The Line Between(22)

“So, will I see you later?” Asked Amy. Her hand traveled up my arm, and the sight of her suddenly made my ‘hard’ problem down below not so hard anymore.

“Not tonight,” I replied. “I need to spend time with my boys.”

Her protest died behind me when I picked up my bag and left. I needed to get out of there, and do something to rid my head of all Kennedy-related thoughts.

I was half way to our apartment when my phone rang. Pulling it from my pocket, I saw ‘mom’ flashing across the screen and sighed heavily before answering. I loved my mother, dearly, but sometimes having the simplest conversation with her was hard work.

“Hey mom,” I greeted. My voice was thick with the practiced enthusiasm I had whenever she called.

“Hi sweetheart. I haven’t heard from you in a while so I thought I’d check in.”

Melanie Winters was a beautiful woman, with a heart to match, but unfortunately life had tainted her. I understood her pain, and her loss, but we coped with it in different ways.

My mother became a shell of her former self, like she’d crawled deeper into herself and never came out. I, on the other hand, chose whatever would numb the torn edges of the hole in my chest, whether it was too much alcohol or sex with faceless girls. God knows I should’ve made better choices, but at the time it had worked and I’d felt nothing.

“Sorry, mom. Classes have been really busy, and dad got me that assistant coach position that’s also taking up my free time.”

“I understand sweetheart, I just…” the line went quiet, and when my mother spoke again I could hear the hitch in her voice. “I miss you,” she sniffled. Fuck. I couldn’t deal with her when she got like this. I didn’t want to be insensitive, but it was just too damn hard. “You’ve been so absent lately, Dane, and sometimes I feel like I’ve lost both my children.”

The air left my lungs like I’d been hit with a sledgehammer. I hated talking about this.

“Your birthday is coming up,” she said. “Your father thinks we should do something this year.”

“No,” I snapped.

My mother’s sharp inhalation on the other side was audible, and I winced. She didn’t deserve my hostility. We were after all carrying around the same sorrow.

“Don’t you think we should do something this year?” My mother asked quietly.

“What’s the point?” I asked. “Jewel isn’t here anymore mom, and I don’t feel like celebrating when my twin is buried six feet under.”

I regretted the words immediately, knowing they would cause my mother a world of hurt. I should’ve been more considerate, but bringing up my sister, and the fact that she was no longer alive, was a trigger.

“Dane.” She hiccupped, and it scratched at my self-condemnation.

“Sorry, mom,” I said. My body suddenly felt weary, and I wanted the conversation to be over already. “I just…”

“I know honey, I know, but you can’t hide from the rest of your life just because she’s gone. You have to live enough for both of you.”

Her words echoed and bounced around in my head. She was right, but I didn’t have the heart to tell her I had no idea how to live anymore. I’d spent more than a year living in limbo, and I’d grown comfortable being stuck between the life I had before my sister died, and the life I now had without her.

“It’s not that easy,” I murmured. I’d stopped on the sidewalk just outside our dorm building. My feet were glued to the ground, and I thought the feeling of being stuck was quite fitting.

“You have to try Dane, not only for Jewel but for yourself. And please, come home and see me. I miss you.”

I expelled a heavy breath from the confines of my chest, and clutched the phone tighter. “I will mom, I promise. I miss you too.”

“Call me, and we can do lunch okay? Love you.”

“I will. Love you too, mom.”

I ended the call and stood rooted on the spot for a few more minutes. My mind filled with images of my sister, her face so much like mine. Her hair was honey blonde, like our mother’s, and we’d both inherited her crystal blue eyes while I’d inherited my fathers’ dark hair. That was where our similarities ended. Our personalities were as different as night and day, and yet she was still my favorite person. She’d been the calm to my storm all our lives, right up until the moment she was taken from me. After that I was just…lost.

I found myself flicking through the photos on my phone, stopping at each one that was taken of my sister and me together. We were both smiling like goofballs in every single one, and then I stumbled across a photo I didn’t even know I had. Jewel was grinning, and so was Kennedy, their faces pressed close together. Jewels’ arm was extended, and I figured she was the one who took it. They were younger, both sophomores in high school. How it ended up on my phone I didn’t know, but I remembered the day it was taken…