My head is searing by the time I open the front door. I drop the groceries in the entryway and run straight to the bathroom.
Taking a deep breath, I grasp the edge of the sink, the marble cool underneath my palms.
“She isn’t haunting you. It’s all in your head, idiot,” I say to my reflection.
I lean forward to stare at the scar, the long, jagged red line still inflamed and angry. I reach up, almost touching it, wanting to feel the healing skin underneath my hand, wondering what is still broken underneath it.
Which might be everything.
I let my hand fall, and my fingers find the counter again, gripping tighter. My gaze drops from the scar to meet my own reflected eyes, the pupils large and unsteady.
“Kyle?” a voice says from behind me, and I practically jump a mile.
I lean to the side and look past my reflection in the mirror to see my mom, still in her work clothes, her eyes tired but alert.
“Are you okay?”
When I don’t deflect right away, she grabs hold of my hand, leading me down the hall and into the living room. She sits me down on the couch, and I finally blurt out the truth.
“I keep seeing Kimberly,” I say as I brace myself for the look of pity to cross her face. “On this couch, and at the ice cream parlor, and today in the stands. I know it’s not real—you don’t have to tell me that. But, Mom… it feels so real. And I keep feeling like it’s because it’s my fault that—”
She squeezes my hand to stop my rambling, my words hanging heavy in the open air.
“Kyle, none of this is your fault,” my mom assures me, her voice calm. Certain. “None of it. You’re going to get better.”
I don’t believe her, but at least she’s not looking at me like I’m insane or pathetic, which is a relief. Just telling her seems to help me get my breathing back under control.
“Do I even deserve to get better, though?” I ask. My voice cracks on the last syllable, and I swallow hard, fighting to pull myself together.
She takes my face in her hands, her thumbs softly tracing my cheeks. “You’re going to be just fine. It takes time to heal. To move on. And not just physically,” she says, then takes a deep breath. “When your dad died, it took everything in me to pull myself together so I could show up and be the best parent I could be for you.”
My memories from then are so hazy and incomplete because I was just barely in kindergarten. I can’t get my shit together now, but she did it all while taking care of a kid.
“How did you do it, Mom?” I ask her. “Kim said that night that I didn’t know how to be myself without her, and I’m starting to think that she’s right.”
“I’m still doing it. One step at a time,” she says. “Always forward. Never back. Just like you’ll do.” Her eyes grow serious. More serious than I’ve ever seen them. She reaches out and pulls me in for a hug. With her face buried in my neck, I can just barely make out her whisper. “You’ll fight to come back.”
Always forward. Never back.
I think about that as I unpack the groceries and smuggle the pizza rolls into my mini fridge in the basement. She said I’d fight my way back. But I’ve never had to fight alone. Through the shoulder injury, through pregame jitters, through tough classes at school, I always had Kim’s support.
Kim told me that night that I could move forward without her.
The thing she didn’t tell me was how.
I pick up the photo of us from the homecoming game and sit down on my bed. Her smile glitters up at me.
My forward always had her in it. We had already signed up for classes at UCLA, my schedule mirroring hers, even though she was the only one with some idea for a major. But I thought there would be time to figure out the specifics for me. To figure out what I wanted, Kim alongside me the entire time.
I guess, if I think about it, I didn’t have much of a plan for myself. More of a plan for us.
Even if I could picture it, there’s no way I can move forward now, haunted by the ghost of my girlfriend.
Ex-girlfriend, I correct myself. And somehow that makes it worse. Like I don’t have claim to the grief inside me. Just the blame. Even thinking of Kim haunting me makes me feel like a dick. She didn’t want to be with me in life, so why would she spend her time following me now? I toss the photo of us down on my bed, realizing there’s only one other possible answer for what happened tonight.
One that actually makes sense.
Maybe I’m just going crazy.
Maybe that’s what I deserve.