Never Again

"I remember the first time I saw him, you know. In the Tower Records in the mall. He was there for about a month before he started working at Blockbuster. He never told me if they fired him, or if he quit."
My eyes are so dry that they burn, as I realize...
"I guess I'll never know now, will I?"
David's afraid that I'll cry, I can see it on his face. David has been watching me cry over spilled milk and soap operas for the past thirteen years. He doesn't understand that now I can't cry. It's like my tear ducts have closed off, like I'll never cry again.
And it burns...
"I remember how cute I thought he was." I laugh. I sound like I'm on autopilot. That's because I am. "Those eyes... his hair was longer then, I don't know if you remember..."
David doesn't respond, doesn't look like he knows how to respond. I'm used to that now.
"He looked right at me, and he smiled, and I swear I was just gone. I thought... and he had the cutest butt, too. I'm sure I made a complete fool of myself."
I'm not going to say I thought I was in love, thought I'd found the person I'd be with forever. Not to David. Not to anyone.
"Clara thinks I killed him, you know."
David looks up at me in shock, daring actually to meet my eyes. He doesn't understand how I can say things like this out loud, that much is clear. He's never felt it, never known how it feels, just not to feel. "Clara's a bitch," he says forcefully.
"I know."
I can tell that he wants to say she's wrong, but knows I won't hear him. I don't care if he thinks she's wrong, or even what I think. He knows what I think.
I didn't kill him.
I just let him die.

I hate him so much. David's trying to talk me into going to the funeral now, saying that if I don't I'll regret it. Saying that people need me. Saying that I owe it to Noah.
I don't owe Noah a damn thing.
Yeah, I'll go. And I'll sit there and pretend to care. But they can't make me cry. They can't make me feel. They can't make me admit that anything I loved could ever be in a little box in the ground.

Clara keeps telling me I didn't even know him. That I have no business pretending this affects me. Every day at school she reminds me, tells me to have a little respect for the people who are really grieving.
I don't hate her. I wish I could. I don't hate anyone anymore, except him. I walk into this dark room, on David's arm, like he's feeding me the strength just to walk, which is more or less true. She looks up and sees me, and her eyes say clear as day, "What the hell do you think you're doing here?"
Maybe Clara knew him and I didn't. But I loved him, and she didn't, and I know that because she doesn't hate him now.
The minister asks if anyone wants to say anything.
As if I'll ever really say anything again.

I didn't even try to walk up here, and now everyone is watching me. This whole room is holding its breath, and I swear Clara hissed at me, and I swear I just heard Noah's aunt ask some lady I don't know, "Who is that girl?"
As if I haven't been to your house a dozen times, Lucy. As if he never talked about me. If you had noticed, or tried to care...
Blame her, why don't you, Clara.
I hear myself clear my throat, something I didn't mean to do. What could I possibly have to say?
The sound is off, just off, like someone flipped an invisible switch, and I can't even hear myself breathing. Instead there's a voice, a voice I'll never hear again, one I thought I couldn't even remember. "Just say what you mean, girl, you waste everybody's time trying to say what they want to hear. Just be honest. If they don't like it, screw them."
"That isn't Noah." I'm pointing at the closed casket — thank God they closed it and I can pretend it's empty. My hand isn't even shaking now. "That's something that looks like him, something left over and worthless. And I..."
It's like the flames behind my eyes will consume me, and there'll be nothing left.
"Trust yourself. Be true to yourself. Don't spare anyone anything at the expense of truth."
"...I know him."
She's afraid, or maybe even too respectful, to scoff aloud, but Clara's eyes are burning too, with rage — how dare this girl, this nobody, take something sacred like this away from the people who really knew him?
"Be honest. If they don't like it, screw them."
"I know him. I know he won't want to be thought of like that. He won't want to hear ‘gone but not forgotten.' He's not gone, I promise you that. He's everywhere, he's right here, and I swear he's laughing at me. He'll haunt me forever, and I hate him for that."
Lucy's looking at me like maybe she'd like to kill me. Just for being too honest about violence. It begets violence, I guess.

I said I hate him, and it's true.
I hate him for the life he'll never live. I hate him for the dances we'll never dance. I hate him because I'll never kiss him, and he'll never know I wanted to. I hate him because he'll never know I love him, because he didn't give me the chance to say it out loud. I hate him because I'll live every day of my life wondering if I could have been in love with someone who'll always be seventeen. I hate him for making me live with a wound that will never heal. I hate him for showing me myself. I hate him for taking away the future, for ending his and for darkening mine forever. I hate him for leaving me no choice but to go on.
I hate him for making me go on without him.

