Cursed (2 page)

I fell back to sleep dreaming of him again but
in the new dream I floated staring at my parents smile unable to
touch the ground and unable to fly away. I was in limbo watching
them waving to me while they sat on a swing with him.

The breakfast table the next morning felt grim
as I contemplated my dreams though I remembered very little. I
didn’t have the garden-variety teenage girl dreams anymore. Nothing
about my life in eight months had been garden variety, tragedy had
struck.

I felt myself get lost for an eternity in a
second remembering our families worst moment.

When my mom died I was walking home from school,
I felt a warm wind hit me and thought briefly it must be the Santa
Ana winds from California coming up the coast. I shivered at
exactly the same moment my cell phone rang and my twin sister
screamed my very own unimaginable into my ears. My legs ceased to
exist as I crumpled on the side of the road.

My soul literally made an attempt at leaving me
as my chest ripped into a million pieces. I had actual physical
pain paralyzing me, for the first time in my life I felt my hearts
exact location.

Her death took my breath and my sanity
simultaneously. I sat on the cold concrete and rocked back and
forth in an attempt to block myself from the truth.

I knew hope was taken from my world but I didn’t
know just how large of a piece it was.

I didn’t know if I would ever recover.

I believed I would be fine as long as I didn’t
leave that spot in the road where the warm wind had no doubt been
my mom brushing against me one last time to tell me how much I was
loved, of this I was certain.

My father found me on the side of the road, he
left the truck running in the middle of the street as he ran to my
side and sat there with me. I had rocked back and forth for hours
on concrete while he had searched high and low for me but I was
numb and devoid of every feeling, if I acknowledged one pain I
would have to face the other.

I knew my father was touching me but I refused
to feel him as he cried on my shoulder nearly shaking me. He tried
to get me to stand but I rejected his attempts.

I knew nothing was special about that place on
the side of the road on the way home and if I left it I would never
again find it. It was the last place my mom had touched me and I
needed it.

I looked down at my suddenly mushy cereal and
played with the mound with my spoon trying to smile imagining how
my mom would smile when she told a joke and always ended up
laughing too hard to finish.

I wanted to smile at the happy memory but the
previous sad memory was blocking my brain from sending signals to
my lips.

I didn’t like to think of such depressing
thoughts before breakfast but that morning seemed to feel worse
than most days. I had been certain I was starting to come around
but the bad dreams hadn’t helped.

“Earth to Aimee, how does this look?”

I looked up from my lost gaze to see my sister,
my identical twin except hair and eyes posing slightly as she
modeled a pair of black leggings with huge grey boots and a silver
sweater hanging off the left shoulder.

Silver was in fact her favorite color.

Alise not Alice was stunning, which sucked
because we were complete opposites where she had dark black hair
like our mom and silver eyes I had blond and blue. My eyes weren’t
even pretty blue, more like grey. It was as if they tried to become
silver like my sisters but quit part way.

We shared every other feature, which seemed to
work on her whereas on me it looked uneven and plain. We were both
five feet seven inches, one hundred and thirty three pounds, long
and lean but not as athletic as our bodies would suggest.

Our mom had always been a very lean woman even
when she had been pregnant with two huge twins.

“You look fine, why do you even care?” I asked
with a hint of disapproval, well maybe not a hint.

Alise rolled her eyes and grabbed a banana, “Oh
my god Aimee you eventually will have to face the outside world,
mom wouldn’t have wanted us to shrivel up and die inside.”

I flinched at her saying the mom word like she
was giving motherly advice. Seeing the distress on my face Alise
sighed continuing slightly less harsh, “She’s watching us from
heaven and she’s going to worry about you if you don’t snap out of
it. You’re going to disappoint her by not living not the opposite.”
She stormed out the door to her car.

Alise's words stung and while I knew she was
right I couldn’t make myself move past what had occurred eight
months prior. I felt the walls starting to close in around me, as
the air got heavy.

