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I know what you must be thinking. “Poor little rich girl, what does she know about misery?” —ROSE DEWITT BUKATER, TITANIC (1997)
No one here has eaten a carb since 2019, but a bottle of champagne is popped every five minutes because drinking carbs is different.
No one has sympathy for you when your life looks this good from the outside. It’s like complaining that your enormous boobs make it hard to find clothes that fit properly. Or whining that you’re afraid of heights when you’re at the top of an ivory tower. No one wants to hear it. And no one believes it, even if it’s true. I feel like my life is an illusion and even I can’t see quite through it.
When you’re “perfect,” you never truly are. You don’t cross a finish line of hotness. It’s a constant battle of maintenance that involves constant failure, and the goalposts are perpetually moving.
I can’t believe I had forgotten about that so completely. How had my brain been powerful enough to hide that from me? I guess I hadn’t wanted to remember. It was too hard.
Aimee, here. Now. Not only alive, but in perfect condition. I understand nothing about how or why this is happening, but I am certain, in this moment, of one thing. I will never leave this life.
It’s her. Walking. Talking. Being suspicious. Asking things. Drinking things. It is beyond surreal. Beyond weird. It’s more than my feeble human mind was ever meant to comprehend. Although, that’s how losing her had felt too.
The answer to how is unsatisfying. The truth is … we live. We can’t spend every moment treasuring the things we love. We still get mad at the dog for tracking mud through the house even though one day, we would give anything to have her muddy paws back on our white carpet. We still roll our eyes at our parents’ needy voicemails even though one day, those recorded moments will be all we have left.
I open my mouth to speak but find that I have no response. When am I going to really live? I’m withholding carbs from myself like there’s a finish line, when I know there isn’t. She’s also right that celebrities often get famous, then spend their lives trying to go unseen. Is it really all about the money? No, I guess it is the notoriety too. But still, it all feels a little pointless when it’s lined up like that.
I put on the sweatshirt, and then look at myself in the mirror. I may not have my expensive new nose or lineless skin, but my reflection looks a lot happier here. Even now, when I’m so deeply confused.
“It makes me feel like my soul is destined to stay on an endless, ridiculous cycle of thinking the grass is always greener.”
I feel overcome with a deep gratitude for the moment. For the out-of-season Christmas lights that are slung around the room. For James Cameron. For the embracing nature of borrowed boy clothes. But mostly for Kiera and Cillian.
They’re here. And it doesn’t feel big. It doesn’t feel intense. It feels nice, right, small, cozy, real. I blubber and when they turn to me, I say, through yet more tears, “You guys are so nice.” They exchange a bewildered look. “She’s lost her mind, but it’s kind of nice, isn’t it?” asks Kiera.
I could pretend she hadn’t died by pretending she had never lived. If I was in this new, completely different life, it made sense that she wasn’t in it.
I wonder if this is what déjà vu is. What if it’s different realities bleeding through?
What possible purpose can it serve to think about all the bad times? Who thinks about those once someone dies?
What if all our souls know things? What if that’s what instinct is? What if that really is the explanation for gut feelings, intuition, déjà vu, kismet, and everything else? What if it’s our souls, remembering or knowing the truths of all our other lives?
“You have to face it,” says Aimee. “You have to. You never did, did you? You never think about it. You said so.”
“I’m the only one who knows,” she says, her tone softening. “I’m the only one who was there. And since I haven’t been here to blame, you blamed yourself. But it wasn’t your fault. Neither of us were perfect. We were doing our best.”
But that’s what grief is, isn’t it? Expectation and resolution slashed, leaving unfinished conversations behind.
Aimee isn’t nothing now that she’s gone; her loss doesn’t need to be a black hole or even a blank space. She just isn’t here. Out
What I need is to be around people I care about. To let people love me. To have small moments, knowing that they’re the biggest ones, and not ignore them because I’m too busy looking way off in the distance, either future or past, for some imagined thing.
“Do you ever get déjà vu?” asks Cillian, leaning a little closer to me. His voice is quiet enough that only I can hear him, but it’s as clear as a bell. As if we’ve sliced the air around us and created a place for us. I nod, my eyes latched on to his, an irrepressible smile at my lips. “I do.” “Me too,” he says. “I’m having it now.” “So am I.”
I don’t try to protect the memory of tonight from tragedy by pretending it isn’t lovely, and I don’t cherish it so hard that I smother out its spark. I don’t question the magic or panic that what I love is slipping through my fingers, or that every good thing will one day be cast pale against the darkness of future catastrophe. Instead, I have a good night. I get kissed in the snow. I eat chocolate in bed. I make plans for tomorrow.
