A silence over everything. Not sure when it arrived, if it’s been here the whole time. I squint past the lights to see if I’m suddenly alone. But no. They’re all still here. Hundreds of them. Staring. Waiting. For me to do something. To say something. To stop drowning.
I’m on the ground, knees vibrating against the stage. I can’t stop shaking. My cards scattered, out of sequence. Everything, out of sequence. I fight back the tears.
Bringing my gaze in, I notice, running down my chest: the tie.
I slide my fingers over it. Feel its weight. Soak up its power.
I have to finish this.
Legs wobbling, my whole body a convulsing mess, I rise to stand. It takes every ounce of power and adrenaline to make it to my feet. To lift.
The cards remain on the stage. I don’t need them. I’ve told the story so many times I could recite it in my sleep. I just have to open my mouth and speak.
Slowly, I raise my chin and lean into the microphone.
“I fell,” I say, my voice carrying off into the distance.
I push out the words one by one.
“I lay there… on the ground.…”
I shut my eyes. Any second now.
“But see, the thing is, when I looked up… Connor was there.”
He always is. Somehow. Day after day, he comes, the thought of him. Visions in the night. His name on my arm. No matter what I do, where I go, a constant reminder. Of what? Of who I am. Of who I could be. Who I should be.
I open my eyes. “That’s the gift that he gave me… to show me that I wasn’t alone. To show me that I matter.”
I do. Don’t I? And not just me.
“That everybody does. That’s the gift that he gave all of us. I just wish…”
It’s the worst part. How unfair it is.
“I wish we could have given that to him.”
It grips me. Sinks in. A slow sobering.
Then, terror returns. Realizations. Where I am. What I’m doing. What I’m saying. What am I saying?
I listen for the echo of my voice in the auditorium, trying to make out my own words, trying to catch up with myself. But my voice is long gone. There’s only silence.
Did I speak at all just now? Or did I only imagine it?
I look up, blinded by the lights. What have I done?
Leave. Now.
Panic-stricken, I turn, and I go, and I don’t look back.