I ran up the stairs to my room and dove onto the
carpet beside my bed. The carpet rubbed against my elbows harshly
as I fished the secret envelope out from under the bed. Once the
treasure was in my hands I opened it ever so softly so as not to
tear the plastic bag within the manila envelope. I held the plastic
bag under my nose and let the fragrance fill my nostrils. The sweet
smell filled the air around me becoming my oxygen.

The walls started to come down a little as
suddenly I was somewhere else. Somewhere safe where the smell of my
mom made all the bad feelings small again.

I felt tears threatening me as I began to chant
softly, “You existed, you loved me, you existed.”

I smelled the perfume that had maintained its
strength thanks to the protective plastic bag. My heart was beating
out of my chest but I closed my eyes and let the world stop so I
could feel her even if it was for a moment. I opened my eyes
relieved and closed the bag gently and put it back in the manila
envelope and safely tucked it under my bed again.

I decided on the way back down stairs I would
visit my mom after school and see if I could just get a small feel
of her again. Sometimes being at the side of the road where I had
been when my mom died made me feel her in the air like a hug sent
in a letter that even though it wasn’t real the intent made you
feel warm just the same. I sat there for hours sometimes talking to
her or just being there where I knew my mom could sense me too.

Alise honked the horn on the car impatiently at
me as I ran down the stairs and grabbed my book bag and walked out
of the door to my sisters frowning face staring at me through the
windshield. She was shouting at me but I ignored her and took an
extra long unnecessary second to lock the house, it was these small
victories that got me through the day.

I never spoke to my sister about our mom even
though I wanted to tell Alise that being a little sad wouldn’t kill
her and acting like it had actually impacted her life even remotely
wouldn’t make her look weak, only human. She had seemed to cruise
past our mom’s death like nothing had happened, she cried a modest
amount at the funeral on Saturday and shopped with friends on
Monday. I had stayed in bed for two weeks till my father threatened
calling my grandma to come help me through this. I resented his
wanting to be the only one suffering through it.

I slumped into the seat of my sisters car
watching the road blur by the window like an impressionist painting
left out in the rain as Alise talked in a steady and unyielding
stream on hands free the whole ride with one of her friends in what
was a series of OMG’s and Seriously on both their parts. I often
wondered if it was a modern day Morse code.

I had always been painfully shy whereas my
sister was painfully outgoing, slutty was the words only the truly
brave used. I had felt myself withdraw even more in the last few
months since our moms passing.

Our father like me mourned quietly to himself
withdrawing to his office pretending to work but we knew he sat
there surrounded by a million reminders of her. I too had my own
reminders of my mom like the stolen nightgown and a few other key
items, which I had locked away in Ziploc bags and smelled like a
serial killer. I had tried to take the perfume and soap but alone
they didn’t smell enough like my mom so I stole some clothes that
hadn’t been cleaned yet. It was the right mix of her and soap that
mattered. I had kept them under the bed for eight months without
anyone seeing. I couldn’t explain my need to smell them even to
myself so I tried not to think about how creepy it was.

Alise blathered on with her friend Giselle while
I watched out the window waiting for it to start feeling like a
regular day again. In eight months I hadn’t been able to get that
feeling back.

“Ok girl peace out.” Alise looked at me as she
clicked the phone off, “Can you believe that? Jaime is going to
freak when she hears that shit.”

I shrugged not answering not only did I not know
what she was talking about but I didn’t care about my sisters’
shallow friends.

Alise groaned as we pulled into the school
parking lot, “Aimee if you don’t find normal again, well your nerdy
normal anyway, they’re going to lock you away for depression in one
of those places where the girls don’t shower and all become
lesbians.”

I stifled a laugh as she ranted on.

“Like a week ago I heard Mrs. Sinclair talking
to the guidance counselor about you. They are noticing your
inability to find happiness again. No one said you have to forget
mom but you need to remember you are still alive.”

