The Astonishing Color of After

by Emily X.R. Pan

Whose fault was it? That’s the question on everyone’s mind, isn’t it? Nobody will ever say it out loud. It’s a question people would call inappropriate. The kind of thing where everyone tells you, “It’s nobody’s fault.” But is that even true? It’s only human nature to look for a place to lay the blame. Our fingers are more than ready to do the pointing, but it’s like we’re all blindfolded and spinning. What makes a person want to die? She had me. She had Dad. She had her best friend, Tina. She taught piano lessons to a third of the kids in our neighborhood. Anyone who knew her would have said she seemed like the happiest. The most alive. When she laughed, her face bloomed and you felt warm at the center. Those last few months her laughs came rare. I noticed it, I really did. But I chalked it up to moodiness; she’d always been in the habit of swinging from one extreme to the other. I excused it too quickly, too easily. Was it my fault? If I had only— Or if Dad had only— If Mom had only— What?