The Last to Let Go

by Amber Smith

  “What’s it like?” she whispers, even though she just said we didn’t have to be so quiet.

  “What’s what like?”

  “What’s life like? What’s life like for you, I mean? You realize you’re still frustratingly private, right?”

  “I am not,” I lie.

  “What? Please, you don’t talk about your family or what’s going on at home—you always say ‘family drama’ or ‘it’s complicated.’ I mean, I wanna know this stuff. I want to know what it’s like with your father being gone. That. What’s that like?” she asks. “I can’t imagine how I’d feel if my dad died. I’m not trying to pry; I just want you to know that I’m here.”

  Being so close to her seems to loosen my grip on all those things that should never be said out loud. Or maybe it has something to do with the half bottle of champagne getting warm in my stomach. “You know those tightrope walkers you see, like at the circus or something?” I ask.

  “I’m serious,” she says, exasperated, her whole body tensing.

  “No, I am too.”

  “Okay. Sorry, go ahead.”

  “It’s like you’ve been walking along on this tightrope your whole life. And you always thought you were doing it all on your own. Keeping your balance, putting one foot in front of the other. You look down sometimes and see the ground, but you never really worried about it. One minute you’re walking along, same as always, and then the next it’s like suddenly you can’t find your footing and you realize that you weren’t doing it all alone like you thought. Something was there keeping you up—someone.” I stop and wonder if I’m telling the truth; sometimes it’s hard to tell.

  “Keep going,” she whispers.

  “But pretty soon you swing your weight an inch in the wrong direction, only to realize there’s nothing there anymore. You see yourself teetering from side to side, but there’s nothing you can do. And then, finally, you just fall. And it’s like you keep falling and falling through the air and there’s nothing to hold on to, and all you want is to hit the ground so you know where you are again, but you don’t—you can’t.” There’s this pang in my chest, interrupting the dull, steady ache that always seems to be there, making the words get caught in my throat. I swallow hard. “It’s sort of like that, I guess.”

  “Brooke?” Dani pulls me closer and whispers into my hair. “You can hold on to me.”

  So I do. I hold on, tighter and tighter.

  “I used to think that if my dad died, I wouldn’t really care, I wouldn’t feel anything. It wouldn’t really be any big loss.” I volunteer this information, not so much because I want her to know, but because I need to say it. Out loud. Just once. Need to own it.

  “Why?” she asks softly. I listen for it, but I don’t hear any hint of judgment behind her words.

  “He wasn’t . . .” I stop because I’m treading dangerously close to the truth, to letting her see all my hiding places. “He wasn’t the greatest person most of the time. I was pretty much scared of him my whole life—everyone was. Sometimes I thought it would better if he just died. But it’s not.”

  “I don’t know how to ask this, but was your father abusive or something?”

  I’ve never really assigned a word to what he was. There were never any words that quite fit. No words that could ever explain enough. “I—I guess,” I whisper. “I mean, it’s not that simple.”

  “I know,” she says, but she doesn’t.

  “You think I’m a horrible person?”

  “Never.”

  It feels like I’ve only blinked when Dani’s shaking my shoulders, whispering my name. “Brooke, wake up. Wake up, your phone.”

  I open my eyes. Dani’s shoving my phone into my hand. I look at her alarm clock. It’s 3:17 in the morning. I look at the screen on my phone: Jackie. My brain puts the pieces together too slowly. But once it does, I bolt upright. “Hello? Jackie? What’s wrong?”

  “Brooke, hi. I’m here with Callie.”

  “Why? Is she okay?” I ask, struggling to get out from under the sheets.

  “Yes, yes. Everyone’s okay. We’re at the apartment. Callie said she’s been trying to reach you—she’s fine, just a little upset, is all.” She pauses. “Brooke, Aaron’s not here. Have you spoken to him? Is it unusual that he wouldn’t come home?”

  Her words echo in my head and something twists inside of me like a snake coiling up through my abdomen, constricting around my lungs, making it hard to breathe, then around my throat, strangling my voice.

  “What is it?” Dani whispers.

