She Was...

”Shit.” I opened my eyes and looked at Weston who was looking at the dashboard. I begin to laugh at his idiocy. “Shut up okay.” I grumbled next to me.

“Let me guess, we need gas.” I had told him almost an hour ago that we would need gas soon. But nooooo, ‘we were almost home. He knew what he was doing’. He was so stupid. God, I loved him. “There’s a gas station on this next exit.” I pointed in front of us. Once at the gas station I got out to stretch my legs. We had just came back from a 4 hour drive to a college we thought about going to together. Plus I was thirsty, so I wanted something to drink.

“Don’t take all day Boe!” He yelled over the car.

“Alright Little Bear!” I mocked him, laughing the rage in his face. I didn’t want to take too long since were like 10 minutes away from home and I just wanted to take a hot bath and lay in my bed. I picked up a smartwater, some skittles, and a honeybun for Weston. I waited in line behind this guy in a hoodie. I wasn’t really paying attention but the guy was taking a long time and from the looks of it he didn’t seem to be buying anything.

“I’m not gonna fucking tell you again!” Out of nowhere the guy in front of me starts yelling and pulls out a gun and points it at the cashier. My eyes widen and I back up from him. I dart my eyes at the door but the guy blocks my way by pointing the gun at everyone in the store. There was a woman with her kid, another guy, and me. “Nobody fucking move!” He swung the gun around. I wasn’t good in these kinds of situations for the simple fact that I’ve never been in a situation like this. Maybe he’ll just take the money and leave and we could all leave with our lives.

The cashier made the move to open the register, when a different guy from behind grabs the guy with the gun and they begin to struggle over the gun, then there were three loud pops. There was so much going on that I really didn’t know what was going on. Next thing I knew my shoulder and my side was in severe pain and I was on my back, staring at the ceiling of the store. I placed my hand where the pain was coming from and looked at it to see blood. Blood….I was bleeding. I didn’t have time to realize what had happened before Weston was at my side. “West…” I said in an uncontrollable sob.

“It’s okay, let me see” He whispered having trouble controlling his own voice. He removed my hand to see the damage underneath it. “Fuck.” He said in a harsh whisper staring blankly at my side.

“What? is it bad?” I cried, the tears falling freely. I knew the answer. His father was a doctor and he wanted to also pursue a profession as a medical doctor too, so I knew he would know how bad it was. I didn’t want to look at it.

“No, no. It’s not bad, it’s fine. You’re going to be fine.” He put his arm around my back so he could lift me off the ground and held me against him. And jesus fucking christ did that move alone made me want to pass out.

I shook my head at the pain. “West it hurts so bad!” I’m not sure if what I was saying was even coherent but I didn’t care. My body was going through some immense pain, and I was crying so hard a pounding begin to start in my head, which resulted in a ringing in my ears.

“I know baby, I know.” His voice shook and he rushed to take out his phone, my guess to call 911. I cried silently for awhile as I listened to him talk on the phone. It was loud around us but I tried to only focus on Weston’s voice. After awhile it was getting pretty hard to focus on anything. My vision was starting to get foggy and on top of that black dots were forming whenever I blinked. I just wanted to close my eyes...just for a second.

He shook me. “No, baby, you have to keep your eyes open! Just stay with me!” I heard it. The strain in his voice, like he wanted to cry but was trying so hard not to, for my sake. I only heard his voice like that twice before. And I hated it because I was the one who caused it. I had never wanted to hear it again but here I was again, causing him pain.

“I love you.” I say as he continued to yell through phone, ignoring my words. “I love you.” I say again and he squeezed me closer this time. “I love you.” I repeat a little louder for him to hear me.

“Stop it Boe.” He looks down at me, tears threatening to fall.

“I love you,” I echo but this time without stopping. “I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you…” I choke out.

“Stop it Goddamn you!”

I hear the sirens in the background and I know this is it. I’m going to die. And I’m going to do it in the worst way possible. Not just by being shot or in a gas station store. But being shot in a gas station store while staring the love of my life in the face. Romantic isn’t it. “Weston...say you like me-” He tries to stop me, knowing what I’m going to say but I stop him by putting the hand without blood over his lips. “Say you like me and that you don’t want to be with anyone else but me.” He looked down at me as if he was the one in pain, bleeding out and my heart ached for him. It ached for him so bad, it was the worst kind of misery.

