Always Together | ✓

Chapter One

August 16, 2003
Dear Dad,

Can you hear me?
Do you see me?
Are you there?
Are you...dead?
If you are, I am sorry. If this is my fault, I am so terribly sorry.
Can we rewind the last ten minutes just like we do whenever we're watching Lion King?
If there's anything I can do to reverse time, would you whisper it to me?
I promise to stay silent.
I promise to listen just as I do in school.
I promise I won't be scared at night anymore, if you would just come back.
I promise to do my chores, to be nicer to my sisters and Mom.
I promise to do my homework every single day, if you'd just come back.
I promise we'll go camping, just the two of us.
I won't ask you to slow the cutting or to stop calling me Devie.
I promise I will hug you hard and never let go.
If you'd just come back.

Sincerely, Devie.

OH, GOD, THIS is heartbreaking.

He must have written this entry after he saw his father on the kitchen floor. I close my eyes and send a silent prayer to alleviate the immense pain of this little boy.

"Genna!" a high-pitched voice followed by an overly familiar bark brings me back to the now.

With shaky hands, I place the journal back in its box. With this box, he's given me his entire life. With these journals, he's being one-hundred percent transparent with me.

When Devin wrote this he knew no one would ever read it. He opened his true self to every word, every dot, every line because he knew paper would never judge him.

I take a full breath before I open the door. Angie runs into my outstretched arms. Her doggy kisses feel like home. I hug her tightly, bringing her as close to me as she can. How I have missed this little angel with horns.

"Hey," Isa says, kissing my cheek. "How was your weekend?"

"It was good, would you like to come in?"

She looks down at her wrist. "I'm kind of in a hurry. Lucas is home and that man can't cook to save his life."

"That's okay, don't worry about. Thank you so much for taking care of her. How was she?"

"She was great!" She kisses me again. "I gotta run. Bye, Genna. Bye Angie."

Angie's already digging her paws on the box. Her head is completely submerged inside it and her nose is sniffing wildly. Her back rolls on the journals as her eyes reel behind her head almost as if she's trying to spray her scent on Devin's belongings. I pick her up and kiss her nose.

"You're so bad and nosy. He's mine."

Carrying the box into my bedroom, I place it next to my nightstand. I grab the same journal I was reading earlier and flip the pages, looking at drawings of a father and a child fishing, biking, playing baseball, cooking. It brings a smile to my lips to see this part of a young Devin.

The colorful drawings continue for a few more pages until it's replaced by child-like writing.

September 06, 2003
Dear Dad,

It's been three weeks since you left.
I haven't been able to sleep; not since your passing.
I'm scared to close my eyes because whenever I do, all I see is you on the floor lifeless with no soul.
Blood.
Red.
Red.
I guess you already know this, but Mom found you.
I didn't have the strength to call the police. I couldn't speak to anyone.
All I heard were her screams.
All I heard were her cries; her shouts and pleads.
She shook me so hard, asking what I had done, asking why I did nothing to help, but I was mute. I didn't know how to answer her.
How can I look into her eyes when I know she blames me for your death?
Those memories create nightmares inside my head.
I can't sleep, Dad.
The blood won't go away.
The empty feeling inside me won't go away.
Missing you will never go away.

Sincerely, Devie.

I can relate to this letter more than any before because when Jess died, I had those same nightmares. Not as lifelike as Devin describes his, but I kept feeling her cold body wrapped around me. Then she would drop to the floor, her eyes wide opened, but the glint she used to have was gone.

This I can understand.

What I can't understand is why Devin would be ashamed of me finding out he had nightmares as a child when I've told him about my own? Touching the pointy edge of the paper, I turn the page and keep reading the thoughts of an eleven-year-old boy who witnessed his father's suicide.

December 23, 2003
Dear Dad,

Mom has bought a new house. She says we all need a fresh start.
This house is smaller than the last.
Isa and Vale have to share a room. They're a little mad about it, but since I'm the only boy and Camila is the oldest, we get to have our own rooms.
I barely ever get out of my four walls. I don't feel like going out anymore. All I want to do is stay home and close the blinds.
Mom and the girls don't get it.
They don't get my pain or screams in the middle of the night when I close my eyes.
Camila makes fun of me because I write in a "diary." I keep telling her it's not a diary, it's just a notebook, but she keeps on nagging. It's getting annoying and it hurts my chest.

Sincerely, Devie.

I never thought I could dislike a person as much as I do Camila.

From the day we met, I knew she wasn't a good person, but I'd hoped we could get along. Those thoughts have now shattered to the ground.

How can she be so insensitive toward her little brother's feelings? Why make fun of a boy who's lost the only person he looked up to? The only one who clearly understood him and had his back even when the entire world turned theirs.

Devin must have felt so alone, so lost in the arms of his own family, under the roof of his own home.