  “No, I—I told him—I mean, I texted him—that I was staying over at Dani’s house. No, he—he should be there,” I stutter through the words; I feel the world tilting. “Something’s wrong. He should be there. I’m coming home.”

  “No, Brooke, calm down. That’s not necessary, I promise. Have your sleepover. Everything’s . . . under control,” she says, but she’s distracted by something that’s happening over there, across town, where I’m not—where I should be. “I’m sorry I called. I didn’t need to bother you with this. I thought maybe you knew something. Look, I’ll leave a note for Aaron. And Callie’s going to stay at my place tonight. Okay?”

  “Okay,” I repeat. “Thanks, Jackie, I’m sorry.”

  Dani turns her bedroom light on and stands in front of me, wearing only her underwear and a thin spaghetti-strap cami. She wraps her arms around herself like she’s scared and cold—like she needs a hug.

  “It’s not your fault,” Jackie tells me. “It’s no one’s fault.”

  Yes it is, I say to myself.

  “We’ll talk in the morning. Go back to sleep. Don’t worry, please. Bye, Brooke.”

  My hands are shaking. I open my mouth, but she hangs up before I can tell her that she needs to check up on the rooftop.

  “What’s going on?” Dani asks as I hang up and scroll through my missed messages.

  Callie, 11:55: Did you tell Aaron you weren’t coming home? Just woke up and he’s not here.

  Callie, 12:34: I’m fine by myself, but thought you should know

  Callie, 1:45: Hello?? Now I’m worried abt both of you . . .

  Callie, 2:12: You guys suck. I’m calling Jackie.

  Nothing from Aaron.

  Dani’s following me as I pace her room. She’s saying my name, but I can’t even answer because I’m trying to get dressed while calling Aaron at the same time. I’m muttering to myself—I might even be muttering to myself that I’m muttering to myself. I’m pressing all the wrong buttons. I feel like I’m losing it. I manage to pull on my pants one-handed. I need to find him. His phone goes straight to voice mail.

  “God damn it, Aaron! Where the hell are you? Call me back the second you get this—the second you get this! I need to know you’re okay. All right? Call me back, just call me back.” I hang up. I throw the phone into my open bag on the floor—it bounces out and makes a noise too loud for three o’clock in the morning at a nice family’s house. “God, fuck!” I whisper-shout as I bend down to pick the phone back up, checking to make sure it’s still on. I stuff it into my pants pocket instead.

  Dani reaches out to grab my hands, but I twist away from her, pulling my shirt over my head, not caring that it’s on inside out. “Sorry, I—I just need to get home.”

  She stands in front of me and turns her head, this concerned look on her face, and she walks toward me even though I’m backing up. “Come here, sweetie. Come here—okay, just slow down.” She pulls me in with both of her arms, crushing me against her breasts and ribs and stomach. I bury my face in her neck, craving the softness of her, and without warning, without permission, I feel my lungs contracting, my throat constricting, my eyes welling up. My body wants to cry. But my mind cannot let that happen. She holds me tighter and tighter, until it stops feeling good and starts to feel like she’s suffocating me, drowning me, pulling me under.

  “Stop, okay?” I whisper, my mouth next to her ear, my words crashing, hard, against her neck. I close my eye
s. “Please, I can’t breathe!” I yell. And as I pull away, too roughly, I catch the look on her face. Her eyes are wide, stunned that I yelled, because I’ve never let her see that side of me before, the side with all the secrets.

  “Okay, you’re scaring me now,” she says, crossing her arms.

  “This isn’t about you!” I snap. “I mean—God, can you just give me some space for a minute?”

  She doesn’t say anything. I’m hurting her and I know this and still all I want to do is yell at her for not understanding. Even though I know it’s not her fault for not understanding, because I never told her the things that she would need to know to understand in the first place. I want to climb back into bed and feel her breathing and listen to the silence and her heartbeat and the whispers of falling snow. But I’m not allowed to have any of those things. And I hate the world, and my life, and me, and even her a little bit, for that.

