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"Yeah well, it seems, neither do you."
Elijah walks around to his side of the car and gets in. I can see my father out of the corner of my eye, but I don't turn my head to look at him. Elijah starts the car, and we're leaving. He reaches over and grabs my hand as I try to fight back tears. Try my hardest not to let them fall from my eyes. I close them, refusing to even let them cloud over.
Somehow I open my eyes, and we're in front of Elijah's house. He opens my door and begins leading me up the stairs.
"The boxes," I croak.
"We'll get them later."
He pulls me past the living room and kitchen, down the hallway, and into his room. Climbing onto his bed, he pulls me with him until I'm cradled in his lap.
"Let them fall, Jolie," he says low.
I shake my head. "They don't deserve my tears."
"No, but that doesn't mean you deserve to have to hold them in."
So I let them fall. He holds me while I let out what I hope is the last of tears for them.
"You take today, Jolie. You cry, you let yourself feel whatever you need to. Because I know that was probably one of the hardest things you've ever done. And I know you feel like nothing you said got through to them because they refuse to see, but it doesn't matter because it's what was on your heart, and what needed to be said. So you take today to sink down into all of that sorrow, all that anger, everything that rose back up as you stood in that room, in your parents' presence. But tonight, tonight Jolie, you rise from that hole, you let those feelings go, and know that you did the right thing and move on from it all. Do you hear me?"
I cry laugh at him taking his grandma's words and fitting them to me.
"Do you hear me, Jolie?"
I nod. "I do."
He kisses my forehead and lays me down. "I will see you when you rise again because I know you have the strength to."
He leaves me, and I pull one side of the blanket over me, covering myself in darkness, letting the tears flow.
When I wake up, the room is pitch black. I sit up in bed, Elijah, and kind of Louise's, word playing in my mind. Rise. And so I will.
I leave the past, even today, where it belongs. Far away from me. I let thoughts of my parents fade and push away any hope that they will ever change. That's not my responsibility. It never was. I was their daughter when they couldn't be my mother and father. And now, I don't need to be that anymore.
I get out of bed and go to the bathroom, splashing some water on my face. As I walk down the hallway, I see all of my boxes have been brought inside. I hear Elijah and Louise laughing in living room and go there. They both look up at me as I sit across from them.
"You have to tell me what the heck is going on here?" Louise asks, barely holding in a laugh, extending the photo album to me.
I take it and roll my eyes, chuckling. "God. I'd forgotten about this picture."
It's me, when I was eleven, at the county pool with a look of pure horror on my face.
"Callie had gotten out of the water, saying it was too cold. It was, but I teased her for it anyway. I stayed in the pool, even though my teeth were chattering. Next thing I know, people were screaming to get out of the pool. I was confused and looked over to see this huge spot of brownish water near where I was. Someone had pooped, or really gotten a bad case of diarrhea, in the pool. My dear sister was kind enough to take this picture as I came running over to her out of the water."
Elijah and Louise burst into hysterics.
"I was horrified." I laugh along. "I took probably the longest shower of my life when I got home. And we never went back there, no matter how hot it got. You guys are laughing at my trauma."
They look at each other, both their lips tucked in, before they start laughing again.
"You're both horrible."
I say it with a smile though. Only Elijah probably understands what it feels like to talk about someone you lost in such a normal way. Not with the pity in peoples' eyes when they speak of them, not about their deaths. To just speak of them as they were. Just people, who lived a life, even if it got cut short. Who appear in pictures, and live in our hearts. Just people we loved.
"We'll make it up to you," Elijah says, standing from the couch. "We got you a little something."
He walks over to the curtain and moves it aside. Interesting hiding place for something. I smile when I realize it's a dresser.
