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It’s been five days.
It’s been five days since you left me for good.
It’s long past midnight, and I can’t sleep. I stare at the ceiling in my room. False shapes flit across my eyesight as the darkness creates things that aren't there.
My eyes are tired and my body is so weak, but I still can’t sleep.
I keep thinking back to what I could have done differently the last time I saw you. Should I have smiled more? Asked you to hang out with me? Brought you with me to the library by force?
It’s been five days since Kris passed, since they… ended their own life.
My heart clenches as the reality of what happened sets in again. Sometimes, when I wake up and your death is still 80 years away, I feel fine. But the guilt sets in. I ask myself why I feel guilty, and it hits me all over again.
Gone.
Dead.
Suicide.
Class started without you, as it had been the past week or two. I hadn't even seen you in the halls, which was unusual, but not suspicious. Just as Alphys was starting the lecture, her phone rang. She hit ignore at first, but it kept ringing and ringing and ringing.
"H-Hello?" She answered awkwardly, turning away from the class. There was a long pause as someone spoke to her. After she hung up, she stared at the chalkboard for a while before turning and speaking to us. "I'll be right back."
She scurried out into the hallway. When she came back, she said that my mom was here to pick me up.
"Something… Happened," Alphys said.
My heart fell into my stomach at hearing 'something'. If it were something good, she would have announced it to the whole class. And my mom picking me up? She hadn't done that since… Dess. Despite my worries, I kept my cheery attitude and excused myself from class.
She was there in the hallway, right next to the front door. Dozens of possibilities crossed my mind, all of them bad. Had dad gotten worse? Was mom sick now, too? Was dad…?
My mother looked tired and stressed on the best of days, but she looked even worse in that moment. Exhausted and despondent. I feared the worst.
Her words were confusing more than anything.
“Something happened to Kris.”
“What happened?”
They must have broken their arm again. Or pranked the mayor's office too hard this time.
She walked outside while I followed silently behind her. She'd arrived in her car; she got in the driver's side, and I dutifully filed into the passenger's.
“Kris..." She took a moment to compose herself by gripping the steering wheel tightly. "They took their own life last night.”
I have no idea what happened after that. It wasn't like passing out or falling asleep, but it wasn't like being awake, either. I woke up in my bed, my eyes strained and painful. Her words played through my mind, and I thought I was going to throw up, but I got out of bed and dashed down the stairs instead.
I would normally be more careful this late when mom was home, but I had to know. Waking up in bed made it all seem like it could have been a dream.
She was on the phone, speaking quietly to someone on the other end. She was even more tired than when she'd picked me up from school. Her eyes were red from crying, something I hadn't seen since I was little and Dess was gone. Her red eyes were all the confirmation I needed before breaking down crying.
I stare at my ceiling still.
An eternity has passed in these five days—just five days without you.
Your funeral was two days ago, and it was like some sort of sick prank of yours. You were lying there like nothing had happened. Your cheeks were full of unnatural color, thanks to the human mortician that your parents had brought into town. In the back of my head, I kept waiting for you to leap out of that terrible casket and tell me it was all just a prank. I don't know if I could have forgiven you for doing that to me, but at least you'd still be here.
There's no dust when a human dies. It's just you, your dead body looking like a sleeping human.
I couldn't tell you what happened during your funeral; I was too busy staring at you, waiting for the slight rise of your chest to signal you were okay. Any movement, any twitch, anything to signal you were okay and hadn't actually died.
That moment never came.
Eventually, my alarm rings. It's officially another day without you. I have to keep going like you aren't missing from my life.
I take off my pajamas. I put on my skirt and sweater.
Everyone's been sad, of course. Alphys tries to call on you when Berdly and I have answered too many questions. Susie hasn't shown up since you left. I still have an extra pencil in my case, just for you.
But life has to go on.
Chewing on a bland piece of toast, I walk to school. Track practice resumes tonight. I might quit. You never even showed up to any of my meets, but somehow, winning a competition while you're gone just seems… wrong.
I blink and I'm at school. I blink and school's over.
Dad is the only one who seems to get the gravity of you being gone. He's staring out the window when I arrive, frowning. He doesn't smile and try to lighten the mood like he used to. All he does is pull me into a hug.
He smells like antiseptic and hospital food, so unlike the Holiday scent I associate with him. I remember how you always smelled of cinnamon, comforting and warm. Before I can even try to shake that thought away, my dad's hospital gown is wet from my tears.
"It's okay to cry," he murmurs as he rubs my back soothingly.
The caring touch is repulsive to me. Why should I get to feel warmth and love when you're feeling nothing? I pull away, shoving him.
