Do you want to?

She stared up at him knowingly and he knew even though it was him speaking then that they were her words as well. “I am going to build rail roads from here to the end of the world to prove my love for you. There is nothing I cannot do for you. Nothing that will not be done. You are mine, you are mine.” There was an invisible nod with each word said. And the sun that was not there was getting brighter and brighter. She began to giggle softly and with each snort or chuckle it got brighter. It was all too much and he was wondering from somewhere far away how he could ever give this up. She began to shake her head looking at something far in the distance. She began to sit up her long almond curls falling behind her back as if her head was tilted back, but it was not and she was not. It took several moments to understand that while she sat up the world seemed to shift and gravity shifted with it. And while she was leaning forward everything was pulling on her only she was to strong or it was not strong enough, he could not be sure. Her arm began to lift slowly as if someone or something had tied a string to her wrist and like a puppeteer began to force her arm upwards. Her finger though that was all her and she was pointing at something very far away. All the while the sun is getting brighter and it is making it very hard to see. It all seems to be too much and he knows she is pointing desperately, telling him to look at something that is very important. But he does not want to look at it. He knows right there in that moment that he never wants to know what it is she is pointing at. All he wants is her right now in this moment and there is something about what she is pointing at that will take it all away. It begins to rain nothing more than a drizzle at first. A mist and it clouds everything, but he does not care he refuses to take his eyes off her saying over and over. “Don’t leave me Haley. I am so sorry. It was all too much and I couldn’t be what they meant me to be. It was all meant to be ours and you left.” Why he was telling her she left when she was right there, he was wondering somewhere far away. Why or how was he so far away when he was right here? The confusion that was easy to ignore in the beginning was now gnawing at him. There was something he knew he should remember and knew that he did somewhere. It began to scare him because he knew even though he should remember he did not want to. He was reaching for her now begging her with everything he was with words he did not know he knew. All the while she was smiling at him sweetly and all he could feel was forgiveness flowing from her. “Oh, God, Oh, God, please don’t go. You can’t leave me. Haley. Oh God, Oh God.” Who was that yelling he was thinking faintly. He didn’t know who it was but the pain in the voice was scaring him. It was all a part of something he knew he should remember but he was trying so hard not to. There was no smile on her face now as she looked at him. There were strings now attached to her wrists and her ankles and they came from somewhere really high up. She was crying now and he was crying because no matter how hard he tried he could not reach her. Her arms and legs began to jerk in this horrible dance that consisted of no rhythm and he was yelling at her to stop only he could not make a sound. She was saying how sorry she was and how much she would miss him and everything they would never get to do. How she knew I would be ok and that she was glad I was going to be ok. It was raining so hard, so hard he could barely see her as she jerked in this ritualized dance. The rain was the size of olives and stung and burned the middle of his chest. The sun began to flash, one, two, one, and two. Over and over the sun flashed and he felt as if his chest was being twisted in to pieces. He shook his head violently wailing his arms jerking his head finally to the right and up closing his eyes. No, no, this was not happening he was telling himself. He quickly jerked his head back and his eyes open and he could not see her anywhere. “HALEY.” He was yelling and the voice he heard earlier was yelling and he knew then it was his voice that was yelling somewhere far away in the distance. He was looking around and all he saw was mountains and brightness from a sun that was not there. What was he doing in the mountains? Oh god he was not in the mountains. Where was Haley at? The memory this whole time he had been fighting was there all of the sudden like subway racing by when you weren’t paying attention. Because he was not really here and neither was she. The sun all the sudden was there burning brightly in his eyes, it was so bright. Oh, god, oh, god, was all he could repeat. He heard himself somewhere repeating it over and over as if it could make it all go away. “Joshua, Joshua. Come on baby, please come back to us.” Who was that crying, he wondered? It sounded a lot like his little sister but why was she up here in the mountains and did she know where Haley went? No, no, he was not in the mountains and Haley was gone. It was all so confusing but he knew she was gone and he suddenly wished he was gone to. The sun that was burning into his retinas painfully slowly emerged as a flashlight with an arm attached to it. The arm led up to his crying little sister. “God damn it Joshua. You can’t do this to me. God damn it pleases Joshua comes back.” She was weeping the words and her breath choking her making her huff. The tears were raining down over his face. He began to cough and choke and he realized he was not breathing. He knew suddenly that it would probably be a good idea to breath and gasped but could not breathe. His chest felt like it was breaking and he watched looking intently down at his sister as she pressed her face down to his. It was in this moment he knew everything and not just what he forgot but everything. His sister’s face paused frozen inches above his and without a thought he began to slowly turn around not in dread but with full knowledge of who he was going to see there. It was….. Love. It was pain. It was everything, both sides of the coin. Good and evil. Safe and unsafe. I stared at it and it stared at me without pity but with so much love. He began to cry to weep and he ran without moving to it. He wrapped his arms around it and wept. There were no words to be said, it knew everything. There was a choice to be made and it was asking me to make it. I knew what it wanted. I knew then and there that I had to go back that there was no choice. It was telling me there that it was all going to be ok, that there was nothing to worry about. Shh, Shh, it kept telling me. It’s all going to be alright. Everything is ok; I need you to go back. There is still something that only you can do. Joshua, it’s ok. I love you. Don’t you know who I am? He said “ Your Nanna, right?” It laughed and the laugh was so sudden and wonderful that he knew that it was not just Nanna. Yes, I am Nanna. It did not need to say anything more than that because it was what was not said that was the loudest. Go, it is time.
“God Damn it Joshua. You are fucking not going to die on me.” With a huge gasp his whole body screaming at him in agony. He arched his back like a spasm and his stomach reaching into the air hitting his sister as he did. His sister was crying, weeping, and thanking God all at the same time. He curled up into the fettle position because he remembered what had happened. He closed his eyes tight refusing to look over his sister at the body lying on the ground. “Haley. Haley.” The words were coming out in long prolonged sobs that were reserved only for the truly forlorn sadness. Oh god she was dead and there was nothing he could do about it. His sister had crawled back with her back against the green couch covered in vomit she was trying to catch her breaths in between sobs. “You basterd. You fucking basterd you think you can just leave me?” She was screaming at him knowing she did not mean a word because the body was there in her eyesight. She buried her face into her arms and did not try to stop the sobs. The phone was ringing and he knew that it had been ringing for hours now. There was loud banging on the door but he could not get up. It was not real, it could not be real. The door crunched as it was kicked in flying into the wall. The door handle breaking into the soft wall and he remembered that Haley always said that would happen. Someone was screaming and he balled himself up tighter telling himself it was all just a dream. Someone must of pressed fast forward because everything seemed to blur and speed up and slow down as the police and emts rushed in.