Let My Heart Rest In Pieces

Let My Heart Rest In Pieces 046

Little Envy

“These dreams, they keep coming back to me every time I go to sleep. I’ll wake up from one; go back to sleep, and keep going from where I left off. I don’t know if you can really call them nightmares, because sometimes I look forward to them. But it makes my heart ache with pain at the memory.”

Roxy gave me a worried look and squeezed my hand. I knew she didn’t know what to say, but she was my friend and I knew she would try to help me.

“Why don’t you tell me about the first one?”

Usually, I had problems remembering dreams from the night before. They could be so real, but my mind would forget them soon after. These dreams were not like that. Although it had been almost a week since the dreams had started, I remembered the first one very clearly. It was the most painful.

When it first came up, I tried to just ignore it and focus on my work. I had a big event coming up soon, and I could not lose my concentration just because of some damn dreams. The focus kept me from day dreaming, but not the actual event at night.

I brought my knees to my chest, tucking them against me tightly. My eyes locked on my best friend’s blue ones and it helped me relax enough to account for my details.

It felt like I was there as I am now. Not reliving it in my body, but watching myself from the sidelines. Does that make any sense? No one knew that I was there, I was like a ghost. I stood beside my seven year old self who was crying and couldn’t even stop. The rain helped hide her tears, but she didn’t care. She wanted to know that she was hurting; she wanted someone to tell her to stop, to tell her that there was no need to cry because her mommy wasn’t really dead. She wanted to know this was just some messed up dream.

But it wasn’t a dream. This point in my life was real, the first slap in the face that life just wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair that someone had taken her mother away from her at such a young age. It wasn’t fair that a beautiful wife had been taken away from a husband to leave him by himself to raise his child. But life wasn’t fair, and it never would be.

I was small and didn’t care about the things that the priest and close friends were saying, but right then, I knew that the people around me were hurting just as much too. Over the years, they had learned to control their emotions, to let out only a few tears. Down deep, they wanted to bawl just like the girl, to pound on the muddy grass and ask the sky why it had happened. They controlled themselves, hiding the pain of having to see such a small girl weep for her dead mother.

My father held my hand the whole time. He always made sure to keep physical contact with me. I know it calmed me, but right now, I wasn’t sure if it was for him or for me. We were both clinging onto the only thing left, and would fall apart if we lost it.

It was strange, seeing my mother’s casket being put into the ground again after all these years. To watch myself try to throw my little seven year old body onto the casket. It made my heart raw when my father had to cling to me and feel me thrash against him, bringing more tears to his eyes that his little girl hurt.

I felt my eyes prickle when I heard my small voice scream “Why?! I want my mommy back! We’re supposed to be a big happy family. It’s not fair, it’s not fair! Why?!”

People began to leave after that, they just couldn’t deal with all the sadness any more. It took a while to calm me down, but when I did, I didn’t really know if it was an improvement. My eyes that used to be filled with such happiness were blank and empty. Not sad, not angry, just empty. My father was worried when he saw it, but there wasn’t much he could do at that point.

When it was time for the two of them to leave, I followed. The light rainfall had stopped, but the sky was still dark. The younger me looked up into the face of her Daddy, with the shadows enhancing every part of his face. It made him look sadder than he really was, but I didn’t know that back then. At that moment, the thought I had eleven years ago echoed around the graveyard.

“I wish it would have been me instead of Mommy, then maybe Daddy wouldn’t be so sad. I should have died, not her.”

“It was such a cynical thought for a seven year old and that’s when I started to grow up. I was like an adult locked inside a child’s body. I learned the hard way that I could not be naïve and survive the world, I didn’t have the luxury of being a child, but I had the acceptance to not hate the way I lived.”

Roxy’s hand tighten around mine, letting me feel some kind of comfort. “Maybe you should see some kind of therapist for this. They can help, but I can only listen and try to help.”

I smiled lightly but nodded my head. “My father and I went together when I was ten. It helped a lot, but I don’t think I need one now. I’ve accepted my pain so I can live a normal life. Maybe these dreams are ways of letting me interpret things as an actual grown up instead of as a child.”

“What about the next dream?”

Every dream after that wasn’t as big as the first one. Most of them were just snippets of my life with my family. Some happy, some sad, but us together none the less. I was surprised when I actually had a meaningful dream a couple days later.

That day we had gone to the fair, and I was finally tall enough to ride some of the big girl rides. There were so many people around, laughing and talking, and I was so happy. My parents were on each side of me, holding my hands and talking over my head.

The two of them went with me on most of the rides, but Dad hated heights, so it was just me and Mom on the Farris Wheel. At first, it was kind of scary, but my mother showed me how amazing it was to see things from this height. It was one of the best moments of my life. I was sad when the ride came to an end.

