Minnesota Goodbyes

Entry #52

Lacy got drunk last night; I'm not sure with who. Sam and Jay, maybe, but she didn't tell me, so it could've been Nick.

Doesn't really matter, I guess. She didn't want to talk about last year and neither did I. (Which feels sort of ironic, actually, with how much I've already said about last year.) So Lacy wasn't home at all last night and I can't decide if that's a good thing or not. Maybe I needed her last night, when that year mark rolled around.

Thing is, I think she was with the guys. She texted to tell me that she was fine and wasn't coming back that night. (Even though her grammar was perfect, I know she was drinking. When she is, she'll do this thing where she holds her phone as close to her face as she can without her nose actually pressing against the screen. After a series of chicken pecks and pauses and pecks, Lacy'll have the whole message out. It might take five minutes for her to type out a sentence, but it'll be grammatically perfect.)

When she slunk back home today, I could tell she was suffering from a hangover. Smudged makeup and too-big sweatpants (Jay's? Nick's?) and rat's nest hair are not Lacy's style.

I'm trying not to think of last night (and the last night), but I can't help but imagine it.

When they first gather, they're somber, the four of them. Until Lacy unscrews the bottle of wine or Jay passes around some shot glasses. Then it's not so much somber as sharing their solitude. A numbing. A forgetting.

But they're still alive, right? Clair and I live in the grave, and they don't. The dead us and the living them. So they can talk about the past, letting the words unjam and uncoil until they spill out, and then there is laughter lined with tears. Recalling the things before and letting them ease the after. The past hurts, but words can still help the living.

And when their pain is stolen from them, they all deflate. (Maybe that's what healing is; the broken part of you is snatched away and remembered no more. I wouldn't know, though; if it's taken, so is Clair.)

But they're healed. What is this anniversary to any of them? Is it a cross on their calendars or a black mark on their hearts?

I don't think so. It's the memory of a thief first taking a girl; then time robbing them of her memory.

So the night must've ended with the four of them sprawled out in the living room (Lacy on the couch because of chivalry, with Sam jammed on the other side because of non-chivalry). Her hand trailing to the floor, brushing Jay's shoulder. Nick slouched in an armchair, gazing out the window absentmindedly. Taking another swig while the others drowsed in restless sleep.

There's a curl of anger in my chest when I think of Nick.

If I'm lucky, he hasn't forgotten. If I'm lucky, her memory festers in him, rancid and curdled.

We don't deserve to forget her.