Dear Andrew

Dear Andrew,
I keep trying to imagine you dead, but it doesn't compute in my brain. Not that I want you to be dead but you understand. I know that you are, I get that. Yet when I think of Thea or your father, you are always part of the thought, a natural extension. Everytime I talk to Thea I alway ask how you and your father are. As soon as Emily called me I felt sick and wanted to be home as soon as possible. Even worse when Thea confirmed what Emily had told me, along with what Mrs. Hummell told my mother made me cry. I thought about the last thing we had that could be considered contact, me telling you I wanted you more in my life on your facebook wall. I never could have conceived how little time you had left, and that I really would not get to seen you again. Get to see you smile and laugh, see you confused, have you make fun of me or vice versa. I realized I've spent more time with you than I've realized. Hours logged at St. James teaching Sunday School with your father, coffee hours, random visits to your house. Eating dinner with you and Thea and your dad. Seeing you at SPSG when you came to pick up Thea. The last time I saw you was over winter break at your house watching Wedding Crashers. We knew that you were outside getting high, and when you came back in you wrapped yourself in a cocoon of blankets. When I said goodbye, what I did was touch your face and laugh. I wanted to call you lucky, tell you next time invite me. I wanted to hug you and kiss your cheek, but who does that to their friends younger brother? Now I wish I had. You are (were) such an amazing boy. I never didn't enjoy seeing you or spending time with you. You were my husband, my favorite, and now you're gone. I won't get to see you randomly on a whim. Ever again. I miss you. Love you.

"And if you were with me tonight,
I'd sing to you just one more time.
A song for a heart so big,
god wouldn't let it live.
May angels lead you in.
Hear you me my friends.
On sleepless roads the sleepless go.
May angels lead you in."

Three Feet of Life and Death

I remember, once when I was a child, I was in what was almost a car wreck not 400 yards from my house.

My father had been drinking heavily, as was his wont, and my mother remember that it was time to pick up my younger brother from a friend’s house. My father insisted he drive, and in those days no one crossed him, so we got in the car and let him drive us off. We managed to pick Tucker up without incident, save for father being rude to everyone for no reason, and playing bad music on the radio. He always listened to the radio. I never knew why, I hated the radio, which I think is why I still know very little about the people that make music: I just listen to bands I might hear by accident. He yelled at me and complained to Mum, saying this thing or that thing was wrong with her, the house, the car, or his life, and it was someone else’s fault, never his own.

After we got Tucker, he and I initiated what was something of a game to us when he was in his drunken state, which was to agitate him as best we could with verbal jabs, and try to not get hit by his hands as they flew into the back to slap us, like shrapnel, having no real direction.

“You’re drunk dad! You should slow down.” I usually concentrated my attacks on his drunkenness or his inability to do something (in this case drive without getting everyone killed). There were seeds of real fear in my voice, though. I was really afraid of him when he was in this state, and I knew he was a terrible driver, even when he was sober. I never wanted to ride with him when drove; I never really wanted to be near him at all. He was a scary creature, and vile. He was the Urukai in my life, and there was no way to get far enough away that that wouldn’t hit.

Naturally, he sped up to spite me in his drunken state. This was not something I had expected, and was very scared when he did, crying out for him to slow down, but he only got faster and faster each time I pled with him. Mother asked to for him to slow down, but he just told her to “shutup woman,” so I thought for sure we were dead. As we came around a turn, another car was speeding heavily, and didn’t make the curve, blowing through our lane and up the side of the embankment made by the carving out of roadbeds into mountains, and swerved back down, into the road, and continued on its merry way. Our car stopped after this, and we panted for a moment, terrified, and then made our way home.

The question I wonder is what would have happened in those scant moments, if I hadn’t said a word, or if he was a kind man, and had listened to me, or if mother had had any kind of sway with him. If he had gone a reasonable speed would I be dead now? Would we have been okay or would have never even seen the incident if we had been going slowly enough? How is it that there was three feet between the two cars, and we both came out unscathed? What grace is afforded us in those brief seconds between life and death, where everything is foggy, but everything can nevertheless be seen with such perfect clarity…and then it’s gone, maybe to never be found again.