Almost Famous |h.s|

After The Article

Time suddenly slows down when you live in a constant state of pain. The minutes feel like hours and the hours feel like days and you get a sense that you will never escape the continual onslaught as wave after wave keeps hitting you. The funny thing about pain is that the minute you start to think you can bare it, that you can withstand it and get better....

Pain demands your attention again.

On August 16, 2018, my family received the one phone call we had managed to escape for so many years...

My baby brother, Jack Kline, had been killed in action while fighting for his country.

At most doctor's offices they ask you what your pain is on a scale of 1-10....and I had foolishly thought that I had known what pain was and what a 10 was on that scale...

what a stupid, ignorant thought that was.

I'll never be able to forgive myself for not calling Jack while he was overseas. It is something I grapple with to this day. I was so selfish, so fucking selfish to try to pretend that if I didn't think about the fact that he was over there that that meant he was safe.
So. Selfish.

On August 1st, my cover article for Rolling Stone came out. Harry's perfect face gracing the cover, although I had never actually looked at it. I couldn't stand to look at him at the time. My disgust with myself too strong to look at him even in picture form. The magazine sold hundreds of thousands of copies, more so than any other magazine featuring him in the past. I don't remember much from how I put the article together but I remember feeling proud of myself even in the aftermath.

Jack had sent me an email on August 12th telling me he'd read it and that he was so proud of me, his "big sis." He had teased me by saying that he wanted to meet him, the boy I'd written about...because Jack thought, from the way the article read, that it sounded like I was in love with Harry Styles....
Jack had been right.

On July 14th, I sat down with my boss's bosses and was told that I was finally promoted to a full time writer for Rolling Stone. I had finally gotten everything I'd ever wanted and yet it all felt poisoned.
That same day, Sinclair had sat me down and explained the regrettable events of the day before. I can sort of recall him saying that he had accidentally blurted out my role in everything to Harry, but the details were foggy. Either Harry asked Sinclair how the relationship part of his life was looking in the article or Sinclair did but none of it matters now. Harry was gone. The only shot at love I'd really had was long gone. Rachel had been right, I did regret it, I regretted it all.

Gemma, Harry's sister, had reached out several times in the weeks after I'd left California. Not only had she been so confused by what had happened between Harry and I, constantly leaving voicemails begging for me to explain what had occurred between us...but she had reached out almost every day after the news broke about my brother and the two other soldiers who had been killed in action. I never answered one text, nor a single phone call. The monster that dwelled within me now, causing night terrors and unfathomable amounts of pain, wouldn't let me.

On August 17th, I had received one phone call from a number I did not recognize but that had the same area code as Gemma's.
I didn't dare pick it up. I remember staring at my phone as it glowed with the number displayed on the screen and praying that it wasn't who I thought it was.
Whoever it was...they never left a voicemail.

On August 25th we were finally able to have my brother's funeral. It had taken the military a long time to get his body to us. Every day we waited was torment. My mom and dad cried every single day that had passed by and I remember watching them and wishing I could cry with them. I thought myself strange that I hadn't shed a single tear after hearing what had happened to him. It was like I was an empty shell with nothing left in me to cry.
When I had approached my little brother's closed casket, that was when I finally broke down. I had collapsed in front of an entire church full of people and I would have been embarrassed if I could feel anything other than the resounding ache in my chest. My 48 year old father had to scoop me up off of the floor and take me outside so that I could finally breathe. 

When we got to the burial site, I stood there with my mom and dad and watched his casket being lowered into the ground, crying the entire time. What had refused to leave my body for the last 8 days since his passing had finally decided to fall from my eyes. A lot of people were there, news crews, journalists, Sinclair, and many more. 

I distinctly recall seeing a figure off in the distance of the cemetery, underneath a willow tree, wearing a familiar pair of black ray bans, chocolate curly hair blowing in the wind, but I still think my mind was trying to help me cope. I remember feeling a smooth hand grabbing a hold of mine, pulling my eyes back down as they began covering the casket with dirt and when I looked up again, Rachel was giving me a worried glance.

Rachel had been by my side through it all. She had moved in with me after Jack's death because she didn't trust me enough to take care of myself. She clothed me, threw me in the shower, forced me to eat, made sure I went to work after my bereavement time was up, and most importantly, she filled the void of the loss of my brother. She had sent her transcript off to a University here in New York as soon as she could and got admitted into their program. She moved from her comfortable life in Virginia, where we grew up, away from her friends and family, just to be with me. 

I owe Rachel everything. I don't deserve her as a friend or as a sister, but she chose to save me anyways and I'm not sure what would have happened to me without her. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Time is an interesting thing. It pushes you forward, it makes you remember and reflect, and most importantly...

...it heals wounds. 

Nothing could ever fill the ache of the loss of my brother, ever, but in time I could live with it at the very least. 

As 2018 came to a close, I could't help but think back on the year I'd survived as the clock ticked down to midnight. Loss and pain were at the forefront but I'll never forget that as the clock struck midnight and everyone on my television was watching confetti fall as the ball dropped...

 I saw nothing but green eyes, a night full of stars, and sunflowers.