Dwindling Rainbow

Death becomes us all.

And suddenly it’s not about the girl who got pregnant at fifteen. It isn’t about the lady down the road with her twenty cats and daily dose of Benadryl. There’s no connection between their existence and yours, it’s written all over your face as you walk down the countless rows of tombstones. The cemetery’s quiet, but you don’t know where anyone is at this point.

They told you that I died as soon as our cars collided. You didn’t even know my name before that point. Did they tell you that I’ve been in love with you since our first day of high school? Doubtful. I always had found you cute, though; your cheeks were rosy and you couldn’t conjugate Spanish verbs to save your grade.

I wonder if you ever noticed me. Hell, it would’ve been a fucking miracle for the teacher to notice me. Not that I remember her name, either. Mrs. So-and-So from Massachusetts. The Boston accent in a New York classroom was the only part of her that ever stood out. Unlike you. You, all sunny and sweet and beautiful. Golden hair and blue eyes and long legs.

That’s all gone now as I watch you approach. Sun and sea turned gray with the horror of that night. Rain, snow, slush. Nothing but gray.

You don’t even shiver when you kneel down and pass right through me. I’m sitting there, you know, on my own grave. And my eyes meet yours for the first time, but yours are solemn and dark, and mine are translucent, even invisible, to you. It’s all I can do not to reach out and try to hold your face in my hands. Your arm passes through my heart and in my chest, it’s like this dull thud – for the first time in what seems like ages, I can almost feel.

The other, nameless headstones are all but forgotten as you gently brush the melting snow away from mine. I watch the realization dawn upon your pale face as you start to calculate the dates and you figure out that we were the same age. Except I still am twenty-five and you’re now nearing thirty. I still find it amazing that you take the time, every year, to visit that one guy you accidentally killed. I would expect anyone else to move on, clear their conscience, but it’s you.

I don’t mind, really. You’re the only company I keep on Christmas morning. The surrounding ghouls – they don’t give a shit about me. I’m just some guy to them, to everyone. Except you, and I can’t understand why.

Your mouth is forming the first syllable of my name, and I think back to when I first heard you say it. I was still bleeding on the tar of the highway, the paramedics had already done all they could. I was still a stupid kid, I didn’t even finish college and here I was, speeding without a damn seatbelt. You’ve always been the safe driver, between the two of us. Double- and triple-checked the rearview mirror, never went a mile over seventy. That’s why you’re visiting me, and maybe that’s how things will always be, if I’m lucky.

Maybe.

“You were some character, Andrew Bolt.” There’s that smirk of yours – it’s only a ghost of a smile, really, but it’s there. Enough for me to forget, even for just a split-second, that a bridge exists between the living and the deceased. I can almost touch you, then, until I remember there’s quite a significant difference between what’s tangible, and what shouldn’t exist.

And just like that, you’re gone. It’s all too soon, it’s all too sad; all that can be heard in the eerie silence is the sound of your receding footsteps crushing the remnants of ice and shriveled grass. I muster all the courage I possibly can, and call your name.

You stop short of the wrought-iron gate that divides our worlds, and I dare to believe that you hear me. Just that glimmer of hope is all I need. Simple. And then perhaps, I could last an eternity, and you wouldn’t have to visit every year. But you shake your head – it was only the wind – and I watch with the bittersweet memory of abandonment as you step into your car.

And the cycle repeats.