He then took a deep breath and opened his mouth, “I love you,” His tears fell on my cheek and they were hot. “And I don’t want to be with anyone else but you.” My heart was officially broken. He bent down and kissed me. It was warm and wet from our tears. Nothing like our first. Next thing I knew I was being taken away from Weston and as much as I didn’t want to, I closed my eyes.

“Me and Boe talked about a lot of things. We talked about everything...I guess. We even talked about what we would want to happened if we died but I guess we didn’t get too full into details.” I didn’t know exactly where I was taking this but if there was ever a time I could tell her something for the last time, now would be it. So I imagined as if I was talking to her. “Boe was...she was...really bothersome actually. From the very first moment her mother brought her over to our house so she could “play with me” I couldn’t stand her. I remember wanting her to just go away. I even told her as clear as day that I did not want to be her friend.” I breathed out. “But I didn’t have too many friends and she saw through me. Even at the age of 7 she had the ability to see passed my bull and I didn’t appreciate that too much. As much as I didn’t like her at first, she was always there to bother me, always there to make me uncomfortable….to love me.” I stopped for a second to gather my thoughts.

“I don’t know the exact moment I fell in love with Boe but I can tell you she pushed me as hard as she could off the edge. I also don’t know when she fell in love with me but I’m sure she jumped happily.” That earned a few giggles. “For a single moment I want to feel like the universe isn’t about to crush me and my heart isn’t about to explode. You would tell me to kiss you and force me to tell you I love you and ask me not to go….I loved...love Bonnie Lillian Armstrong. She is the love of my life, always will be and I’ll go everyday missing her.” There wasn’t anything else my heart would allow me to say. That was it. I stepped down and walked back to my seat, still avoiding the picture.

After the service, Boe’s family held the after gathering at their house. Their house wasn’t too small but it was smaller than mine. It was familiar and it still smelled of her. I didn’t want to go but I also didn’t want to be rude, so I went. There were people talking and laughing with each other as if they haven’t seen each other for awhile and was just catching up. The mood was definitely lighter now, it was good. I sat off to the side with my best friends Leighton and his girlfriend Maxine. Or at least I think she’s his girlfriend now. I honestly don’t know what’s going on with them two anymore. That was Boe’s job to keep up with that kind of stuff.

“Hey Weston, can I borrow you for a moment.” Mrs. Armstrong, Boe’s mom, asked me. I said of course and followed her upstairs. We stopped in front of Boe’s door. I’ve been here many times to recognize her door. I just haven’t been here as of late. “We’ve already been through her room, I just wanted to let you do the same.” She didn’t wait for me to reply and left me in front of the door.

I didn’t know if I was ready but without thinking I opened her door and stepped inside anyways. And god did my knees almost give out. I was greeted with a gust of her smell. Slapping me across the face. Closing her door, I went over to her bed. I see her family didn’t touch too much because her bed looked exactly how we left it. Tousled with our sweat probably still on it. I walked around her room, observing it as if, it was my first time. There were tons of pictures on one wall, specifically for that reason. There were some of her and her friends, her family, random stuff, and me. Mostly of us together. I’m going to take those. I then went through her things. I don’t know what I was looking for but it was something. Looking through her sock drawer, I came across a small black box that I knew oh too well. Inside was a silver band ring that I had gotten her months before. I had proposed to her on graduation night. Really I just told her to marry me while we were in my car in front of her house.

She had smirked at me, taking the box with the ring and said O.K.. I don’t think she took me serious or not. I mean I was serious but we both knew we weren’t going to be married anytime soon, not that it had mattered to us. That’s possibly why she never wore the ring. That and her mom and would no doubt freak out about.

I squeezed the box in my hand and fell back on her bed. Fuck, I can’t do this without you.. I wiped at my eyes willing the tears to go away. There were just too many emotions going through me right now, I couldn’t possibly understand and the only person I wanted to talk to about this wasn’t even here. “I had a dream about you last night.” I started out loud. “Maybe you knew that.”

“Everyone keeps saying you’re in a happier or better place but that couldn’t possibly be true because your better place was with me. Your happier place was here, with me.” I let the tears run down my face. “I just...miss you is all.”

I get up from the bed, wipe my face with my sleeve, and make my way to leave. But not before looking one last time around the room where Boe and I shared so many memories, laughed, cried, made love together. It was always us. Together. I looked down at the pictures in my hands, running my thumb over her laughing face. Her eyes were closed in this one. I closed her door behind me and went back downstairs, ready to leave.