Page 129 of One Last Rainy Day
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“You were fearlessly flying down that street by midnight,” I say, ripping at some of the grass near his headstone—chest roaring as it has been since I saw his lifeless body on Cecelia’s bedroom floor nearly three months ago. “Not that you asked, but I did get an ass-whoopin’ just to come and meet the boy who sat on the curb every day.”
A wave of pain crashes into me as my eyes sting. “Best decision I ever made. I won’t ever regret it,” I choke out. Waves of anguish rush through me as I lower my gaze to the definitive dates. The dates that mark the beginning of his life and the end of it. I come here as often as I can to convince myself that this is real.
That he’s gone.
Something inside me refuses to believe it.
Our last words weren’t at all sentimental in nature or anything memorable. More transactional and out of fear.
But he knew. He always knew of my affection for him and vice versa. I used to wonder why people were so worried about last words after someone passes because the relationship is what matters most, but I get it now. I get it. I would give anything to have those seconds back, but I still have no idea what those words would be.
Then and there, I decide there won’t be.
I’ll never stop talking to him.
“Fuck,” I rasp out at the sting of the memory of the day we met. Seeing that kid on the curb, seemingly lost and waiting for anyone or anything to come along. The second time I saw him, I just knew that someone he was waiting for was me. Just as that surety settles over me, the breeze kicks up, and the trees rustle above, the foliage floating slowly toward the ground around me. The hinge of the gate squeaks as I focus on a gold leaf as it lands on top of his headstone.
“You always knew how to help me make sense of things, and you left me here to figure it all out. You did that for me. You always put things into perspective. I can’t,” I swallow “...I need you because I can’t make sense of this, brother. No matter how hard I try, I can’t understand how you not being here will ever be the way things were supposed to play out.” The ball in my throat chokes me silent momentarily as I grunt against it.
“I’m so fucking lost, Dom.” I fist my eyes as the merciless crack ripples through me as it has every single day since he left.
“How in the hell am I supposed to do this without you? The truth is, I can’t...but you’re going to make me, aren’t you?”
The breeze blows steadily, and I close my eyes in an attempt to gather myself. Face stinging, I take a few deep breaths, and inside them, somehow conjure an image of a freezing January night. A glimpse of Dom and me a few years after we met, flying down the street on our bikes. The shine on his, which was brand new as he flew past me, arms raised just as it started to snow.
“We’re flying,” he yells, looking back at me, eyes bright, a smile taking up the whole of his face. I’m flying with him. Head tilted up, snowflakes pelting my nose and lips as he whizzes past me—past the streetlight and into the darkness, his high-pitched voice filtering back to me, “Come on, Sean!”
My cellphone vibrates, jarring me out of the most vivid memory I’ve ever had, and I’m strangled with agony at the loss of it as his voice echoes through time and back to me.“Come on, Sean!”
“I’m right behind you,” I whisper in promise, “I’m right behind you, Dom.”
“I’m glad that you loved him, and I’m glad he knew what it felt like to be loved by you before he died, and it’s because of the way you love, Cecelia.”
—Tobias,The Finish Line
Tyler
“Ne me pleure pas. Promis moi.”
Delphine’s whispered plea echoes through me as I stand at the large window in my suite. Gaze trailing up the glittering Eiffel Tower to the high beam shooting straight up into the clouds above. Thunder sounds nearby, light rain trickling down the four-squared windowpane as the rumble of my phone follows.
T: What were his exact instructions?
Sighing at the sight of the same message I’ve gotten a dozen times or more, I type my reply.
Working on cracking that top again?
T: Always.
I swear I relayed every word to you verbatim.
T: Humor me and tell me one more time.
In a blink, I’m re-living the day I gave the laptop to him. A day I’ve lived through one too many times.
“Wake up, asshole,” I snap, pushing through the door, still furious about the hand he dealt Sean and me yesterday whenhe woke up in the hospital. A moment I prayed for every second since he was gunned down on the street and spent a week in a coma. The upset in his eyes when he realized he’d survived broke me in a way I can’t ever see being repaired. Not after all the loss we’ve suffered.
