One Foot in the Grave

by C. C. Hunter

  I lick my lips, still tasting his kiss. If I died right now, I’d go happy.

  Mom and Dad’s footsteps echo behind me. They say something, but I ignore them. I’m in that moment, reliving it. How his kiss felt. How his kiss tasted. How his hair felt. How sweet life is. It doesn’t even matter that I’m dying.

  I move in and press my forehead to the glass. It’s cool, the April weather still holds a hint of chill in the air. Then I frown when I realize he never told me if he was Eric or Matt. I remember what I said about wanting Matt to kiss me since seventh grade. If he hadn’t been Matt, he’d have told me, right?

  My heart says it was Matt, but my heart isn’t real. Can I believe it? Damn, I don’t know who I kissed.

  “Leah?”

  I turn. Dad and Mom are staring at me, all happy like.

  “That seemed to go well.” Mom offers up a real smile. The kind that wrinkles the sides of her nose. It hits me then that I can’t remember the last time her nose wrinkled like that. I put that on my bucket list. Give mom more nose wrinkles.

  They look at me all goofy like. Part of me wonders if Mom saw us kissing. I don’t care. If it makes her happy, I’d kiss him again. It wouldn’t be a hardship.

  “Yeah. It went well.” Moving in, I hug her, then dad. It becomes one of those group hugs. I hear my mom’s breath shake, but it’s not the bad kind of shake.

  “I love you both.” Emotion laces my words. Happy emotion. Then I break free and me and my Donald Ducks bounce back to my bedroom to plug in my heart.

  While it’s not supposed to work like that, I’m sure that kiss ate up a lot of battery life.

  Once I plug in, I pick up the phone to call Brandy to tell her my boy news. Then I stop. Knowing Brandy, she’d feel obligated to find out whom I’d kissed, and even try to push him to come back. Maybe I’ll just keep this to myself. My secret. The one I’ll take with me to the grave.

  2

  The pizza’s cold, the consistency of cardboard. For a moment, Matt Kenner thinks he’s cut into the box, but he eats it anyway. It fills the hole in his stomach, but not his heart. He wants to call Leah. Wants to see her again. Wants to kiss her again.

  Wants to freaking pound his fist into the kitchen table. Death had already robbed him of his dad.

  The thump of a car door shutting has Matt sitting straighter. The swish and thud of the front door opening and closing adds to the late-night murmurs of the house. His brother’s footsteps clip across the wood floors as he no doubt follows the one light on in the kitchen.

  Matt looks over. Eric stands in the doorway. Eric, the buffer, more outspoken twin.

  Matt’s mind rolls that around for a second. It bumps into his ego. But Leah had wanted to kiss him—not Eric. Most girls Matt dated came to him by the way of Eric. When they couldn’t catch the eye of the more popular twin, they set their sights on him. He never blamed his brother, but who wanted to be someone’s second choice?

  “Hey.” Eric’s keys hit the table. He sees the pizza, goes to the kitchen candy drawer and pulls out a handful of M&Ms, then drops into a chair. Snatching a piece of pizza, he takes a bite, then drops three M&Ms into his mouth. He swears chocolate and pizza were meant to be eaten together.

  Right then, stale beer and another unpleasant smell mingle with the cold-pizza aroma. If his mom were up, and aware, she’d give Eric hell for drinking and driving. She isn’t up. Isn’t aware.

  She’d been like this ever since their dad died. Going to sleep by eight after crashing from Xanax, only to get up the next morning and load up all over again.

  “Should you be driving?” Matt fills in for his mom.

  “I had two beers.” Eric’s disapproving expression is one more reserved for a parent than a brother, but the look doesn’t hang on. His brother has done his share of filling in when it came to Matt too.

  Eric rears his chair back on two legs. “I thought you were going with Ted to stay at his dad’s lake house.”

  “I changed my mind.”

  “Why?”

  Matt’s only answer is a shoulder shrug. After he’d left Leah’s, he’d just wanted to feed his stomach and be alone.

  “Were you talking to someone?” Eric eyes the phone in Matt’s hand.

  “No. Just thinking.” Matt sits his phone down on top of Leah’s number.

