You Belong With Me

Alex’s P.O.V.

Death of a family member or loved one is probably one of the hardest things a person will ever have to go through. The pain eats you alive inside. The worst part is knowing that there’s absolutely nothing you can do to bring that person back. You will never be able to hug or kiss or tell that person how much you love them one more time. You can’t take back mistakes you made or terrible things you said. It’s just over.

That pain you feel, it’s raw, it burns, it tears you in half. It’s indescribable. The worst part is it never goes away. You just have to find a way to endure it so that it doesn’t conquer you in the end.

Apparently, it was suicide. His best friend had left something in his apartment the night before and had a key, so he let himself in. He found Eric hanging from the shower curtain in the bathroom. By the time the paramedics arrived, it was already too late.

At first, I refused to believe my brother would do something like this to himself. He was always happy, always smiling. There was no way in hell he would want to end his own life. He was still alive. He had to be. Thoughts like these calmed me down. Of course he was alive. How could he be dead? All of this was just a cruel prank my family was trying to play on me. There would be a simple way to set everything straight.

While still wrapped up in Taylor’s arms, I took out my cell phone and called Eric’s number.

“Hey, this is Eric. I’m not here right now, so leave a message and maybe I’ll get back to you, maybe not,” came his husky voice from the other end. It was reassuring to hear his voice.

“Hey, Eric, it’s Alex. Look, I don’t know what the hell is going on, but I need you to call me back as soon as possible. I need to know that you are ok.”

When I hung up the phone, I saw that Taylor was looking at me with soft, tear-filled eyes. “Alex...” she said slowly, carefully. “Eric is gone. He’s not going to call you back.”

“What are you talking about? Of course he is! He’s my brother. Why wouldn’t he call me back?”

“A-Alex, he’s d-dead. He can’t call you back,” she said through her tears.

“No, he’s not! How can you even say that? Eric is at home in his apartment! He probably just didn’t hear his phone over the TV or something.”

She shook her head sadly. “I wish that were true, but we both know it’s not.”

“No, Taylor, he’s not fucking dead!” I screamed. I could feel the heat rise in my face. “He can’t be.”

Without saying another word, she buried me deeper into her arms. Oh, how much I had missed this over the past few months. However, I could not let myself believe that the worst has happened. If I did, it would have broken me.

We sat there quietly for a few minutes, each thinking about Eric. I remembered the last time I saw him. I talked all about myself and didn’t bother asking him how he was doing, not once. What a selfish bastard I was. The next time I saw him, I would make sure to say I was sorry.

When we were little, our parents would take all three of us to school and then pick us up again in the afternoon. During recess, Eric would go off and play with some of his soccer friends, but, if he saw that anyone was giving Taylor or me any trouble, he would come over and set that kid straight. He never cared if he would get in trouble for it later. Even then, everyone knew not to mess with Eric Gaskarth. He was the one who taught me about girls, parties, and just life in general. Anything could happen to me and I knew that I would be ok because I had him, my big brother. I could always count on him. He was my rock; he never moved from my side.

“Remember that one time when we went on vacation in California when we were like fourteen and we were stuck in the hotel room while our parents were out drinking?” asked Taylor, breaking the silence.

“Yeah we were so bored that Eric decided to take the keys to the rental car and drive us around L.A,” I responded. “We were in the biggest trouble of our lives afterward, but it was all worth it because it was so much fun. We got to see everything in the city.”

“That’s what I always loved about him. He was always so spontaneous and he never gave a damn about the consequences. I was constantly worried about what would happen to us afterward, but not him. He always knew how to live in the moment.”

“Yeah and he was so funny whenever he got drunk. He used to get us in trouble when we would come home drunk because he was so damn loud. He used to say that it was worth it to get in trouble in the morning if we were going to have a lot of fun that night. He was always the loudest and craziest at parties.”

“Yeah,” she agreed. “He could be anything we asked him to be. When we needed him to be our older brother, he was there protecting us and giving us great advice. When we needed him to be the fun best friend, he would get as crazy as possible. Sometimes, he was even a little scary. We used to have to wrestle his keys out of his hands if he wanted to drive while he was drunk. The main point is that he was never selfish; he always put others before himself and he taught us some great lessons.”

