Life without You...

Part 1 - The Funeral

Letty's POV

"It's never goodbye."'

Dom's drawling voice echoed in my head as we stood at his Father's graveside. Dom was now nineteen, Mia and I were sixteen. All that had been left to bury was ashes.

In a freak accident the chassis of Mr Toretto's Dodger Charger had twisted and when clipped by Kenny Linder, a fellow driver, it had forced the car straight into the wall at one hundred and twenty miles per hour. We'd been told the force of the collision had been enough to kill him instantly. Dom claimed he'd heard his father screaming as the tanks blew up and the car was engulfed in flames. Unfortunately I'd been there and as much as it pained me to admit it, Dom had been the one screaming. Even now I fancied I could still smell the burning of human flesh and metal. The thick black smoke rising into the air and the tears blurring my vision.

I shuddered at the cool air which now seemed to fill the graveside. Graveyards were always cold and on this day especially this one. I'd already buried my Father and they'd buried their Mother when they were small. Now they were burying their Father too. My heart was breaking for them. In many ways I felt like I was burying my own Father as Mr Toretto had treated me like one of his own. Mr Toretto had showed me my way around an engine. It was thanks to him I had built a car, a Ford Torino Cobra. The man had even taught me how to race a little.

Mia clutched my arm and I pulled her close to reassure her I was still there. Her composure had slipped now and there was no regaining it. Dom was stood like a boxer. His back as straight as though I'd stuck a poker up his ass, his hands joined in front of him. He looked every inch composed but you could see it in his eyes. He felt every drop of pain and was pretending he was coping.

"The life of the dead is placed in the memory of the living," Father Michael said clearly, his words ringing across the graveside, "And so we carry forth the memories of all who have died so they will never be forgotten." He paused for a long moment then turned to Dom as though forgetting the rest of us existed. "As long as you remember your Father, in your heart and in your mind, he will never be forgotten. He lives in you."

My own tears escaped at those heartfelt words and I felt Mia's weight sag on me even more.

"Hold up chica, it's nearly over," I murmured in her ear.

She gasped and fought back her now fresh wave of tears. It had been a hard few days for them and if I was honest I believed there was only so long a person could hold their composure for before it collapsed.

Whilst they shook the mourners hands after the burial of the casket I stood back. My heart was broken today and now I needed to either go to Mexico and rejoin my Mother or beg Dom to let me stay. School wasn't going good but I'd work in the garage all day and all night if I had to. I'd clean, cook, whatever. I didn't want to go Mexico. I had a life here and I couldn't leave it now it was just starting.

That night as we walked back through the doors of 1327, a house which had always been bustling with life, love and friendship, it was now dead, drained and weary. My dark hair tumbled out of its ponytail as I tugged the bobble out of it. Dom hung his suit jacket on the back of the chair and pulled his tie off from round his neck as though it had been strangling him. Mia mutely headed right upstairs.

Instantly I was drawn to the kettle. Tea was the solution to this emptiness.

"Letty," Dom began, his face crumpling with anxiety and his dark eyes dulling in pain.

"Dom, please let me stay," I begged.

"That's not what I was going to say, but we do need to talk about that," he said with a sigh, "What do I do now?"