Chapter 1
You were yelling about something, I don’t really remember. You weren’t mad at me, I knew, you were angry at our situation. So was I but you were always the more vocal one. I had been, and always would be, the stand-to-the-side quiet one.
We had both been walking on a tightrope above all of our problems and it was getting thinner every day. I knew one of us had to fall eventually and that we would take the other with them, but I always thought it would be me to fall first – you were stronger than me after all. Losing your job at the food stand broke the string I guess, and for once, you fell first. The measly income from that wasn’t much but it was half of what we had to live on. At that point, I was so glad to have convinced you to let me get a job too; otherwise we’d have completely starved that month.
At some point, I started shaking. I hadn’t realized until you noticed and had already put your arm around my shoulders and spoke softly in my ear, “Calm down, it’s alright. I didn’t mean to upset you,” You squeezed me close to you and pet my hair as I began to cry.
I was so caught up in that moment. I hadn’t cried like that in a while then, so when I broke, so many years’ worth of suffering poured out. I cried for our past and our parents and the kids we had been when they were taken from us. I cried for the present and what we were going through and the kids we still were. I cried for the future and what I knew would be harder times ahead and for the people we would inevitably become. You let me cry it all away until my head hurt and my throat was raw from pained moans.
After a while, what felt like an eternity – what I’d hoped to have been an eternity, my sobbing quieted and you said, “We’ll get through it,” again in just a whisper. You pressed your lips to the side of my head then added, “You’re so much stronger than this; than me. I know you don’t think so right now, but you are.”
You taught me the courage of stars before you left
“We have to be brave until things get better,” You squeezed my shoulders for emphasis, “They will, I can see it. You’re going to realize one day, just how powerful you are, and you’re going to be able to do anything you want. Leave me in the dust is what you’re going to do,” You laughed, trying to get me to do the same but I wasn’t in the mood.
So you continued, “What I’m saying is, we have to keep living,” You knew what was going through my head, you could always tell. You knew that I sometimes thought that it would all be easier if I didn’t exist – if I didn’t keep living. But you always said something or did something that would pull me away from those thoughts. I told myself that you were the reason I kept going. That if I ever lost you I would die too.
How light carries on endlessly even after death
I don’t feel that way now. I’m still living like you told me to. It still hurts like I lost a piece of my heart. But it isn’t as bad as it used to be. You taught me enough then that I’m still going on. I’m still trying to be brave like you asked. It’s hard; oh, it’s so hard sometimes. And there are days like before where I want to give up; I don’t have you here to comfort me like back then but I’ve grown close to a few other people now and they’re helping me along. But it isn’t the same, it will never be.