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She singsongs the words, telling me that over the rainbow, bluebirds fly. I think about bluebirds, and I think about rainbows. The words make me feel happy, but she sings it so sad.
“I dunno. They said we don’t name new babies after bugs, but then they named her after a month. That doesn’t sound like a people name either.”
I wonder if she’s dreaming about her parents who love her—who are still alive to tell her that they love her—and I wonder if maybe she’s the one flying high over the rainbow, as free as a beautiful bird, without any worries or fears. And then I wonder… Why, oh why, can’t I?
And then one night, I started singing it to June. Only, I changed the words a bit. Somewhere, over the rainbow, Junebugs fly…
I dreamed I was marrying Brant!
So I refused to ever see her as my sister. I refused to see the Baileys as my true family because that would make me guilty. That would have given me the darkest, heaviest burden imaginable, and it likely would have snapped me in two.
But I got out of bed that Sunday, threw on a clean T-shirt, drank my morning coffee, and hopped into my car. I drove to Wendy’s apartment, and I broke up with her. For the very last time.
“Except for you, Mr. Elliott.” I freeze, then spin back around. “Come again?” “You will stay.” “I will?”
I stand there, confounded and giddy, gazing up at the ceiling and whispering softly, “I’ll do you proud, Mom.”
Both girls react in a similar, wide-eyed way when they see me. My heart only reacts to one.
June. Not Junebug. He said he’d always protect me…but he has no clue that he’s the one striking me down.
“She couldn’t go through with it,” he mutters, and I almost don’t even hear him over the ringing in my ears. “She pussied out before I could sink my dick between her lips. Congratulations.”
If my father hadn’t murdered my mother, I would still just be the neighbor boy and she would be the girl next door. Instead, he branded us with a label, forced me into something twisted. He turned the only girl I’ve ever wanted into the only girl I can never have.
“Peach wants cake. Hurry it up or I’m gonna start calling you Toad.” My lips pucker as I crane my neck to glance at him in the kitchen. “Why?” “Toads are slow.”
The hairiest fuckin’ guy I’ve ever seen. And you take his hand and look up at him all innocent-eyed and you say, ‘Why did the water turn you into an ape, Daddy?’”
“I bought it because you used to tell me that your mom smelled like desserts. I know my birthday is the same day she…” She swallows, glances up at me. “Well, you know. I wanted to give you a reminder of her every June first—a happy reminder. A sweet memory hidden in the sadness.”
I’m hopelessly, irrevocably in love with you, June Bailey.
Edward Cullen what are you doing here?
Kip gets it. His passion for saving people is just as great as mine, ever since he lost his parents in a suspicious boating accident.
“What happened between you both was big.” Kip meets my eyes. A beat passes. Then he finishes, “Be bigger than it.”
It grew wings. And the only way to prevent wings from soaring, from flying too high to where danger is imminent, is to clip them.
But clipped wings can still fly.
“I probably shouldn’t be saying this, but the thought of another man putting his hands on you makes me borderline murderous.”
My mother has always had that uncanny sense of something not being right. She calls it a motherly intuition, while I tend to lean more toward the voodoo or witchcraft angle.
I’d probably club him if I caught him gawking at her.
“Independence. Right.” He ducks his head, lips pursing with thought. “You’re playing with fire, Brant. If you’re looking to get burned, have at it, but those flames are going to spread… You have to be okay with letting the things around you burn, too.” I swallow. “It’s complicated.” “Fire is pretty straightforward. You light a match and shit burns down.”
I’ve been seeing Dr. Shelby again, my childhood psychologist, hoping for advice. For guidance.
And I’m not saying your situation is the same… I’m not saying you’re destined for tragedy.” A smile blooms on his mouth, a little trace of empathy through the agony. “I’m just saying, friend to friend, that there are worse things than loving the wrong person.” I stare at him, waiting, my stomach twisting into knots. “And that’s losing them.”
“No relationship comes without a fight, but it has to be worth fighting for. It has to be worth all the sacrifices you’ll inevitably have to make.”
“They’re not all you have left.” Her hand reaches across the table, landing atop mine. She sends me a tender smile. “You still have you. And you matter, too. You matter a whole hell of a lot, okay?” Giving the back of my hand a gentle squeeze, she concludes, “Don’t forget about that girl I’ve grown to love like a sister. She has big dreams, and those dreams deserve the same consideration.”
Is there strength in fighting for this fucked-up, taboo relationship that absolutely nobody will embrace let alone accept, and that will force us to lurk in the shadows for the rest of our lives?
Passion is meaning. Passion is purpose. And tragedy is simply the risk we take in order to experience it.
“I’ll always protect you.” I watch him carefully as a beat passes. As he absorbs my words. His kissed lips part with a sharp inhale. “Now…cover your ears,” I tell him gently.
A tragedy occurred, that much I know. I just don’t know if the tragedy was in her leaving me… …or loving me.
The angry adrenaline leaves me as I deflate, running a hand through my hair and finding my bearings. I glance up at the pen sticking out of Samantha’s bun, finally knowing why it’s always in there. She’s been documenting our life’s moments—turning them into something tangible.
Small ones, big ones, forgettable ones, devastating ones, cherished ones. Our entire lives are in these shoeboxes. It takes my breath away. And at the center of it all, one thing stands out. One thing is crystal clear.
“You’ve always put love first, Brant,” Samantha says, her blue eyes glimmering with awareness. With knowing. With a mother’s instinct. “You’ve always put June first.”
I’ve stayed busy with work, but more as a means to nourish my creative passion for cooking versus using my job as a way of forgetting.
People talk about rehabilitation all the time. Broken bodies learning to walk again. Impaired minds fighting disease, addiction, and dark thoughts. But have they ever had to rehabilitate a heart? Hearts fall apart, too. Bodies crumble, minds fail us, and hearts turn hopeless. They can deteriorate if we’re not careful, and for all the tragedies I’ve suffered through, for all the tears and pitfalls, I can’t think of anything more tragic than a hopeless heart. The heart is the crux of life itself, and once it starts to wither, everything else starts to wither, too. And that’s a damn shame. That’s
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September 13, 2020 Vilomah. I’ve never heard of this word before, but apparently, it’s what they call a parent who has lost a child. It means “against the natural order.” Only…it feels like I’ve lost so much more than that. I’ve lost three children, and I’m losing my husband in the process. I don’t think they make a word for someone like me. The only word I can think of is…sad.
I hadn’t expected a surprise visit from the love of my life, so I’m only wearing a pair of blue jeans and a loose-fitting Wicked T-shirt that I’ve tied at my hip with a scrunchie.
He takes my hand. He takes my whole life, too.
A picture comes through of Pauly and Wendy standing in the middle of Chicago’s iconic Millennium Park. My grin widens. Yeah, so—that happened.
“Show Tunes June,” Andrew quips, waggling his brows. “How’s my dancing queen?”
Just as we cannot force ourselves to love someone, we cannot force ourselves to unlove them either. Fate can be foolish, and fate can be careless. But fate is always true.
A white horse is decorated like a unicorn, trotting around the small group of folding chairs with a “horn” half falling off its head, a multicolored mane and tail, and letters scrawled across its flank and shoulders in rainbow letters that read “Rupert.” Rupert. The unicorn in my fever dream when I was twelve. I told Brant about it, and he’d laughed. He’d laughed and evidently taken immaculate mental notes.
It’s a kiss of courage, a kiss of comfort, a kiss of two people beating the odds and weaving a love story out of tragedy. It’s finding a happily ever after with the one person you least expect yet the only person meant for you.
