Penny laughed. “Yeah right. So your date set you on fire because of me and James?”
“It was an accident.” I think.
“Mhm. What happened right before she set you on fire?”
“I was telling her about…” I cleared my throat. “Past relationships.” I’d almost let it slip. I’d almost just talked about Brooklyn. My stomach churned. And suddenly I felt like I was going to be sick.
“So you’re letting Penny set you up on dates now?” Rob asked. “Why? I just offered to be your wingman again.”
I waited for Penny to blab to everyone that I was on a dating app. Or James. Or Tyler, because apparently he knew too. But everyone stayed eerily quiet. “It was a one-time thing,” I said. “And I’m never doing it again.”
The smile on Penny’s face faded.
“I actually have a meeting,” I said. “Have fun watching the rest of the game.” I turned away before any of them could ask me to stay.
“Matt!” Penny called after me.
But I was already out the door. I was done with that stupid dating app. And I was done pretending I even wanted to date.
Chapter 19
Sunday
There was one more thing I did when I missed Brooklyn. Only when I missed her so badly that it hurt. At my lowest moments. And I hit those lows more often than I wished to admit.
“Hey,” I said into the cool night air. I blinked fast, the gravestone in front of me blurring slightly.
The flowers I’d brought by last time were dried and browned. I cleared them away before sitting down. I leaned my back against her tombstone and closed my eyes. Sometimes in the middle of this graveyard on a night like this, you could barely hear the city traffic. And it was like I could feel her in the silence. Like she was still here. She haunted me the most in the silence.
“I had a bad day,” I said out loud and opened my eyes again. I ran my fingers along the grass that had been recently mowed. One of the worst things about those early days after I lost her was the grass on top of her grave, slowly growing in until it looked like she’d been buried here forever. I hated that fucking grass.
There were a million things I wanted to say to her. And the fact that she’d never hear them killed me every day.
“Is it just me, or does the fall really fucking suck?” I ran the back of my hand under my nose.
Silence.
“I thought I saw you the other day. I almost got in a car accident because I got so distracted. I don’t know what I was thinking actually. You’re gone and I’m just…stuck.”
Silence.
“It’s hard to breathe when I think I see you in the city.”
Silence.
“I feel like I’m drowning.” Brooklyn had said that to me once. I’d added to that feeling for her. I’d never been enough. She’d deserved more than me. I’d let her down. Or else she’d still be here with me.
The silence was tearing me in two.
“What am I supposed to do, Brooklyn?”
Fucking silence.
“I’m worried that you’d hate what I’ve become. I think I hate what I’ve become.”
I sniffed.
“This wasn’t supposed to be how my life turned out. You were supposed to be here. You were supposed to be here with me, making me feel like I wasn’t drowning.”
I looked down at the grass. I felt like an idiot. Talking to the silence. But it was impossible not to talk to her when I came here.
“I tried drinking chamomile tea. I don’t even remember what it was for. But it clearly didn’t work because I’m here.”
Silence.
“Your dad texted me again.” I slowly exhaled. “I can’t forgive him for what he did to you. You’d probably want me to, right? You were all about second chances. And thirds. Your heart was so big.”
I stared off into the distance. “I’m going to make him pay, Brooklyn. I’m going to destroy him.” I should have tried to get him put away years ago. I owed it to her. And instead I’d just been…screwing around. Trying not to drown.
“I just miss you so much.”
The silence was going to kill me, I knew it.
I knew why I was here though. It wasn’t to talk about missing her, or to talk about how her dad was a dick. She knew all that. I was here because I felt like I needed to make a confession. And I’d feel better once I got it out. Please let me feel better. “Penny set me up on a dating app.”
Silence.
I looked toward the spot where I was pretty sure I’d buried her engagement ring. “I wanted a family with you. It’s all I wanted. I don’t want that with anyone else.” I took a deep breath. “I promise, Brooklyn. I promised you then and I’ll make good on it now.”
I wasn’t sure how many times I’d come here, trying to feel better about the shitty life I was leading. But this was different. One-night stands and random hookups were meaningless. It’s why I did them. Because it wasn’t a betrayal. But the dating app made me feel guilty. Even though I knew I wasn’t taking it seriously.
“I promise,” I said again. “But…I think maybe, a little part of me still wants all that stupid stuff. A family. A home. And I’m sorry that I want it. I’m so fucking sorry.” I didn’t have to say anything else. We both knew I wouldn’t act on those feelings. We both knew I could never move on. I’d never do that to her. I couldn’t.
“It just hurts more in the fall,” I said into the silence. “You get it. You get what it feels like to have no one.”
I looked over to her uncle’s gravestone. I knew how terribly alone she’d felt after his death. She never deserved to go through so much pain. She never deserved to die feeling like she had no one by her side. No one deserved that. “I’m sorry.”
I always came here when I missed her the most. When I felt like I had other things to apologize for. But it always came back to that one moment. Of letting her down right before she passed away. Of letting her feel like she was alone. “You weren’t alone. You always had me.”
All I wanted to do was lie down and close my eyes. I’d done that a lot the first few months after she’d passed too. I’d slept right here. To make sure she knew she wasn’t alone. I shifted so that I could lie down on top of the grass. I just needed her to know that I was here.
“It’s hard this time of year, Brooklyn. And I always wonder what we would have been doing if you were here.” I swallowed hard and looked up at the starless sky. I didn’t have enough memories of her to fill 16 years of missing her. So I just replayed all of them. Even the ones that hurt like hell. Especially the ones that hurt like hell.
“It feels like you’re disappearing on me. And I don’t know how to live without you.”
I didn’t want to. I couldn’t. “I don’t know why I asked what we’d be doing if you were here. I know what we’d be doing. We’d have a family. We’d be happy in our home. We’d have each other. That’s all I ever wanted.”
I felt tears trickle down the corners of my eyes and into my hairline. “I don’t want to do this without you anymore. I feel guilty all the time. I feel like fucking shit every day, Brooklyn.”