Page 72 of The Lies We Steal

“Other times, it’s not as easy to tell when something needs to be put down. You may not see it right away, but it’s always in the eyes. That’s where you see if a person is already dead, even if they’re completely healthy. Their heart is beating, but their eyes, they have already gone cold.”

I thought about what he said a lot over the years. Especially when I looked into the mirror.

I thought about it even more as I walked behind Silas. I could only hear the crunching of dirt beneath our shoes and the echoes in my memory of Silas screaming. And just like that cougar when I was eight. Like he was being torn apart limb from limb.It wasn’t a roar it was a shriek that broke through glass. The pieces stabbing into my chest as I watched him just moments ago, sob over Rosemary’s body.

His hands pumping into her chest, over and over again. I could barely watch knowing it was doing nothing. So painful that hope wasn’t even an option. I cringed when the cracking of her ribs filled the air. It was at that moment, Rook and I had to do something while Thatcher called for help. She was gone. She’d been gone for hours now. We all knew that when we saw her.

None of us had the heart to tell him that though, not until he was doing more harm than good.

My hands grabbed at his shoulders, “Silas,” I think it was the softest my voice had been since I was child, “You gotta stop. She’s gone, she’s gone.”

“Fuck off! Fuck off, Alistair!” He weeps, pushing down with more force. Rose’s body has zero resistance to his strength. She shakes with every chest compression, her normal flushed cheeks are a morbid gray and it makes my eyes prick to see her like that.

I tug harder, hooking underneath his armpit. Rook follows my lead, and I can hear his voice,

“Si, please, man.” His voice is wet, the tears soaking to his throat, “You’re only gonna make it worse, just let her go.”

Police sirens whine in the distance, the flashing red and blue lights bounce off the trees outside, breaking through the destroyed house teenagers used to get wasted without their parents finding out.

“No! NO! Rosemary, wake up, Rosie, please! Let go of me! I have to help her, GODDAMMIT, ROSE!” My arms burned with strain as we hauled him off her body, his feet kicking out as he fought us the entire way.

I’d done a lot for my friends. This was the hardest.

We held him down like a wild animal, nothing we could say would calm him down. He just kept howling her name into the night. Like the moon would hear his pleas and restore her life.

I wanted that for him.

If I could have traded places with Rose. If someone would have given me the option, I would have let them take me instead. Just so Silas would be okay.

The police, the EMTs, they came in like a swarm of bees. Buzzing around the scene, talking in hushed voices. When the shock faltered a bit, when he realized she wasn’t coming back and there was nothing the medics could do but cover her with a sheet, he went silent.

My throat was sore for him, and even though we tried to get him to leave, to get in the car so we could help him. He refused to leave. And because I was drained mentally, I had no fight in me. I couldn’t have wrestled him all the way to the car, so we waited with him.

We stood by until the police were finished, even after they questioned us. We didn’t move. Not, until they were about to lift her up onto the gurney and that’s when he moved again. Like a raging bull he pushed through them, shoving his way next to her again.

Officers reached for him, yelling at him that he wasn’t allowed past the yellow tape like we hadn’t already been there forty minutes prior to their investigation. He ignored them, like bullets ricocheting off metal, their voices did little to stop him.

Rook snatched his shoulder, “Silas, what are you doing man?” Worry riddled him, afraid of his answer.

He turned, a few feet away from her cloth covered body, facing the police and all his friends. It was like he was looking straight through us when he said,

“I just wanna carry her one more time. Her feet get cold when she doesn’t wear shoes outside.”

Nobody, not a soul tried to stop him as he scooped her up into his arms. Her sluggish arm falling out from underneath the white sheet, the tips of her fingers painted bright red.

We walked behind him, Thatcher, Rook and me as he carried her to the ambulance. I watched her hand sway by his side, her hair spilling over his forearm and I hated knowing she’d never laugh again. That she’d never tell a corny joke again or tease Rook about his hair. I hated that she’d never be around to make us feel…normal. Like regular guys instead of Ponderosa Springs’ bastard sons.

How she’d crept into the spaces of my heart and become a friend, only to be removed so quickly. The way she didn’t care about how people stared at her in the hallway when she held Silas’s hand for the first time in middle school. The weird schizo holding hands with the mayor’s daughter they whispered.

But Rose didn’t care.

She looked at Silas like none of that ever mattered.

Now, he was carrying her body to one of her last stops before she would be buried six feet beneath the ground.

Her life ended, just like that. Without any warning.

Taken from us.

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