Incomprehensible
“The Thing that eats the heart is mostly the heart.” –Stanley Kunitz
“Arabella, you need to find another way of handling Paul’s death. Paul would not want you to be lying in bed sobbing over him as you have been for the past month. I think you should try speaking to someone. You know, like a therapist. Therapy can be really helpful.”
What does that even mean? “Paul would not want you to be lying in bed sobbing over him.” How does my mom know what he would want? I watched my boyfriend take a bullet, all for me. Does she not remember this? My mom just does not, as always, understand.
Paul’s death is a tragedy and has left me with the only thing I know how to do, grieve. My mother always says, “Bell, I know you’re upset, but everything happens for a reason,” but this time is different. Whenever I am upset over anything, even when the guy I was dating before Paul cheated on me my mom said, “Everything happens for a reason.” My mom means well I know she does, it’s just with this situation the reasoning to me is incomprehensible.
This so-called reason better be a good one. Paul pushed me out of the way to save my life from a chaotic gas station robber. I dwell on this every day. Every day is a struggle to get out of bed, which is why, when I do not have to, I don’t.
***
Thinking back to that day I can still smell the pool of soda laying on the floor where it spilled. The smell of nachos and hot dogs hung high waiting to be chosen and then devoured. Paul held my hand and kissed my cheek as I laughed while we waited for our turn to pay. The doorbell from the door being swung open alerted us all there was a new customer in the store, the new customer that caused this tragedy.
He pulled his black pistol quickly out of his right back pocket and pointed towards the small female standing behind the counter. The other customers immediately dropped to the floor. Cell phones were ringing and vibrating. A daughter’s cry was muffled by her father’s hand wrapped over her mouth. Paul and I stood there in shock. Our turn had finally come and Paul was holding my waist tightly as he stood behind me. I can still feel him breathing heavily on my neck and feeling the hair on the skin of my arms prick up. The loose ends of my auburn hair from the bun I so carelessly put up swung back and forth from the force of Paul’s breath.
The man stood there, staring through the holes of his black mask at the woman. His voice was in a lower register, but forceful.
“Give me all the cash you have! Nobody is to move while she is retrieving my money! No one!” He said as he looked around the room for anyone moving.
He took a few steps towards the counter and stood closely in front of Paul and I. The woman scrambled, putting all the money into one of the gas stations bags. I could hear her sobbing quietly as she fumbled the money into the plastic bag. I could see that the man’s eyes behind the mask were dark. His build was muscular as I examined him. His hands firmly gripped the gun, but I could tell he was nervous because the pistol shook slightly. Either that or his grip was too firm.
I felt myself gasping for air. My nerves were so intense I felt like I was about to pass out. The man looked at Paul and yelled, “Take the bag from her and hand it to me!”
Paul did not move.
“I said give me the bag!”
Paul jumped and retrieved the bag from the woman. As he handed the bag to the man, the man proceeded to hold the gun straight at Paul’s chest.
“Now don’t move until I leave. You understand?” the man said as he looked towards us. Paul noticed the man’s eyes were turned toward me. Paul stepped back towards me. His body shielded me as the bullet was released, as promised if Paul had moved. The man’s voice echoed as the bullet soared towards its target. His voice echoing, “I said not to move!” The bullet hit Paul and caused him to collapse. The man ran out of the gas station once Paul and the floor met. Next thing I remember, the paramedic was peeling Paul out of my arms.
***
Laying in my bed is one of the things Paul and I loved to do most. Lay in bed and watch movies. Fool around. A bed is so sentimental and such a symbolic notion for love, in my opinion. So many beautiful things take place in a bed, a couple’s first kiss, people making love, holding a newborn in your arms while you both relax, and simply just cuddling with your significant other.
The nightstand next to my bed displays an iHome with my white IPod plugged in to charge, a small lamp with a zebra printed cover and a glass frame with black bordering protecting Paul’s senior photo. Black cursive laced the right corner of the glass with the word love. Dirty clothes spread out like puzzle pieces making up the width of my light wood flooring. Paul’s baseball jersey clung to the back of my desk chair, his last name Lowry facing me.
