Chapter 1: The Last Goodbye

The cold wind brushed her face as the rain continued to fall, falling like tears fall from one’s face. The sun had hidden behind the clouds, draining happiness from those below it and leading everything into sorrow.

Maren Strachan brushed the remaining tears off of her cheek and turned away from the dull gravestone, newly placed in the earth of the cemetery. She couldn’t bear looking at the name, the years they lived, and the ending comments. Will Strachan; 1980-2004; beloved son, friend, brother, and fiancé.

Will was Maren’s dear brother, and he was all set to be married to her best friend, Keona McNeil, next month. However, a fatal car crash at the hands of a driving drunk had ended her brother’s life, broken her friend’s heart, and made Maren lose the only one she could truly talk to. He was the only one who understood the strange things that had been haunting Maren since she was ten years old. The strange images that had appeared in her head without warning at all, and the voices she heard when she least wanted them. Visions of people in danger, voices of people calling for help, things that had taken over Maren’s focus for the past twelve years. Will had them too, visions of events that would happen just moments later. He was the only one who understood.

Now, he was gone, and Maren would have no one to understand her now. She turned to where her sobbing friend, Keona, lay over his grave. Maren patted her friend’s back, and helped her to her feet. The two embraced and cried on each other’s shoulders.

“Why did he have to die?” Keona sobbed onto her friend’s black dress, “Why?”

Maren rubbed Keona’s back for a moment, then stepped back to observe. Her friend was a mess, as she had been for the past week since Will’s death. Her dark complexion was stained with tears and sadness. Her hair, normally dark and full, had turned into a matted mess, and her doe eyes were red and puffy from the shedding of waterfalls of sadness. Normally bright and colorful, the Hawaiian hippie had turned into a dark and dull girl of sadness.

“The stars will cry the blackest tears tonight,” Maren said to no one in particular as she stared back at Will’s grave. It had been a quote that Will had said at their mother’s funeral several years before.

Keona turned towards her friend. “The stars? Who cares about stars?” She then broke down into a torrent of tears once more, even though Maren had thought her friend to be all cried out. Maren stroked Keona’s back, trying hard not to cry herself. Though many around her were sad and sobbing, she had to be strong. Her useless father had not attended the funeral, for he was away in Timbuktu or something on business, and besides, him and Will had never been very close. Her mother, God rest her, was dead for the past 15 years, for she had died giving birth to Maren. She barely even knew her, and Will had only been two when the unfortunate incident had occurred.

Maren’s boyfriend, Cameron, came up to her and the two hugged and cried. “My God, Maren, I am so sorry.”

Maren shook her head. “I’m okay, but thank you for your sympathy.”

“You’re okay?” Cameron was shocked, “How can you be okay? Your brother just died!”

“He died a week ago,” Maren pointed out, “I have to be strong, for Keona’s sake.”

“Keona was just his fiancée, but you were his sister!” Cameron exclaimed, “Maren, being strong isn’t about trying not to cry. It’s about giving support to everyone.”

“And how can I give support when I am a wreck?” Maren asked, “Besides, Keona has known Will as long as we’ve been friends, and she’s more sensitive to this kind of stuff.”

Cameron still didn’t understand. “This is awful, unbelievable crap going on around you, and you’re worried about being strong?”

Maren sighed. “Cameron, look, I appreciate all that you’ve done for me in the past week, I really do, but I’ve done my crying. I’ve cried every day for the past week. It’s not like I’m not sad, because I am, but I just need to be there for my friends. Will would have tried to be strong if it was my funeral.”

Cameron hugged Maren once more. “Listen, I better be going. I have to get to work by six tonight.”

She nodded and kissed him lightly on the lips. “Go, I’ll be here for a while. You don’t need to wait for me. Call me after work, okay?”

“Yeah, I will,” Cameron promised, “and once again, I’m so sorry.”

Tears began to flow from Maren’s eyes, tears that she had wanted to keep locked away, as Cameron walked towards his gray mustang, blonde hair gelled neatly on his head, and tuxedo fitting him finely. She hadn’t meant to scare him off, or make him think her to be odd, but she loved him so much, cared for Keona so much, she didn’t want to appear as a wreck. Cameron didn’t deserve a wreck. Maren wasn’t even sure if he deserved her. However, she couldn’t imagine if she was in Keona’s shoes and Cameron had been the one who died.

She brushed her long brown hair out of her wet brown eyes and walked back towards Keona. “Hey, you ready to go?”

“I just want to say one more goodbye, alone,” Keona nodded from her position on top of Will’s grave.

“Yeah, I do too,” Maren replied.

Keona looked up and smiled weakly. “I’m a mess, aren’t I?”

