Alone With Ross

•71•

Saying goodbye sucks.

Not saying goodbye seems even worse.

I started packing after the phone went dead, Ross' words still rang though my head, I was dying to know exactly what else had happened, but something tells me I don't want to know.

"Do you remember the day that I had told you I loved you? Because I can't seem to remember a time when I didn't love you." There was a pause. "It felt natural, it was easy, you know, you're an easy person to love."

After taping the last box shut I kicked it away, hearing the cardboard scratch against the hardwood. I felt empty, like I had packed away the things that had made my life partially full. I'm leaving with almost everything I came with, I've recently bought some toiletries and organization baskets and hangers, just basic things I'm going to need for my dorm.

Mama Vi was able to pull some strings for me, helping me get a cheap car, it's decent, I'm just hoping it would be able to make the drive safely.

"What time are you planning on heading out?" Mama Vi came around the corner, a file under her arm.

"In a couple of minutes I just want to think for a bit, and I'm planning on staying the night at this motel, I want to get at least six hours hammered out." I put my hands into my back pockets and Mama Vi nodded taking the file that was under her arm, her face somber. "What's this?"

"Your birth records."

I opened up the file to see my two small footprints on a fancy looking piece of paper. My social security number. As well as my birth certificate, my eyes zeroed in on my parents' name neatly jotted down on the bottom, I ran my fingers over it, trying to see if I could feel the grooves of where the pen had made its mark.

It's strange, how when you discover things that people have left from their life time, how they're still here, my parents are gone, but they'll still be in all of the books they've read, places they've wandered, papers they've signed.

It's comforting.

"Thank you, I haven't seen this stuff since I was a kid." Mama Vi patted my back, bringing me into a hug, a goodbye.

"Things get worse before they get better." She began. "You've experienced the lowest of lows, now there's nowhere to go but up. You deserve the world."

I wanted to tell her about how I had doubted her words, I wanted to tell her that I couldn't see things getting better because I was so blindingly numb to the world around me. But at the same time I wanted to believe her.

"Thanks for everything." I hugged her a little tighter. Pulling back to get one last glance at her, she had tears in her eyes but a smile on her face. A pleasant picture.

"Call me when you stop at hotels and such, just so I know you're okay." I nodded in response and grabbed the last box that I had kicked across the room. Just I was about to leave I had stopped in the doorway. "Vi?" She turned to look at me and I looked at the ground almost ashamed for leaving this task for her. "Tell Ross I'm sorry." She nodded her head walking behind me to shut the door.

After packing the box away I was off, to a different page, different phase, a different life.

One without Ross.

••••

"Come on, pick up already." I held the phone tightly to my ear only to hear Caspian's voicemail again. I finally pulled up to the house, not even grabbing my things I head inside as quickly possible, and I barged into Mama VI's office only to find the couch empty, the blankets she used folded and put away beneath the couch.