you, Winnie. You are forever my hero." I stepped away from the podium and clicked the button to play. The room went dark and pictures began to pop up from our childhood. Her smiling face stained with orange popsicle; me in the background licking a red one, always safe and not reckless. The room makes an awe noise, and smiles break out as well as couple of laughs. Chatt and Winter's high school dance pictures form collages with all their silly looks and smooching kisses.

It carried on as I carried out. Slipping out the back, hoping memories will soon fade.

I sit on the back parking lot sidewalk, taking out a cigarette. It's a hot sunny day as I lean back onto the concrete staring up at the blue clear sky, a sign of peace, I’m so told.

"Hey, AJ." A male shadow blocks my sunshine.

"Hey." I sit up, putting the smoke stick next to my lips. I squint to see Jenkins standing beside me.

"I was just walking in. I'm sorry I'm late."

I stared out into the distance. "It's alright I wouldn't have come if I didn't have to."

He half-smiles, "Can I sit down?"

I pat down the hot cement next to me. "Sure. No one else has taken the spot yet.” I put my sunglasses back over my puffy, swollen eyes.

Leaning back onto the cement, I light the fuse.

"Pretty packed in there." I copy the half-smile, "Well, she was loved by all."

Without a word, he takes the burning cigarette from my lips, crushing it under his black shoe.

"Umm, alright." I shake my hands and brush off the dust.

"They're disgusting, not to mention bad for you." He exhaled. "I'm not going to be kissing any ashtrays anytime soon." He stared at me with seriousness.

I shrugged. "No one asked you, Jenks." Actions saying I don’t care if you like me or not. I remove myself from the situation, him pressing against my back.

"AJ, that's not what I meant; it came out wrong. I care about you. I just want you to care about yourself.” I hear him trail off and stop his pace as I walk away into the shady trees, far from anything near.