  “Look, I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Dani. Okay? I really, really need to go home. Now. It’s an emergency. For real. Please, can you just take me?”

  “Yeah,” she breathes, looking at me like she’s not sure she knows who I am. “Okay,” she whispers, reaching for the clothes she wore yesterday, scattered across her bedroom floor. “Okay,” she repeats to herself as she gets dressed.

  GHOSTS

  “CAN YOU DRIVE ANY FASTER?” My tone is clipped, my words too sharp for the cold, icy, empty streets and the middle of the night.

  “No. The roads are slick. I’d rather get you there alive.” I feel her looking at me. “You have to tell me what is going on. I want to help—I’m trying to help you—why are you so upset?”

  “It’s my brother. He didn’t come home.”

  “Why is that such an emergency?”

  “You wouldn’t understand, okay? And I can’t explain it right now.”

  “Well, try.”

  I breathe in deeply, through my nose, and exhale slowly from my mouth. “Our sister was alone. She’s only twelve. I can’t understand why he would do that unless something bad happened, okay? I need to find him before—”

  “Before what?”

  “Can we please just stop talking?” I am exhausted, yet wired, and too tired to be so wired. I feel all wrong in every way.

  “But I don’t understand. What about your mom—I mean, where’s she? What am I missing?”

  “Can we please stop talking, Dani?” My patience grows more slippery with every word.

  “Fine. Okay, stop yelling, though—you’re making me nervous, and I can’t drive when I’m nervous!”

  “I’m not yell—” But of course I am. I keep my mouth shut until we get there.

  She slows to a stop in front of my building. The fresh snow makes everything look like a dream. Makes me want to slow down and turn to her and cry and kiss and beg her to forgive me. It makes me want to tell her to keep driving and take us somewhere, anywhere, far away. It makes me want to leave it all behind, forever.

  “Let me at least come in with you,” she says, unbuckling her seat belt.

  “No. Please, I need to handle this by myself, okay? Thank you, but—oh my God, there he is!” I open the car door and try to run to where Aaron’s just rounded the corner. My feet slide on the ice, and I struggle to keep my balance. “Aaron!” I call out, my voice getting lost in the air as it swirls around us.

  “What?” he whispers into the silence, not bothering to quicken his pace to reach me sooner.

  I hear Dani calling my name behind me.

  “Where were you, dammit?”

  “I’m right here, you don’t have to yell,” he says, several feet away from me now. “What’s wrong?”

  “You didn’t answer your phone!” I shout. “I was scared—Callie was scared, I mean.”

  “It died.” He pulls his phone out of his pocket and waves it around. “What? Is she okay?”

  I walk closer to him, trying to see his face more clearly, but he’s all in shadow. “Callie didn’t know where you were. She called Jackie to pick her up.”

  “What for?” He shrugs through the words. “You’re here.”

  “I wasn’t here—I texted you that I was staying at Dani’s.”

  “Okay, well, I didn’t know!” he says, getting defensive.

  “Where were you?” I repeat.

  “I went out. Is that a crime now?” he asks, as if that’s a question I can answer. “It’s not that huge. Callie’s okay, right? You’re okay. I’m okay. So calm down, all right?”

  “Brooke?” Dani says again.

  “What?” I shout, turning around to see her looking at me in that way—maybe the way I was looking at Aaron that night on the roof—that makes you feel like a total worthless piece of garbage for disappointing the one person you want to love so badly.

  “Brooke, Jesus,” Aaron says under his breath.

  “I’m sorry, but please go, Dani. Okay?” I say.

  “I’m just trying to help,” she says, her voice so small. She walks toward me cautiously, and I want to believe that she’s being careful because she’s afraid of the ice, not me. She holds my leather messenger bag out at arm’s length.

  “I know. I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” I keep repeating. I walk over and try to pull her in for a hug. “I’m sorry,” I whisper against her cheek as she pushes away from me, like I’m suffocating her this time. “I’ll explain everything. Later. Okay? Okay?”

  “Okay,” she finally answers. She gets into her car, closes the door, and pulls away slowly. I wave to her, but she looks straight ahead. Everything’s left quiet in the wake of our voices.

