Until Lila.
Life had broken her.
Just as it had broken me.
Maybe it was why we found each other.
Call it fate, kismet… or maybe it was God’s doing…
Lila was meant to hold my broken pieces together; just as I was meant to hold the shattered pieces of hers.
No, she didn’t fix me, and I didn’t fix her. We just… held each other; it was that simple.
“I got you,” I said softly against her temple.
She trembled in my embrace. “They didn’t deserve… to die. They didn’t!”
I murmured soothing words to her as she wailed her agony. “Why did they… die… and why… me… why am I… here? I want… to go… to my mom and my… dad. I don’t… want to be here. I don’t!”
I’m sorry, so so sorry, baby girl.
The pain flowing from Lila was as palpable as the frigid wind around us. Such agony and such a lonely, broken soul.
More time went by, and eventually, her sobbing turned into hiccups and quiet sniffles. Lila was still on my lap, face still tucked into the crook of my neck and her fingers still clutching my shirt as if her life depended on it.
I brushed her hair out of her face, my thumb rubbing over the trail of her tears. “I got you.”
She hugged me tighter.
“Can I meet your parents?” I asked.
Lila gave me the tiniest nod. She stumbled out of my lap and stood up on shaky legs. I did, too, trying to ignore the tingles prickling through my legs after sitting in the same position for too long. She took my hand in hers, and we walked toward her parents’ headstones.
“Hey, mom,” Lila said, her voice cracking. “I’ve got someone for you to meet.”
Catalina Garcia.
The sun shines brighter because she was here.
Beloved mother, wife and daughter.
She pointed at the tombstone beside her mother. “And that’s my dad. Dad meet Maddox, Maddox meet Dad.” A small, wobbly smile appeared on her lips. “And no, daddy. He’s not my boyfriend.”
Zachary Wilson.
A gentle man and a gentleman.
Loving father and loving husband.
What a beautiful memory you left behind.
My throat clogged with emotions, so I nodded in greeting. “It’s good to finally meet you, Mr. and Mrs. Wilson.”
Lila knelt down in front of the headstones. She brought her legs to her chest and wrapped her arms around her knees again. I realized, now, that she was trying to physically shield herself from the pain. I joined her as I tried to understand what I was feeling. There was a heavy weight on my chest, and it almost made it harder to breathe. Lila was eerily quiet for the longest time before she finally spoke.
“You scare me,” she whispered.
“Why?” You scare me, too.
“Because I trust you. Because I want to tell you what I’ve never told anyone before.”
Same, Lila. Fucking same.
“Do you know what hurts the most?” Lila said, sniffling. “The regret.”
I waited for her to continue to tell her story.
Lila
“I think I’ll always carry that regret in my heart because the last thing I said to my parents was that I hated them. I remember whispering it in the back of the car, but I don’t know if they heard it or not. Because right after I had said those words, I heard my father scream, and my mother cry out. Then… the car… I was in the air… and the next thing I knew, everything hurt. So much pain.”
A single tear escaped and slid down my cheek. I dashed it away, almost angrily, because right now, anger tasted bitter on my tongue while the pain laid heavy on my heart.
“I was only thirteen, well… almost fourteen. So young, so foolish, such a stupid, stupid brat. They wouldn’t let me attend a birthday party that all my friends were attending. Mom said they didn’t know the girl whose house I was going to, so they didn’t feel comfortable with me going. Dad didn’t think it was safe because it was too far from our neighborhood, and they didn’t know the parents. I wanted to go. I wanted to have fun with all my other friends. But they refused, and I was so, so angry. We were in the car, and we were arguing. Then I said… I hate you.”
The memories were vivid in my head, as if it were just yesterday. I could almost hear my parents’ voices, and if I closed my eyes, I could see them.
I looked away and blinked away the burning sensation in my eyes, but the tears didn’t stop. “I didn’t mean it. I didn’t. I just said it because I was angry, but I didn’t mean it, Maddox. I… didn’t. Those were the last words I said to my parents. That is my deepest regret,” I broke off, letting out a pained whimper. I choked on my shame. “It… hurts because I will never get to tell my parents how much I love them. I will never feel my mother’s arms or my dad’s warm hugs again. My mom will never sing me happy birthday in her silly voice, and my dad will never tickle me because he loved to hear me laugh. He said my laughs sounded like a chipmunk.”
I ducked my head, hiding behind the curtain of my hair. “Sometimes, I forget what it is to feel okay, to feel normal because I’m filled with… so many unspoken emotions.”
Maddox was silent, and I wondered what he was thinking about. Did he pity me? Could he feel my shame? I didn’t want to be pitied, though… for the first time since my parents died, I just wanted to be held.
I’d been pushing the people who cared about me away: my grandparents and Riley. They tried, but I always shut them down because I hated being pitied, I hated the sympathetic look on their faces. When Gran suggested therapy, I refused to see any shrink. Talking about my feelings to a stranger? Letting them see me at my weakest? No way.
Realization dawned on me, and I choked back a sob. By pushing them away, I was causing myself more pain. I needed someone to talk to.
I needed to be held.
I needed to cry and have someone tell me it was going to be okay.
Sniffling back a cry, I dabbed my tears away. Maddox was here, and it was ironic because of how much I despised him when we first met.
“Do you know why I hated you so much before?”
He let out a dry laugh, without any humor. “Because I was an asshole?”
If only he knew the truth…
Maybe it was time.
I took a deep breath and let it out. “No, I despised you, hated the mere idea of you, because you reminded me of my parents’ murderer.”
His head snapped up, and I could almost hear his heart beat rattling through his chest.
Thump.
Thump.
Thump.
There was a moment of silence, his lips parting as if to speak, but he couldn’t say a word. His eyes bore into me, searching, and I saw matching pain in his. My words hung heavily between us, and we both bled from the invisible gunshot, a festering open wound.
I swallowed past the heavy lump in my throat, my whole body shaking with tremors. “We wouldn’t have gotten into an accident if we hadn’t been hit by a drunk driver that night.”
Four years had gone by, and I was still haunted by the memory.
“He was seventeen and very drunk, way above the limit, especially for someone underage. The road was slightly icy, so he lost control of his vehicle. Our cars were travelling the opposite direction, and he hit us from the front. I still remember the bright headlights flashing in front of me as his car crashed into ours.”