Everyone is painfully nice to me lately, even though they don't understand why I'm so upset. After all, we weren't close. I was just the nice girl who loaned you pencils almost every day. None of our classmates seems to remember the time when we were joined at the hip. How being without you felt like breathing with just one lung. They just remember us going our separate ways.
Back then, when you left me, I was able to survive by thinking about you thriving. You might not have been my friend anymore—not really—but at least you were doing things you loved. Playing video games, pranking people, playing the piano, being a menace. But now… Your loss is permanent.
It's been seven days without you.
An entire week since you slit your wrists in a warm bathtub.
Maybe I should join you.
The pain hasn't lessened at all. Everyone says that I'll heal with time—everyone but dad. When I asked him how long it would take before I stopped waking up crying, your name on my tongue, he just gave me a sad look and hugged me tighter.
I answer questions in class robotically. Yes, no, 20 years, B. Alphys doesn't want to call on me anymore, since I don't even pretend to act cheerful. Berdly keeps asking for help with homework, like nothing's wrong. Like you aren't gone forever.
I have an assignment due in the morning that I've been putting off. After my first-ever bad grade this week, my mom made it clear that failing out wasn't acceptable. So I'm at my computer, staring at the revolving wall of pictures.
When you pop up, I literally jump out of my seat. My heart breaks into little pieces all over again when I see you, cheerful and happy and alive. You'll never be that happy again. You'll never be in a blurry photograph because you refuse to sit still for the time it takes to take a proper picture.
I get sick. I rush to the bathroom and kneel in front of the toilet. There's no catharsis from throwing up like when you've got food poisoning or the stomach flu. It's just emptying myself over and over because I can't handle you being gone.
Why did you do this to me, Kris?
I go back into my room and open my wardrobe to change into something fresh, but I'm stopped by the Angel wings in the back.
I haven't worn them in years and years, not since we were kids. You, in your devil horns and me, in my Angel wings… I rip them out of my closet, determined to throw them away so I'll never have to experience this feeling of painful discovery again. I walk determinedly down the stairs and see my mom sitting on the sofa, staring at the wall.
She turns to face me when she hears my steps. Her face twists when she sees the Angel wings in my hand.
"What are you doing?"
"… Nothing."
Her face softens ever so slightly. "You'll miss those someday."
I bite my lip to stop myself from sobbing. Somehow, crying around her feels taboo. She stands up and pulls me into a hug, the first in a long, long time.
"I almost burned Dess's guitar, you know."
"Wh-what?" I pull away and stare at her in shock.
She sits down and gestures for me to join her. I do.
"Seeing it… was just another reminder that she was gone. That she'd never play again. Every time I saw it, saw anything in her room, it was like I was losing her all over again. I thought the wound of her loss couldn't heal with memories of her around."
I pick at a thread coming loose on the hem of my skirt, tears dripping down my cheeks.
"The grief was… overwhelming," she says, frowning. "But your father convinced me to keep everything in her room as is. I'm glad I did. I won't stop you from throwing away your memories, but try to think about the future, okay?"
I nod, still crying. She wraps her arm around me and pulls me close. The gesture makes me cry even harder.
It's been two weeks now.
Every moment is still agony. Your death… your suicide has changed me for good.
I walk up my stairs after school and stop short as I see the snowflakes on the wall for the first time. I touch the blade-shaped snowflake and think of the day we made them.
Why did you leave me, Kris?
Maybe I wasn't a good enough friend. After all, I didn't try that hard to keep us connected when you drifted away. I called your house a few times, dropped by once or twice, and always talked to you at school. But I didn't confront you. If we had been closer friends, would you have confided in me about your suicidal thoughts?
Things could have been different. You might still be here if only I had been a better friend.
It's been two years now. Your grave is as tidy as ever, but I still bring a washcloth to wipe off any dirt. There's a fresh bouquet near your headstone. As I wipe down your grave, the movements methodical and practiced, my heart aches.
I'm leaving for college tomorrow. Something you'll never get to do. Maybe you wouldn't have even gone to college if you were still around. Still, it's another lost opportunity.
I sit cross-legged on the grass and stare up at the sky. I've long since stopped crying every day, but I still think of you often. Sometimes I go over to your mom's and have tea with her while she asks how I'm doing.
I used to have to lie, but now I don't.
I'm doing okay. Good, even.
"I miss you, Kris," I say to your headstone.
You can't hear me, but I always feel closer to you here.
Will this be the last time I visit your grave? I tell myself it won't be, but college will be busy for me. I got into a good program at one of the best schools in the country. It's far away. Almost as far away as you are.
I stand up and leave the graveyard, knowing it won't be the last time I visit.