"Maybe there was nothing I could do. Maybe there was nothing anyone could do. Maybe Noah was just too good for all of us, and we should be thankful for the time we had with him, and sorry if we never got to say how much it meant, and how much it changed us. I'm sorry, because I never got to tell him."
Clara, Lucy, Ms. Randall, my mom — they're all crying now. Even David's eyes are bright, I can see that from here.
I'm the one who deserves to cry. I'm the one who loved him. I'm the one who tried.
"But maybe there was something. Maybe if we had tried harder, maybe if we had said what we thought, just once, maybe if he had known there were people who loved him... maybe it would have made a difference."
I don't know why I'm making it worse. I just know someone has to tell the truth. I know Noah wants me to tell the truth.
"That isn't Noah," I say again, like it's the only thing that matters now, making sure they know this. "Don't remember him like that. Remember his passion for life, remember his kindness and his sarcasm, and remember how he changed you. None of that can ever be contained in this little box. Remember his eyes, and what they said to you, and remember he's still watching you. Because that isn't Noah."

His eyes sparkled with so much life, I wondered how he could contain it sometimes. Maybe that was it. Maybe all the life just burst out of him, and didn't leave him enough to go on. I don't know.
I remember when he told me about his mom leaving, his dad dying, his brother raising him until he moved in with some rich girl in Arizona and sent him off to Lucy. He told me how she drank, how she sometimes forgot to feed him, how he had to find work so young just to pay her bills, to keep the water running and the house warm in winter. He said it all like he was recalling the events of a movie, like these were the details of somebody else's life and he was just remotely involved.
He wanted so badly to be a doctor, to help people, to make a difference. A pediatrician. He loved kids. He took care of Sarah, his little cousin, until Lucy sent her off to boarding school.
He had so much love. And I watched it give him so much pain.
I remember exactly how he would twirl his glasses between his thumb and index finger, exactly how he would roll his eyes and blow off Clara's petty jealous comments, exactly how his hands fit into mine.
I remember exactly what I was wearing, and how his cologne smelled, and the scuff marks on his shoes, and the tiny smile that played across his lips the day he promised me, promised he would never hurt me, promised he would be okay.
It was my fault. I let myself believe him.

I don't remember any more of the funeral. David's saying that I passed out in the car. We're at my mom's house now, and she's not back yet. I can tell that David wants to kiss me, to hold me and tell me everything's going to be all right, to stroke my hair and let me cry on his shoulder, but he's afraid to touch me. He's on the other side of the couch, watching me, like something's going to happen. Like I'm going to explode, or if he looks away I'll vanish, or something.
I love David, always have. Until four months ago I always knew I would grow up and marry him someday. Just for the hell of it. Just because we made so much sense together, had so much in common, liked each other so much. Now he's looking at me like I'm a stranger, and I know I'm looking back the same way.
Four months. Four months, Clara keeps telling me — it's just a blip, she's known Noah since kindergarten, and who the hell do I think I am, pretending to know how she feels?
Four months, with a lifetime inside them.
"He was so close," I whisper, and David doesn't hear me, and after hesitating to ask himself if he really wants to hear me, he tells me to repeat it. So I do.
"So close to what?"
"To freedom."
Am I crying?
"To what he always wanted."
I am crying. My tears are white-hot, and I can feel the steam rising from my cheeks. They fall onto my lap and burn my hands, folded there.
"He would have graduated in May, and then... everything could have been his. Everything he ever wanted. And I would have been there. And... oh, David, why couldn't he have waited..."
I'm sobbing now, curled in fetal position on the couch, and David comes to me and he does stroke my hair.
And yeah, I still know I'll marry him someday.
"I know," he says, "I know. I don't have answers."
I choke on the heat of my own tears.
"Maybe he wasn't ready to be free," he says gently, though no matter how gentle he tries to be, his words will cut me, and burn me and scar me just as deeply as these tears. "Or maybe he didn't believe he ever would be, really. I don't know."
He kneels beside the couch, looks into my eyes. He softly kisses my hands and brushes the hair from my face. "I'm sorry, that's all I can say. I'm just so sorry."
I nod, and it takes almost more strength than I have to give. "I'm sorry too."

Noah, my best friend, my soulmate, a stranger I knew for barely a moment, the closest thing in the world to my heart. I hate him, and I will always hate him. I'll go on, just because he left me no other choice, and I'll be okay again, just to spite him, to prove I can, to prove I don't need him.

I don't need you, Noah. And I'll never forgive you, for doing this to me.
You'll follow me everywhere. I know you. You'll haunt me just because you know you have the power.
You'll be in my heart forever. And I'm thankful for that, because it's the only way you'll see how much I loved you.
You'll be in my heart forever, because wherever I go and whatever I do, I'll feel the scar you left there for me.