October 30th
DAY ONE THRILLER NIGHTS
Iskateboard over to my dad’s house. The cold wind pricks at my exposed skin through the holes in my jeans and I pull my flannel a little tighter around my body. The snow started to fall late last night and into the early morning, but it didn't stick to the ground much. A light layer of mist now sprinkles from the sky, the sun starting to peek through the dark morning clouds. I’ve got my earbuds nestled in my ears as I listen toI Ranby A Flock Of Seagulls, admiring all of the horribly carved jack-o-lanterns displayed on everyone’s porch as I skate by.
I didn’t go back to sleep after my nightmare this morning. I ended up suffering from a headache afterwardso instead, I flipped on some random documentary on Netflix and waited until I knew my dad would be awake. I texted him before I left the house and asked if I could borrow a car. I didn’t tell him why and he didn’t ask, but I assume he thinks it’s so that I can drive up to the Pines, when really I might be driving out of town altogether. I still haven’t really decided.
An eerie feeling caresses my bones as I ride past the older white house. The one with the falling-apart window shutters and decaying side panels. The one I know all too well.
I stop at the end of the front yard made up of dirt and overgrown weeds—no longer the plush green grass I’d once known it to be. The air around it seems a bit dark as I stare into the windows, blackness beyond them. It’s been vacant for about four years. The last time I saw it, it was just as empty, about a week after the murders. However it was still in decent condition and there was no FOR SALE sign in the front yard like there is now. I don’t remember exactly when the sign got placed, but it had to have been within the last six months because it wasn’t here before then.
A chill sweeps down my spine when I think abouthimbeing here, so close, and without a trace. Sorrow pinches against my heart when I think about the moment I last visited this house, eager to find comfort and familiarity. Desperate for an answer. But I was only greeted with emptiness, confusion, and regret and I left with doubt and anger.
And then I grow ill when I recall what happened after that, alter that day when I went home and cried in my room. But I push that memory down, knowing that what's done is done.
I take one last look at the abandoned home before I continue my ride down a few blocks over to my dad’s. When I get there, I kick my board up on the sidewalk and prop it up against the mailbox, shuffling my duffle bag from one shoulder to the other right as the front door swings open.
My dad’s house is the only one on the block not decorated for Halloween and it makes me kind of sad, bringing out old memories of when Deck and I used to dress up and walk out onto the street with our mom. Our house was the first with the lights on and that last to turn them off, ending our night singing happy birthday, watchingThe Nightmare Before Christmas, and sorting out our big ass bags of candy. But now my birthday seems hollow, swallowed up by the hole that Declan’s death left me with and celebrating Halloween or my birthday without him just seems impossible.
My dad looks out at me as I walk toward him. I wave at him as he walks down the steps and over to his Tahoe.
He greets me with a smile before placing his coffee mug on the hood of his truck and then activates the garage for me. I watch as the door slides open, creaking along as it does, and slowly the yellow 1997 Volkswagen Beetle is revealed.
"If you can get it to start, it's all yours," he says with a tone that says I might not be so lucky.
"Thank you," I reply with an apprehensive smile.
I approach the car, remembering the brief moment when it was once mine. Mom had gifted it to me a few months before my sixteenth birthday before she died but mainly because she wasn’t driving it anymore andDeclan had gotten Dad's old Bronco when he got his license. However, after only a few months of having it, Deck wrecked it and I had to give up the beetle so that he could use it to get to and from school.
The day he died was the last time this little beat up car was used. We drove it up the mountain together that weekend and my dad had to have it towed back down; it's been sitting in the garage ever since. Same with the Bronco—ever since Deck's car accident. My dad wanted to sell it but we couldn’t get it off—something I am grateful for because it’s become the only thing I have left to truly remember him by.
But now, as I stare at this little yellow car, I feel my heart breaking all over again.
I turn to watch my dad as he grabs his coffee off the hood.
“Have you made up your mind?” he asks and I simply shake my head.
“No. I just want to make sure I have it in case I do,” I say, which isn’t entirely false.
“I thought Jensen was going to take you?”
“That’s not for sure,” I say because that’s also not a lie. We did have plans to go up together. But I can’t assume that he’d still want to take me if I did decide to go and I don’t really even know if I’d want him to take me. While we still remain friends, I don’t want to send him any more wrong signals.
After a moment of silence, my dad smiles at me before opening the door of his truck to hop in. I worry he'll drive off without saying goodbye, but instead he backs out a few feet before rolling down his window to stick his head out.
"You know…" he sighs, stopping right at the end of the driveaway. "I didn't just lose a son that night."
My heart shatters and I start to feel that knot tighten a little more, clenching in my chest. Soon, I'll be wound so tight from the fractures that are twisting inside of me, tortured by my own anxiety and grief, that there will be no hope of unraveling me; left to be a hollow yet tangled mess.
But it’s not really fair of him to put that on me. Whether I remember that night or not, I’ll never be the same person I was coming down that mountain, as I was going up.
I watch his truck drive off before grabbing my skateboard and placing it safely inside the garage. I don’t want to subject myself to these thoughts and feelings anymore. Maybe Ishouldjust get away. Maybe I just should take the bag I packed and just drive; see where the day takes me.
I pick up the keys to the car and let my hand slide over the body of it for a second. It’s been sitting here for years but I haven’t seen it since the last time I rode in it. Deck looked ridiculous in it—all big and bulky. But despite his acclaimed high rank in the school and in the town, he didn’t complain one bit.
Declan had his problems, sure. I think most kids do. But he was always grateful for everything, always expressing just how lucky he was to have the things he had in life.
But everything changed in the last month of his life. He started doing drugs and drinking heavily. He was not himself. I remember that he slowly stopped caring about school work and missed curfew and dinnerswith Dad and I. I was concerned. I hated seeing him go through something that he wouldn’t talk to us about.