“Of course he did.” Then, I realized what I was saying and caught myself. “Wait, why are we talking about him in the past tense? He’s still the same old guy. He hasn’t ever changed one bit.”

“Alex, will you stop making this harder than it already is? God damn it! He’s dead. We just have to accept it.”

“Fuck, Taylor! He’s my brother! He can’t be dead! I will never accept that he’s dead. I don’t know myself without him.”

“There has never been a time that I wished I was wrong more than this one, but it’s true. He’s dead and we can’t change that no matter how much we might want to.”

“But, I don’t want to live in a world where he doesn’t exist.”

“Neither do I,” she said quietly in my ear.

This time, it was her phone that went off.

“Hello?” she said into the phone. She listened to what the person on the other line was saying for a few minutes and then said, “Ok, we’ll be there as soon as we can,” and hung up the phone. “We have to go,” she said to me. “That was my mom. She said that our parents are at the hospital with Eric. We have to go to say goodbye.”

“But, I don’t want to say goodbye. He’s not going anywhere, so why should I say goodbye?”

“Alex, please just come with me. I know you will regret this later if you don’t and I can’t leave you here by yourself right now. If you won’t come for me, do it for your family. Your parents need you.”

I nodded. If they believed the lie, I would have to comfort them and tell them how it couldn’t possibly be true. I got up from her lap and got my stuff together and followed her upstairs and out the front door. Neither of us was in any condition to drive, but she did anyway because I think she knew that we might not end up at the hospital if I was the driver. In fact, we probably wouldn’t have gone anywhere at all.

The whole car ride was again filled with silence. In what seemed like no time at all, we parked and walked into the hospital.

“Can you please tell me what floor and room Eric Gaskarth is in?” Taylor asked the receptionist.

She typed something into the computer and then responded, “Fourth floor room 412.”

Taylor said a quick thank you and we ran to the elevator. When we got there, we saw my dad and both of Taylor’s parents sitting in front of his room with red, tear-stained faces. Jack was there too. He sat there with his head between his legs. He looked up when we heard us approaching and got up to give me a hug, but I backed away.

“What are you all doing here?” I asked.

“Alex, what are you talking about?” Jack asked confused. “Your brother just died.”

“No he didn’t! Why can’t you guys just realize that he’s playing a joke on all of us? He does this kind of stuff all the time!”

When I said this, my father got up and stood directly in front of me so that I couldn’t see anyone else but him.

“Alex, S-son, I th-think you know that’s n-not t-true. He’s g-gone. Our Eric is g-gone.” He broke down and began to sob uncontrollably. He tried to take me in his arms, but I fought in his arms. No matter how hard I hit, he didn’t let go.

“No, Dad, no! He can’t be gone! He can’t be!” I screamed.

The next moment, I saw my mother come out from his room, the pain written all over her face. Her face was red and black makeup was running down her cheeks. When she made it out of the room, she was crying so hard that she could not seem to stand up anymore, so she clutched to a chair before she could fall to the floor.

“I want to see him,” I said quietly and firmly to my father.

“I don’t think that’s such a good idea,” my father disagreed.

“God damn it, Dad! I want to see my brother,” I screamed, finally pushing off my father. I ran over to the door and pushed it open, Taylor and Jack right behind me.

There he was lying in that bed. He didn’t look like Eric Gaskarth anymore. His pale skin was whiter than I had ever seen it. I saw the red marks around his neck where the rope had been. He almost looked like he was sleeping. His face was blank, expressionless. Even I could tell there was no life left in him. I walked over to the bed and lifted up his hand. I had never touched anything so cold. I lifted it up to my lips and kissed it and then let it go. It just flopped right back down. In one night, my brother had gone from being a warm, healthy, happy body to a cold, hard corpse. This would be my last memory of him. I couldn’t deny it anymore; he really was dead.

My legs felt like jello and I could no longer stand up. Taylor and Jack let me fall into their arms on the floor. “Oh God no!” The tears began rushing out of my eyes again. I heard horrible, painful screaming and it took me a little while to realize the noise was coming from my own mouth. I began to shake and heave and gasp for breath. I was having a breakdown, but somehow that didn’t matter to me. Nothing mattered anymore, not without Eric. I no longer cared what happened to me.