  His brother, pizza balanced on his fingertips in front of his face, studies Matt as if picking up on his mood. “About what?”

  “Leah McKenzie.” No real reason not to tell Eric.

  “Who?” Eric shoves the pizza into his mouth, tosses in three candies, chews, then swallows. “Wait, isn’t she that girl who’s sick? The pretty one, dark hair and light blue eyes, but too shy.”

  Matt swipes his phone, pretends to read it, but his mind’s on Leah. Oh, I . . . thought you were going to kiss me. She isn’t shy anymore.

  “You had a thing for her. Wasn’t she the one you were trying to get the nerve to ask out but she started dating someone else?”

  Matt feels Eric staring. “Yeah.”

  His brother takes another bite. Matt’s ego feels dinged again. The day he’d been about to ask Leah out, he saw her in the school hall, standing shoulder to shoulder with Trent Becker. Matt had lost his chance. Which was the real reason he’d jumped at the opportunity to go to her house today. Yeah, he needed the extra credit, but he’d already resigned himself to getting a C.

  “Why are you thinking about her?” Eric lowers the front chair legs, gets up, and pulls a soda from the fridge. “You want one?” he mumbles around a mouthful of pizza.

  “Yeah.” Matt takes the can, puts it on the table, palms it, and feels the cold burn on the inside of his hands. “I went to see her today.”

  “Why?” Eric pops the top on the soda, downs the fizzy noise, and drops back in the chair.

  “Ms. Strong tutors her and couldn’t make it today. She offered me extra credit to do it.”

  Eric’s brow wrinkles. “Is she like dying sick, or just sick-sick?”

  Leah appears in his mind, soft, smiling, and for some reason happy. “She doesn’t look sick, but . . . she’s got an artificial heart.”

  “Really? Like connected to a machine?”

  “It’s small, like a backpack. But . . .”

  “But what?”

  Matt spills, hoping it will lighten the weight in his chest. “She doesn’t think she’s gonna make it.” Which is why he can’t get how she could be happy.

  “Damn.” Empathy laces Eric’s voice. He sips his soda and studies Matt over the rim as if he knows there’s more to the story.

  “I kissed her,” Matt confesses. Keeping something from Eric is impossible. Identical twins know each other’s secrets. That weird twin-connection thing. Mom used to tell the story of how Eric, only three, had broken his arm playing at a friend’s house and Matt had come to her crying that his arm hurt before she’d even been notified. Matt couldn’t remember it, so he wasn’t a 100 percent certain it was true.

  “Why?” Eric nearly chokes on the soda.

  “She wanted me to. I wanted to.”

  Eric sets the can on the table with a half-full clunk. “No. You can’t do this. Don’t go there.”

  Matt stares at his unopened can. He wants to pick the damn thing up and throw it. “It’s just—”

  “No!” His brother’s sharp tone brings Matt’s gaze up. “Look at us. We haven’t . . . We haven’t gotten over losing dad. Mom can’t handle another loss. You can’t handle another loss. We gotta heal, damn it. No more death around here.”

  Matt stops short of taking his anger out on Eric. Hadn’t he just said the exact thing to himself? Wasn’t that why he hadn’t already called Leah? “I know.”

  “Seriously,” Eric says. “We can’t take on more grief.”

  “I said I know!” Matt closes his eyes, then opens them, wishing he didn’t see Leah’s smile, didn’t see her dreamy expression after he’d kissed her. Silence fills the yellow kitchen. The color reminds him of Leah�
��s Donald Duck house shoes.

  Eric finishes off the slice of pizza and then licks his fingers. Matt feels the slice he’d eaten, a lump in his stomach. The silence stretches out for too many long seconds.

  “Where’ve you been?” Matt asks, before the silence gives away just how hard this is for him.

  “Nowhere, really.”

  The vague nonanswer smells like a lie. Matt raises an eyebrow.

  Eric shrugs.

  Just like that, Matt knows where Eric’s been. “You’re seeing Cassie again?”

  “Get out of my head.” His brother drops the chair down on four legs with a clunk.

  “Like you don’t stay in mine!” Matt picked up his soda then slams it down. “What did you just tell me? That we need to heal. Cassie isn’t what I call healing.”