Maren didn’t answer, for she didn’t want to hurt her friend. “I’ll leave you alone for now.” She walked away and turned around to stare back at her weeping friends. The blue flowers that had been placed on the sides of the grave were the only colour in this dull, dark place. Maren wanted to leave, wanted to paint this cemetery that stayed in black and white to be given a more colorful hue.

Maren stood, hands folded in front of her chest, trying to keep warm in the bitter cold. Her black dress and jacket just simply weren’t warm enough to fight the bitter wind. Her hair blew around her tanned face, and one stray strand of hair got stuck to her wet cheek. Keona passed by Maren, finished her last goodbye.

She made her way to Will’s grave and knelt before it. Biting her lip, she began her goodbye. “Hey, Will, it’s me, Maren. I would have brought flowers, but what are you going to do with those? You’re dead.” Fighting the tears, Maren tried to continue. “You’re dead, and I’m trying to be strong, but it’s hard, and kneeling here on your grave is what I’ve dreaded for the last week. I didn’t visit you while you were lying in state, and I’m only saying my goodbye now, because I was scared. I was so scared, that if I had to say our last goodbye, you know, the real one when I finally admit that I am never going to see you again...the pain might never go away. I know already, that it’s going to hurt so much, letting go like this. You’re beneath a pile of dirt and I’m bawling my eyes out. If you were here, you’d be laughing at me.”

The rain continued to fall down, almost mimicking the water treading down her cheeks. “The pain of knowing that I’ll never see you again may never go away either, and it might never stop, but I have to, because otherwise, I’ll never come to terms with reality.” Maren kissed her fingers and placed them on Will’s name on the gravestone. “I love you.” She stood, and walked towards her red PT Cruiser in the cemetery parking lot, where she would take Keona home and then finally relax at her own apartment.

“We ready now?” Maren walked up to where Keona leaned against an old oak tree, crying.

“I’ll never be ready,” Keona said softly.

“We have to go sometime,” Maren pointed out.

Keona sniffled softly. “It’s just so hard.”

Maren decided to quote from the eulogy she had given. “If the people we love are taken from us, the way they live on is to keep loving them. Death cannot stop true love, but mainly delay it for a while.”

“I will never love again,” Keona vowed. She said nothing more, and merely followed Maren into the car to be taken home, for her vision was so clouded with wet that she would never see her way on the road through the rain.

Maren got home at around five o’clock, after dropping Keona off and picking up some pop at the corner store. There was only one message on the machine, from her dentist’s office, reminding her that she had missed today’s appointment and had never called to cancel. Maren cursed under her breath, for offices like that charged you extra if you didn’t show up for an appointment. She didn’t have much money, for working at Barnes and Noble didn’t earn you much pay. There weren’t many other jobs available anyways in Salem, Massachusetts, especially for Maren. She had never gone to university, and still wasn’t sure what she wanted to do as an adult. She certainly didn’t want to be stuck at Barnes and Noble for the rest of her life.

She went to her room and tore off her dress, now wearing only her bra and panties. Maren slipped into her tank top and boxers, then collapsed onto her bed and turned on the television. Her favourite movie, Shakespeare in Love, was on, but she had little interest. She wanted to sleep, and as soon as her eyelids began to feel like heavy weights, they fluttered to a close, and she slept with the television on. It had been a long and trying day.

Maren awoke a few hours later, at the sound of the telephone ringing, and she knew who it was before she answered it. “Hello?”

“Hey, it’s Cameron.”

She had guessed correctly. “Hey, how was work?”

“Business as usual,” Cameron laughed, “so, how are you doing?”

“I napped for a while. Haven’t had any supper yet, so I’ll just go and get takeout,” Maren replied.

“No, I mean, how are you doing with the whole post-funeral situation?”

“I’m fine,” Maren said briefly.

Cameron sighed through the phone. “Well, that’s good. You doing anything tomorrow morning?”

“I don’t think so. Why?”

“I thought maybe we could take a walk together at Marine Park, just to let loose some emotions and appreciate the flowers,” Cameron suggested.

“You make it sound so romantic,” Maren giggled, “it’s so odd how that park used to be a landfill.”

“It’s neat how you can take something ugly and hideous, then turn it into something beautiful,” Cameron said thoughtfully.

“Yeah, well, I’ll see you tomorrow morning,” Maren replied, “good night.”

“Good night. I love you.”

Maren turned back to her bed and turned off the television, for it was kind of hard to sleep with Judge Judy preaching in the background. Her eyelids drifted off into slumber just moments after closing. She wouldn’t know until several days later how important that quote that Cameron had said about turning beast into beauty would be.