Jack carefully removed me from his grasp a few minutes later and left the room in a hurry. Soon, he returned accompanied by a nurse with a needle in her hand. I screamed and thrashed as Taylor and Jack held me down and the nurse stuck the sedative in my arm.
---------------------------
It seemed like hours later when I finally woke up. Now, I was lying in my own hospital bed. Taylor was sleeping in the chair in the corner. I don’t know how she could have managed sleep at a time like this, but she did. I got up out of bed. My legs wobbled a bit. I guess I must have been a little bit weak from the sedative. I walked out to the hallway and saw that my whole family was there, but no one seemed to notice that I had woken up. I walked back to Eric’s room. I had to see him again; I had to say goodbye.

“Hey, big brother,” I said shakily as I sat down in the chair beside his bed. I took hold of his cold hand again. It took awhile for me to find the right words to say. How do you find the right way to say goodbye to your dead brother? Is there a right way?

“I don’t really know how to say this to you,” I admitted. “Never in my life would I have dreamed that I would have to say goodbye to you. I never thought I would have to survive my life without you. I guess maybe I thought you were immortal. Everybody else was capable of dying, but not my brother Eric. I never thought I would have to live a day where you weren’t there. I’m so s-sorry for taking you for granted.” I paused to wipe the tears flowing from my eyes.

“I know that it’s probably my fault that you did this to yourself,” I continued, crying even harder. “I should have asked how you were doing, I should have called you more, I shouldn’t have talked about myself so much. You were probably suffering and I wasn’t listening. I was so selfish and you were always so much better than me. If I could take it all back, I would.”

“I never thought you were capable of doing something like this to yourself. Whenever I saw you, you were always happy. Maybe I just didn’t know my own brother well enough. A part of me can’t help but wonder why you would go to such extreme measures though. Did the thought ever cross your mind that you would hurt everyone you said you loved?” All of a sudden, I was angry.

“How could you do this to us, Eric? How could you h-hurt us like this? Even if you didn’t f-feel like you could c-come to me with your p-problems, you could have gone to Taylor Mom or Dad or Jack or Holly or one of your f-friends. Why the f-fuck did you have to g-give up on l-life? Damn it, Eric! I will n-n-never f-forgive you for this.” At this point, I had to stop talking because I was crying so hard.

“Anyway,” I said after I calmed myself down a little bit, “I just wanted to say that there will never be a day that goes by that I won’t miss you. You’ll always be my brother and I love you. I don’t know what I would have done without you all this time and I have no idea what I’m going to do without you in the future. I hope you are in a better place now than you were on earth. You’ll always be in my heart and I’ll always miss you.” I gave his hand one last kiss and walked out. I couldn’t be in that room with my dead brother anymore. It was making me claustrophobic; my whole world was closing in around me.

When I walked out of the room, I saw Taylor standing there waiting for me. Without saying a word, she took my arm and led me back to my room and helped me get into bed.

“Hey, Taylor?” I said. She looked over with a question in her eyes. I patted the bed next to me and she crawled in next to me. “Thanks for being there for me tonight. I really needed you.”

“He was my brother too,” she said simply and she was right. She put her head on my chest and began to close her eyes. I felt her chest move up and down as she breathed.

“It’s pretty ironic, isn’t it?” I said as I played with her long blond hair.

“What is?”

“Today is Thanksgiving. How am I supposed to be grateful for anything if my brother is dead?”

“I don’t know,” she quietly responded. “The world seems like a pretty cruel place right now.”

There was silence as we both thought about the terrible things that had happened that night.

“Maybe...” she said after a little while. “Maybe we should be thankful for ever having the chance to get to know him and love him. Maybe we should be grateful that he was even in our lives in the first place.” After she said that, she fell asleep again in my arms. Sleep was out of the question for me. For the rest of the night, I laid there and stared at her, careful to keep all thoughts out of my head.

Later, the rest of the world would find out about what happened to Eric. My life would never be the same again.