Love Letters to the Dead

It’s the second week of March. Spring should almost be here, but the air has held on to its cold, wind coming in gusts to scare off the buds that might want to start blooming. It’s been a long time since I’ve written one of these letters—almost a month. I guess after I tore up Kurt’s poster, I didn’t feel like it anymore. Until I watched The Dark Knight and started thinking about you. I first got to know you from that movie 10 Things I Hate About You, and I always remember that scene where you jump up on the bleachers and sing “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You” to the whole girls’ soccer team to capture the heart of the girl you like. But after that, even though you got a lot of offers, you wouldn’t do any more teen movies. Instead, you ate ramen noodles in your apartment and waited. You didn’t just want to be famous, you wanted to be true to yourself. And eventually you got more roles, better ones, and you became the kind of grownup that made growing up seem okay, like you don’t have to lose your spirit in order to get older. You became the kind of father that any daughter would have wanted to have. When they found you in your apartment, dead from too many pills, I really did think it was an accident. I don’t think you meant to go.

I read about how you were pla

This month has passed by in a blur, but I guess there are a few new things to tell you about. One thing is that Ha

The other thing is that Ha

When we parked in front of Blake’s little mountain shack, I felt immediately nervous. It wasn’t locked, so we walked right in. It smelled like cherry-flavored cigars, and all the windowsills were lined with glass bottles covered in dust.

When he came out of the bedroom, I froze. Ha

He moved right past us and opened the fridge. He pulled out some Tecates and tossed them to us. I didn’t catch mine. It flew past me and onto the carpeted floor, which I felt that I was sinking into. I tried to move my feet, but they wouldn’t budge.

Ha

“Laurel, are you all right?”

“What? Um, yeah. Sorry.”

I watched Blake put his arm around Ha

Blake’s roommate was sitting on the couch, which was upholstered in brown velvet and looked like it had been there since the seventies. The roommate doesn’t speak. Not because he can’t, but because he took a vow of silence a year and nine days ago. He hasn’t said a word since. After Blake explained this, he pulled Ha

I forced my nail under the tab of the beer and popped it open with a crack that sounded as loud as an explosion. I sipped it. The roommate’s eyes kept glancing up over the top of the page at me. I tried to count all of the little bottles sitting on the windowsill, but I kept losing track. My feet stayed just where they were, glued to the rug.

I wondered if where we were was like the places where May would go with Paul when he’d take her away those nights. It was so different than I’d thought when I pictured her driving off somewhere magical. I imagined her now in the room with the curtains drawn and fluorescent lights on, lying on the dingy cream-colored rug and smoking cigarettes, letting the smoke trail out of her dark lips.

The roommate moved his legs over, I guess to make room on the couch, and I got a sinking feeling, as if the carpet were quicksand. He patted the place on the couch beside him. All I could think was, It will just hurt worse if you fight it. As if my body were moving without me, I saw myself walk over. The world went quiet. Like we were being recorded on silent film. The roommate and the room and me. And I started just watching us in the movie. I watched his hand reach out and start to touch me.

My head was pounding. His hand—his hand was on my thigh. All of a sudden I was somewhere else. All I could think was no. Please no. Make it stop. I slammed my head against the wooden arm of the couch.

I felt the shock of the hurt and I let the colors start to come in at the edges of my eyes.

I don’t know how long it was, but when I opened them, the roommate was staring at me, confused.

And then Ha

“What’s wrong?” Ha

“Can we go?”

Ha

On the way to the car, I picked up some snow and rubbed it on my face to try to wake up. Ha

I could feel the bump growing on the back of my head. I started to cry. “Please, just drive,” I said. So she did.

When we were partway down the mountain, she asked again. “What happened?”

“I never want to go back there,” I said.

“Okay, you don’t have to,” she said gently.

“But I don’t like Blake. I don’t want you to see him again.”

“Not you, too,” she groaned. “That’s Natalie’s line.”

“Please, Ha

“Why?”

I couldn’t let anything happen to Ha

Ha

My heart squeezed up. I started to panic. I thought somehow she knew. “What do you mean?” I asked.

“I mean, like, ’cause she died.”

“But it’s not her fault,” I said.

“Yeah, but that doesn’t mean you can’t be mad. I’m mad at my parents for dying and leaving me with Jason, and I don’t even remember them.”

I thought about it. Nobody had ever said it like that before. “You’re brave,” I said.

She laughed. “What do you mean? I am not. I’m an idiot.”

“No, you’re so smart. I wish that you knew it.”

And then it was quiet. We turned up the music and drove down the mountain roads, dark and shiny from March’s melting snow.