Losing Nevaeh

In real life, you never lose anyone close to you. You would never think in a million years that you would ever lose your sister. Your sister who was just barley eighteen. Who was engaged. Who had a whole life ahead of her. Something as horrid and as wrong doesn’t happen like that. Maybe to the other person, but never to you. But life is sick and twisted, and that other person is you, even though you would never dream of it.

Being part of a completely dysfunctional family, I had thought of it, although I had never thought it would be Desiree. No, I’d always thought it would be Justine that would be first to go. Druggie Justine, the one who already had conceived two children- neither of which she had custody of. Life proved me wrong. Instead of taking the oldest girl first, life had taken away the middle child. Desiree, stoner- but smart, totally cunning, a complete spit-fire, not even out of high school, sarcastic, but oh so amazing, Desiree.

The day is still burned into my mind, and I know, no matter how old I turn out to be, I will never forget that day. It was on a Wednesday, over Christmas break, and I was napping. After staying up all night the night before, I was trying to catch up on sleep. Halfway asleep, I heard yelling from the kitchen, but thought nothing of it. Just another one of mom and dad’s arguments. But then my bedroom door was being opened, and I sat up, still in a sleepy dreamland. My dad stood there in the doorway, his face somber.

“Desiree’s been in an accident.” Fear settled into my gut, but I shook it away. Just a bad car accident, she’s fine. Its happened before. Everything is fine. And although I keep telling myself this, tears appear in my eyes.

“Is she okay?” I feel my throat close up, begging my dad with my eyes to erase my fear- but I’ve seen the movies, I know how the next part goes.

“She didn’t make it.” And that’s exactly what it feels like. It feels like its just a sad, tragic part of a movie, only its not. I think the absolute worst part of the whole thing was that it wasn’t a regular car accident. No, it was worse if it even could be any worse. She was walking down the road, and she was hit by a Buick. She was reading a book though, a new Stephen King novel. Somehow, that tiny detail gave me just a sliver of comfort. I figured Desiree would want to go reading a book. That’s how I would want to go, after all.

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As an introvert, I had a pretty good life. Both of my parents were still together, I had a nice Christian boyfriend, I had nice friends- although after Desiree I pushed all of them away almost immediately, and lost ties with them all. My sisters were smart and- not to be cocky- we were all quite the lookers, yet we didn’t look related in the slightest.

Justine; the oldest. Long chestnut brown hair, that fell to just above her waist. Pushing 6 ft, with gorgeous green eyes, with a swimmer’s lean body. Desiree; with curly black hair, short but with curves in all the right places. Dark brown eyes that put chocolate to shame, and lips that would make any sane boy melt. And me; wavy blond hair that went to the middle of my back, high cheek bones, my body was long, narrow at the hips, with gray eyes like tornadoes.

But after Desiree died, I was no longer an introvert. I found out that I never really was. I was just a night owl. Not even a night owl- more like a party animal. And lucky for me, I feel headfirst into Lucas Story’s party scene.

Lucas was once just the cute neighbor boy that lived next door. His bedroom window was directly across from my window, and from time to time when our eyes caught through the windows we’d nod in acknowledgement, but we never spoke.

Still, I noticed how attractive he was. He was tall, over six foot, and his body was deliciously built. His brown hair hung slightly into his eyes, just enough give off a hint of mystery. The tattoo that flashed from time to time on his wrist intrigued me. He was several years older than me, but that didn’t matter to me. Yet, I was still to afraid to speak to the neighbor boy.

After Desiree’s passing, we went for months without speaking, not one word. But after a while, I noticed the softness in his eyes from his side of the window. I hated him for it. I didn’t want his sympathy. I didn’t want anyone’s sympathy.

No one but my family knew what I had went through. We all hated each other for the loss of our little Desiree. And we showed it. See, no one knew our little family secrets. Daddy was addicted to pills; Mommy alcohol; and sister Justine was a heroin addict. Desiree had smoked pot every now and then- but hey, what’s a little green ever done to anyone? Anyways, I was the only one who didn’t have a serious addiction. When Desiree died, everyone’s anger was dropped on me. Why? I don’t know. Maybe I never will.

After a particularly bad night, I locked myself in my room and flung down on bay window seat. I let everything go and just cried. I suppose somewhere in the back of my mind, I did notice the boy standing in his window watching me, but I ignored it. It wasn’t like he was going to do anything about it.

But then, my window was opening up, and Lucas Story was pulling himself up beside me. He wrapped his arms around my middle and pulled me into his lap.

“Shh, Nevaeh,” He cooed, “Its all gonna be okay.” He touched my red, puffy eye so lightly I wasn’t sure if he did at all. I tucked my face into his neck. He rubbed my back, and as much as I despised his sympathy, I craved for it. Maybe it was the greediness in me, or maybe it was just because I hadn’t been touched with anything other than anger for months.

I fell asleep with him holding me and rubbing my back like that, and when I awoke early the next morning he was gone, and I was snuggled in my bed. The voices in my head told me to run, to run like hell and never look back. But the voices in my heart had another idea, and they told me to run to him- and quickly. So I did.

I washed my face, and then slipped through my window. I tiptoed across the lawn and tapped quietly on his window, as not to disturb him incase he was sleeping. The window swung open and a smile that greeted me was one I couldn’t help but return. And thus, my wild party adventures began.