  Aaron walks up the steps, then brushes the snow off the top step before he turns and sits down. He looks out over the rooftops at the half-moon, barely visible through the thick clouds.

  I follow his lead and brush the spot next to him and sit as well. The snowflakes float down around us, the muteness of winter finally setting in. In the streetlight it looks like dust, a fine white powder, a million tiny stars twinkling as they fall.

  “Listen, you can’t be like that,” he finally says.

  “Like what?”

  He shakes his head slowly as he looks at me, disapprovingly. “She genuinely cares about you. Don’t start treating her like shit.”

  “I—I’m not—I didn’t mean—”

  “Yeah, I know!” he snaps at me. “Believe me, I understand. You didn’t mean to, right? You’re sorry—who does that sound like?” He reaches into his coat pocket and takes out his cigarettes. “It’s not okay to take your shit out on other people. For fuck’s sake, haven’t we learned that by now?”

  “Why are you saying this? You act like I’ve done something terrible. You’re always fighting with Carmen.”

  He turns his head and looks at me like he wants to yell but just doesn’t care enough to actually do it. “Yeah, that’s why you should listen—I know what I’m talking about. You and me, Brooke, we need to be careful with people. Callie, too.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean you have to watch how you treat people. You have to watch how you let people treat you. They’re in us, both of them.” He pauses while his words sink their way into my brain slowly. Then he adds, “We split up weeks ago, by the way. Not exactly breaking news.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  He shrugs in response.

  “How come?” I ask, trying to make my voice softer, gentler.

  “I don’t know. No reason. A million reasons,” he mumbles through his cigarette. “Better question, why are you all freaked out and yelling at your girlfriend? And me, too, by the way? This is not exactly a catastrophe here,” he says, looking around at the sheer calmness surrounding us.

  “No, but it could have been—”

  “But it wasn’t,” he says, cutting me off.

  “But it could’ve been! You don’t even know what I’m talking about, do you?” I feel myself start to laugh—needing some kind of release for my frustration.

  “What?” he asks me, trying to be comfort
ing but getting frustrated himself. “What are you talking about, then?”

  “You, Aaron! It was the worst moment of my whole life. Finding you on the roof. Did you know it was me?” I finally ask the question that has been on the tip of my tongue for two years.

  His brow furrows in confusion, as if maybe this is one of his memories that he keeps locked away.

  “You do know what I’m talking about, right?” I ask when he doesn’t answer.

  He hesitates. “No. I mean, yes, I know what you’re talking about. I didn’t know it was you, though.” He brings his cigarette to his mouth again, looking out across the street, and says absently, “I don’t really remember much about what happened.”

  “Well, I can’t forget it,” I tell him. “I think about it all the time. And I think about what would’ve happened if I hadn’t come up and found you. And I get scared it could happen again—I’m scared about that all the time.”

  He nods, but he doesn’t say anything. It’s so quiet I can hear the paper and tobacco sizzle as he inhales deeply. “Can I ask you something stupid?” he finally says, his voice amplified by the cold and the snow and that silence they create together. I nod. “Do you . . .” He stops to laugh at himself. “Do you believe in ghosts?”

  “I don’t know,” I tell him. “Why, do you?”

  “Sometimes I think I’m being haunted. Possessed or something.”

  “By who?” I ask, even though I already know the answer.

  “I can hear his voice in my head. Always there, pushing me around. ‘Loser,’ ” he mimics, almost perfectly, Dad’s deep baritone voice. “ ‘You little girl, you stupid idiot, be a man.’ ” I watch his nostrils expand as he inhales, his mouth opening slightly on the exhale. “Sometimes I look in the mirror—I see his face. Then again, I guess he was haunting me long before he was dead. It got better after I moved out. But now, being in this goddamn place again . . . he’s everywhere I turn. Starting to feel him get inside my head again.”

  “Aaron, I—”

  “And I don’t want you to be haunted like that, not by him, not by me, not by some screwed-up thing I did on the roof.”