When we went to leave the ride, a man came up with a camera and asked us if we wanted a picture. We took one, and it came out beautifully.

I took the picture frame from my nightstand and handed it to Roxy. “That’s the picture.”

It was silent for a while, until the smaller girl looked me dead in the eyes. “What do you think these dreams mean?”

I shrugged my shoulders. “I’m not really sure. Maybe they don’t mean anything.”

~~~~~

Later that day, I unexpectedly fell asleep on the couch while watching something stupid on TV. As usual, even if it was only a nap, I dreamed of my life when I was smaller. I was in my room back in California, the walls bright orange because that was what I had wanted back then.

I saw myself sitting on my bed, knees bent with my head resting on my knees. I was still in the dress from the funeral and my eyes were still empty. I didn’t know exactly why I was here, because nothing of importance had really happened when we got home. I was confused.

That is, until my younger self looked up and saw me standing there. Usually, I would have called for Dad if there was a stranger in my room, but I was blank and didn’t care all that much.

“Who are you?” she asked, her voice small and quiet, almost a whisper.

I was silent for a moment, not expecting her to have seen me, but then I decided I should just talk. “I’m you Envy.”

Her head cocked to the side, and I saw a smidge of child’s innocence in her. “Prove it.”

“Um… I don’t know how.”

“What’s my favorite toy?”

I smiled at the question, remembering the thing that I played with the most at this age, even if I wasn’t proud of it.

I slowly walked over to my dresser, the third drawer where I kept it. “I would never admit that I liked them, because I didn’t want to be like the other girls.”

I pulled out the well taken care of Barbie doll, and the smaller me blushed and looked away. “Okay, I believe you.”

I sat down on the bed next to myself, wow this was getting confusing, and looked over at her. She looked at me, or at herself in the future, and interest grew in her eyes.

“How old are you?”

“Eighteen,” I told her, giving her a small smile.

“How is Daddy where you are?”

“Daddy is doing really good. Not too long ago we actually moved to New Jersey.”

“Why?” she asked.

I shrugged my shoulders. “We just needed to get away, kind of make a new life. I really like living here, I’ve made a bunch of new friends.”

She scooted closer to me, crossing her legs Indian style, her smile growing. “Are they really nice?”

I grinned widely, thinking of all the weird, new friends I had made so quickly. “Yes, they are really super nice. You would love them Envy.” Why is it always weird saying your own name?

“Do you like anyone? I mean, like like?”

It was my turn to blush, and you could see the excitement bursting out of the little girl. “Is he cute? I bet he is, I only go for the really cute ones because they don’t have cooties. That’s what Jasmine said anyway.”

I remember her saying that too and I listened to her because she was a year older than me and I thought she was smarter. “Yes, he is very cute.”

“What’s his name?”

“Frank Iero.”

As if saying his name was like some magic, a picture came up, landing on the bed. It was a snap shot that had never been taken when we were sitting together at lunch. If you didn’t notice, you would have thought that we were a couple.

“Wow, he is cute. Are you his girlfriend?”

I shook my head, my straight hair hitting me in the face slightly. “No, we’re not a couple.”

“Why not?” she asked with a pout, “You guys look like how Mommy and Daddy do when they’re together. Well, were.”

Sadness over took her again, and I brought her to me in a hug. She didn’t cry, because there are no more tears for her to cry right now.

“How is my life without her?”

She wiggled a little bit out of my arms so she could look into my face. “How can you be happy without her?”

“I know it seems hard right now,” I told her, stroking her hair, “but it does get better. You still have Dad, and he loves you with all his heart. Making friends also helps, because they will be there to help you when you really need it. The pain is still there, but I have my friends to help me feel happier.”

“And Frank?”

“He helps a lot.”

~~~~~

“Envy, wake up!”

“Huh, what!” I shouted, bolting up. I looked around and saw that Frankie was sitting there, looking at me with humor in his eyes.

“I learned to move when I go to wake you up.”

I rubbed my eyes, trying to get the sleep out of him. “What are you doing here?” I asked.

“Everyone is waiting outside, we’re going to hang out and you’re coming with us.”

“What if I don’t want to go?”

“Too bad,” the boy said with a smirk, pulling me up and throwing me over his shoulder. I squealed, telling him to put me down, but I didn’t really mean it. This position gave me a good look at Frankie’s ass.

I looked back towards the couch, and I swore I saw the little Envy from my dreams. She smiled at me, giving me a thumbs up, and said, “He’s a good guy.”

“I know,” I whispered as the boy we were talking about carried me out the door, “I know.”