by Bedly Alcide
I did as I was told. He continued on saying, “Don’t you see that there was nothing you could have done to prevent Ashton’s death. I want you to tell me what role you played in his murder?”
“I brought him there!” I cried, flustered with his incomprehension. “I dragged you and him along with me to confront the Kurl! If I hadn’t been so caught up in saving the day, none of this would have happened. Furthermore, I let him jump in front of me! I allowed him to sacrifice his life! I could have just pushed him away if I’d been paying better attention. How can it possibly be anyone else’s fault but my own?”
Carson laughed humorlessly. I didn’t particularly enjoy that dry piece of sarcasm, and I was feeling rather irritable right now. I guess sibling really were there to test my limits. “Ashton would have followed you whether you told him he could come or not. I would have done the same. Do you want to know why? It’s because he cares about you! I care about you!” he released my hands from his grip, but they didn’t return to the steering wheel as he ran a hand through his hair. I took this to be a sign of annoyance. “You and I both wanted to avenged Gabriele’s murder and bring our mother’s stalker to justice. It was instinctual of us to want to watch out for our family, even if we don’t know where they are.”
“That’s not the point, Carson,” I said through gritted teeth.
“I’m not done yet!” he snapped. “There is no way you could have prevented him from jumping in front of you. I would have done the same thing had I not been trying to pry the gun from her hands. It was his sacrifice to make, and wouldn’t you rather he died that way than have had to suffer months of enduring cancer? You had no way of knowing what he was about to do, anyway. Beating yourself up like that is not going to make things any better, Dawn!”
“Well then, who else is there to blame, Carson?” I asked unthinkingly. This whole time that I’d been blaming myself, I hadn’t been thinking about who really was to blame. It wasn’t me. It couldn’t have been me. I’d been on the opposite side of the gun. I’d been the intended target.
“Are you kidding me?” he asked disbelievingly. “What about the girl who pulled the trigger? What about the girl’s mom who started this entire thing in the first place? If anyone is to blame, it’s the Kurl. She most likely forced her bad habits upon Loraine. How could you be to blame for any of that? Are you finally getting some sense into that thick skull of yours?”
I began driving then. I’d given in to the realization that I hadn’t actually killed him. Maybe I would eventually be able to move on with my life, but I still needed time for the wound to heal. It was one of those things that just needed time to stitch itself back up, even if it would leave an everlasting scar.
“I just didn’t know else how to cope, Carson,” I confessed. “I finally knew why it was that we felt that weird connection, and then he gets killed, and I’m not supposed to initially blame myself. It was just too much of a coincidence to only be a . . . well, a coincidence.”
“You’ve seen the light!” he exclaimed, nearly jumping out of his seatbelt. I smiled in wonder. I hoped he and I weren’t too much alike.
As we drove home, I felt another wave of tears attack my face. They were silent, at least. I figured I’d still be crying about this, years from now. What I wanted to figured out now, was where I would go next. Staying in Hazelwood didn’t seem like the right thing to do at a time like this. Maybe if I would go away for a little while and let things cool off in town, nobody would be as sore about me. Maybe I didn’t think his death was my fault anymore, but I didn’t know what everyone else though, despite their positive reaction at the funeral.
I would feel like a coward if I were to just run away from my problems, though. Did I really want to leave Ashton’s memory so abruptly? I didn’t know if I was ready to abandon that. Was it healthy to hold on? This was all new to me, and I had no idea how to handle the situation.
I was a believer. I believed that God was with me. Despite what had happened to Ashton, I knew there must be a reason I was still here and he wasn’t. I wasn’t going to fulfill any of those expectations staying in this dinky old town. Ashton would be with me in soul and heart if I left Hazelwood, wouldn’t he? God would ensure that. If Ashton was with me, in any form, I could do just about anything. I knew I could. And if I executed my destiny, then maybe I might just get to be reunited with Ashton someday in the distant future.
“I think we should travel,” I told Carson, voicing my idea. I thought it was a good suggestion and figured Carson wouldn’t be too opposed, as long as I didn’t remind him that I had school to finish.
“You’re only a sophomore in high school, Dawn. I can’t take you out of school,” he argued half-heartedly. Maybe he would be easy to persuade.
“Alright, fine,” I agreed. “I’ll finish out this year, and we’ll travel over the summer. I’d really like to meet Harvey, and I think it would be a good idea to try and locate Gloria. I bet you she’s still out there somewhere!”
“I would love to find Mom,” he said, clearly lost in an imaginative daydream of his own.
“So, it’s a deal?” I asked excitedly.
“It’s a deal.”
-The End-