I felt my wall come up even higher as my
emotions tried to make me feel something about my being alive.
Before the car was even fully parked I was out of the door walking
to the school. The cold air washed me free of any lingering effects
of my sister’s attempt at reasoning with me, I just focused on the
dirty lesbians in the asylums around the country, it made me smile
even if it was just a tiny bit.

I crossed the courtyard to my first class
knowing my body was rejecting my sisters reasoning from head to
toe, it exhausted me to try this hard to be sad. I had sensed my
body wanting and needing a small amount of happiness but I had
fought those emotions and feelings. If I became a happy kid again I
wouldn’t remember how badly it hurt to lose my mom.

I coasted through my classes doodling thinking
about the dream I’d had. It had been a repeat I was certain. I
remembered seeing the look on my fathers’ face, it had been fear. I
knew my dad was worried about me but he was not one to be pointing
fingers, especially not lately. He had seemed to be in a rough
patch and hadn’t really come out of his office except to ground
Alise every other day. She swore up and down she had caught him
sitting in his walk-in closet under moms’ dresses and clothes
touching them.

The bell rang for lunch before I realized I had
even gone to a second period class. I looked down at the homework
assignment I had written down amazed it was a coherent sentence. I
picked up my books and slipped from the class not making eye
contact with anyone.

“Aims wait up.”

The voice belonged to my bff, he was the only
person who seemed to be able to see me past my sadness. I knew one
day I would snap out of it and resurface because Blake still saw
me. I was confident that if I ever got too lost in my pool of
despair he would reach his hand in and pull me up. I stopped
walking and turned to see Blake running up the stairs to my locker.
He was not handsome in a traditional way; he was tall and thin but
not skinny. His blue eyes stood out against his dark hair but the
thick glasses and constant looking down muted the color of his
eyes. He was always stuck in a book or iPhone or itouch or chess
game.

He rarely made eye contact with other people. I
was not one of these people; I was his best friend and the only
person able to beat him in chess besides Mr. Mac our chem. teacher
who held the chess club meetings.

“Hey Blake.” The words left my mouth so softly I
thought for certain he hadn’t been able to hear them.

He smiled at me barely looking up from his
iphone, “You look like shit today Aimee. Enough with the black
already.”

He was probably the only person able to make
that comment and make a smile cross my lips. It felt unnatural for
me but I left it there anyway.

“I like black.” I tried to be serious as I
closed my locker and we started to walk. I felt a small piece of
myself resurface whenever he was around.

He shook his head as he looked me straight in
the face, “No you don’t and you are starting to look like one of
the Goths. It’s hard to hang in the nerd crowd when you scare the
nerds. We scare easily.” He walked forward and opened the door to
the cafeteria for me.

I shook my head, “I’m in mourning Blake and it’s
a full year before we wear colors again.”

He laughed, “That’s for widows in the eighteen
hundreds. I miss you in spring colors and shorts. I really miss you
having color on your skin. I miss your eyes how they used to
sparkle now they’re dull like fish eyes. When that Aimee comes back
I think I’ll have a party.” my heart made a little skip.

I tried to stop it but couldn’t. My heart
disobeyed me and skipped for Blake, a little.

I walked through the door laughing, “Who will
come?”

He smiled revealing the whitest teeth ever; it
was an actual OCD for him. I knew that I could reach into his
pocket at any given moment of the day and find floss.

“The chess club, matheletes, obviously us
science geeks and actually I really like the kids at the newspaper.
They’re not as smart as we are but they know politics and a lot of
them believe the CT’s Aimee and I have to respect that.”

I laughed again even though it hurt my side to
do it, my laughing muscles had grown soft and weak over the past
winter. Blake believed in CT’s, Conspiracy Theories. He believed
nothing the media wrote unless they were students in university
still or working for some low budget paper that relied on a mailing
list as opposed to general publication for the masses.