Page 244 of Every Breath After

And I can’t really blame him.

For keeping his distance. For avoiding this…denying it…

For not giving up on her, when the rest of us so clearly have.

Sure about that?

But as quick as that doubt rises, I squash it down, knowing it’s pointless.

I don’t feel her. I don’t feel anything.

And short of a body, we’ve had all the confirmation we need. A first-hand witness account of her death. The FBI isn’t going to continue wasting resources on trying to disprove that, much less scour the planet for what remains of her, if anything.

But Mason refuses to accept it. He refuses to bury an empty casket.

And now that I’m here, staring reality in the face as a mahogany coffin hovers over a six-foot-deep hole in the ground—and there’s a priest yammering on about fate and better places, shoveling empty platitudes and irrelevant scriptures into the graves that now reside in each of us…

Well, if I didn’t smoke a fat blunt with Waylon and Ivy on the way here, and take twice as much Xanax as my prescription calls for, I’d probably do something stupid and fucked up. Make a scene. Lash out dramatically. Like shove the priest into the hole, or sob and bash my fists on the waste of money that is this empty coffin.

Little does Father whatever-his-name know, these holes inside us can’t be filled.

Nothing will ever make this okay, or any easier to swallow.

Not even a body. Even if that’s what Mason likes to think he needs.

Whichever way you look at it, it’s torture all the same for all of us.

Waylon and I stand side-by-side, staring down at the sealed casket. On his right he has his cousin, Ivy, and on my left I have Phoebe.

At one point, Mason’s little sister curls her hand around mine. For some reason, it reminds me to take a breath. Except when I do, I catch a whiff of fresh dirt and flowers, and it just reminds me where we are.

It makes me wonder if Mason’s high right now. High like me.

Maybe he’s lucky—maybe he’s sleeping, rather than torturing himself with things like empty caskets and news trucks and fantasies of beating up priests.

Gavin’s not here today, which speaks volumes as to how worried everyone is about Mason.

I try not to think about it.

I’m still too pissed off at him.

Still too numb to be anything but angry with Mason.

Because it’s easier to feel that than be worried I’m going to lose him too.

Easier to focus on him than the fact I’m at my sister’s fucking funeral.

This isn’t right.

This isn’t the way things were supposed to be.

A hand appears in front of me, extending a flower.

With my free hand, I pinch the stem between my fingers.

Red roses. The flower she pretended to the world was her favorite.

Because the truth is, Izzy’s favorite wasn’t a flower at all, but a weed—daisies. And not the kind that are planted intentionally or sold at flower shops, but the kind that invade gardens and grassy fields, and poke through wooded backyards, growing unchecked, imperfect and wild.

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