  His brother squeezes his can. The crunch of aluminum sounds tense. “First, this thing with Cassie isn’t what you think. Second, getting involved with someone who’s dying isn’t in the same category as Cassie.”

  Dying. Matt flinches. “Maybe not, and nothing against Cassie, but she dumped you twice, and you went into a funk both times.”

  “I told you, I’m not dating Cassie. It’s not like that.”

  “Then what’s it like?” Matt hears his mom’s tone in his voice.

  “She’s dealing with something.” Eric exhales as if he’s been carrying around old air, or old pain. Matt feels it too.

  “What kind of something?”

  “Will you stop it!” Eric belts out then closes his eyes in regret. “She won’t tell me. She won’t tell anyone.” His jaw clenches. “Everyone’s saying she’s been acting weird, so I talked to her, and something’s definitely going on.”

  “Can’t she turn to one of her friends for help?”

  Eric’s posture hardens. “I’m not going back to Cassie.”

  Yeah, you are. Matt can see it, even if Eric can’t.

  The whoosh of a toilet flushing from his mom’s bathroom brings their eyes up and the tension takes an emotional U-turn. Not that it lessens, it just changes lanes.

  Matt hates this lane.

  His dad’s death still hurts, but the way they’re losing their mom is almost as bad. Instead of moving past the hole in her heart that their dad’s death had brought on, she’s curled up inside it. Lives and breathes the grief.

  Matt exhales. “Did you call Aunt Karen?”

  “Yeah.” Eric shakes his head. “She going to call but she can’t come down. She’s working some big case.” He pauses. “She came down twice last month. We can’t expect her to do more.”

  Matt stares at his hands cupping the cold soda. “Then we have to do more.”

  Eric nods.

  “Maybe we could get Mom out of the house tomorrow,” Matt says. “Go see a movie and eat dinner out. I’ll see if I can get her to go jogging with me. She used to all the time.”

  Eric runs a hand down his face. “We could take her to the plant store. She used to love working in the yard.”

  “Yeah.” Matt closes the pizza box. “You want another piece?”

  “Nah. I’m out of M&Ms. Besides, I went by Desai Diner and ate the food of the gods.”

  “That’s what I smell.” Matt’s brother’s love for anything curry, and chocolate and pizza, are probably the only two differences in their tastes. Well, that and girls.

  Standing, Matt sticks the leftover pizza back in the fridge, then snags his soda and phone. His gaze falls to the scrap of paper with Leah’s number that he’d hidden under his cell. He picks it up, wads it up, feeling the same crumbled sensation in his chest, and tosses it in the garbage.

  Eric is right. When one person in this family hurts, they all hurt. He can’t do that to them.

  3

  May 15th

  Matt wakes up gasping for air. He blinks, trying to make out the images flashing in his head—images of running in the woods. Of fear. From what, he doesn’t know. Just a dream.

  Swiping a hand over his eyes, he sits up. Sharp stabbing pains explode in his head. He pushes his palm over his temple. Agony pulses in his head with each irate thump of his heart.

  Though he’s not certain why he’s angry. He goes to get up, feels dizzy. Feels himself falling. But he’s not falling. He still grabs for the dresser.

  When able to walk, he heads to the bathroom in search of some painkillers. Swallowing two bitter pills without water, he stares at himself in the mirror. For one second he swears he sees Eric standing behind him; then he’s gone.

  Confused, he splashes cold water on his face. The pain fades but leaves a numb sensation.

  He heads back to his room, stopping when he notices Eric’s bedroom door is open. His brother sleeps with it shut. Matt peers in the room. The bed’s unmade, empty. The clock on the bedside table flashes the time. Three a.m.

  He walks to the kitchen thinking his brother is probably eating a bowl of cereal. The kitchen’s as empty as the bed. The ice maker spews out a few chunks of ice. The heater hums warmth through the house, but Matt feels cold.

  Frowning, he goes to peer out the living room window. His brother’s car is here. Where the hell is he at three in the morning?

  Damn him, he knows better than to stay out past midnight. Sure, Mom’s no longer enforcing curfews, but they’d agreed to stick by the rules.

  He shoots back to his room to call his brother. Eric’s probably hanging with Cassie again. The ‘not going back with her’ promise hadn’t lasted two weeks. This last month he’s spent more time with Cassie than at home. And Matt sees the effect it’s having on his brother. That girl isn’t good for Eric.

  He snatches up his phone already practicing the hell he’ll give his brother, but then he notices he has a new text. From Eric.

  When did that come in? Two fifty-three. Right before Matt woke up.

  He reads the text. I need . . . Nothing more. Almost as if Eric had been interrupted and accidentally hit Send.

  What did Eric need?

  Matt hits the call button. One ring. Two. Three. It goes to voicemail.

  Hey, leave a message.

  “Shit!” Matt mutters. At the beep he says, “Where are you, Eric? Call me. Now.”

  Right then he feels his brother behind him. Relief washes over him.

  “Why are you late?” He swings around. Eric’s not here.

  Not here.

  Not. Here.

  The pain in Matt’s temple starts throbbing again. His stomach churns. He recalls the nightmare of running in the woods and, just like that, he knows. It hadn’t been him in the dream. Eric.

  Chills crawl up Matt’s spine, his neck, all the way up his head. He can’t breathe. His brother’s in trouble. He knows it like his lungs know how to take air. Like his eyes know how to blink. Like his heart knows how to beat.

  His grip on his phone tightens, and he considers dialing 911. But to say what? My brother’s not home? Eric’s only three hours late.

  How can Matt explain this feeling? This emptiness, the not-here feeling that is spreading through him like a virus. His stomach lurches. He rushes to the bathroom, barely making it to the toilet before he pukes. The retching sound echoes in the dark house.

  He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. Tears fill his eyes. No!

  How can he explain to the police the god-awful feeling that’s telling him Eric isn’t just missing? He’s gone.

  “Are you okay?”

  Matt keeps his head over the toilet but glances at his mom. Perched at the door, she’s wearing the sweats she wore yesterday. Her blond hair is a mess—she’s a mess. “Are you sick, hon?”

  He tries to find his voice, but can’t. His throat isn’t working. Not for talking. He pukes again.

  Hands on his knees, his heart thumping in his head, he sees her move to the cabinet. She pulls out a washcloth, runs water over it, then steps closer.

  She brushes the cold wet cloth over his forehead, then lovingly swipes his wet bangs from his brow. Her green eyes meet his. For the
first time in forever, he sees a hint of his old mom. And yet he knows he’ll be losing her again.

  “What’s wrong, Matt?”

  “I’m sorry,” Dr. Bernard says. To her credit she looks sincerely remorseful.

  Thirty-six hours. That’s how long it had been since Matt woke up knowing. That’s how long it took for the doctors to tell Matt and his mom what he already knew.

  “All of the tests confirmed my fears. There’s no brain activity.”

  His brother’s dead. Brain death they called it.

  He and his mom had called the police. They didn’t seem to take it seriously. That changed at six this morning. The cops showed up on their doorstep with news that Eric had been found at a roadside park. A gunshot to the head. They life-flighted him to a hospital in Houston, where the best doctors work. But not even the best could save him. He was gone.

  The police had found the gun next to his body. The Glock had belonged to their father. Gunpowder residue had been found on Eric’s right hand. One of the cops used the words “possible attempted suicide.”

  Now they’d change it to “suicide.”

  Matt couldn’t wrap his brain around that. He didn’t have the stamina to fight it yet. Fighting didn’t come nearly as naturally to him as to Eric. But as soon as he could breathe right, he planned on correcting the police.

  Yeah, Eric got into funks, and he’d been acting off with the whole Cassie problem, but to kill himself? Not Eric.

  His brother fought and won at everything. School, girls, sports. He didn’t know how to say quit, much less do it. Eric never gave up.

  More important, he’d never leave Matt and his mom like this. He knew what it would do to them.

  His mom lets out a soulful groan that sounds like a wounded animal. Aunt Karen wraps her arm around his mom. Matt had called his aunt first thing and told her they were going to need her. He didn’t need her, but he needed someone to take care of his mom, because he couldn’t. He couldn’t console himself, how the hell was he going to console her?

  Breathing hurt. Blinking hurt. Being alive hurt.