He left his jersey here the night before the senior get together. It was a month away from graduation and we had plans of attending North Dakota state university in the fall together. We were happy. Paul came over after practice exhausted and sweaty. He took off his jersey and threw it on to the back of my desk chair. His muscles showed through his white undershirt. I smiled at him as he climbed into bed with me, laughing as he held me close; knowing his smell from practice lingered intensely. I playfully pushed away and looked at him.
“In just a few months we won’t have to worry about my mom or your parents bugging us. We will be able to do whatever we want while at school,” I said
“I know I can’t wait. I am just happy I got into the same dorm as you. I’d hate to have to walk from a different dorm to your dorm to see you,” Paul joked.
“But, you would right?”
“I don’t know. It would depend on how lazy I felt that day. Plus the other dorm is kind of far isn’t it?” He laughed and kissed my forehead. “You know I would baby I’m just kidding. I love you.”
But now, those plans of attending college together were gone. Our future was gone. Paul and I going to that college together meant everything. It was our dream school and now I will be attending it alone. I wish. Just wish that I wouldn’t have needed that pack of cigarettes that night. Looking back now, the cigarettes were so not worth losing my best friend, my lover, over. I should have just suffered without and waited until we got to the party. I could have just bummed one off someone there. My heart is slowly eating itself. I cannot get out of this depressing state and I no longer have energy to try. I blame myself for everything that happened that night. It has been a month too long without Paul.
***
I can still see the robber standing forcefully, pointing the gun towards Paul.
“Don’t move I said! Don’t move or I’ll shoot!” he yelled.
As soon as Paul moved in front of me, he shot. The bullet hit right into Paul’s heart. Everything from then on was nothing but a haze. I just remember holding Paul as the paramedics tried taking him from my arms.
“No! No! Just leave him in my arms please! Just leave him!” I cried as the paramedic finally released Paul’s body from my arms and onto the gurney.
I screamed on and off throughout the night for the first week, each night my mom awaking me from the horrible nightmare of the night. Paul’s death just kept replaying in my head, the same nightmare every night for the first week. I just kept seeing the bullet stabbing through his skin and into his beloved heart, the bullet that in an instant caused his heart to stop.
I woke up screaming, “Paul! No!”
My mom held me and repeated, “Baby, it’s okay. It’s okay.”
I just laid my head into the crook of her neck and bawled until I fell back asleep.
Nightmares still occur, but no screaming, just a lot of sweating and damp sheets. A lot of wishing I could go back to that night and not say anything about needing or wanting cigarettes. We didn’t even need to go to the party. It was just our last high school seniors get together. I knew I would never see most of those people after graduation anyway. Paul’s death will forever be a painful memory and the one thing that will gnaw away at me for as long as I live.
Maybe I can just lay in bed until my heart stops beating, just as Paul’s heart did. Then he and I can be together. Waiting takes time. What is time? Was it Paul’s time to go? He was not ready to go and I know it. Maybe I should let this be my time. Call it quits. I blame myself for Paul’s death. Maybe that will make up for Paul getting killed if I die too. Yeah. I think it is time to call it time out.
***
I spent the next two days, which were my first two days of summer break, sleeping. I only got up to use the restroom. Food was nowhere in my plan. That morning my mom came in to wake me up. Pulling the string on my blinds to let them rise and allow the sun to say wake up instead of her own voice. I pulled the covers over my head as the sun was beginning to do its job.
“Mom, seriously, shut my blinds and get out. It’s too early for this,” I muttered.
“Bell, you have been sleeping for almost two days now. Get up, shower, dress, and come eat some breakfast. I made you an appointment for today to speak with a grief counselor,” she left and headed back downstairs.
Did she really just say she made me an appointment to speak with a grief counselor? Why would she do that? Maybe all this crying and sleeping is scaring her. She probably figures that if I speak to this grief counselor, the depression will go away. As much as I do not want to meet with the counselor I know deep down this is a good idea for me. It will be nice to talk about my feelings without a negative response. I hope.
I did as my mom said, taking a quick shower, and dressing in some plain black leggings with a long dressy blush pink top. I put my long hair up in a ponytail, revealing the freckles that spot my face. Paul would tell me my freckles were cute and he would love it when I let them show by leaving my hair up and out of their way. My face was his favorite feature. As I walked down the stairs, I felt weird. It has been days since I had set foot outside of my bedroom.
Aside from my mom’s nagging and clinginess, the woman can cook, but not even her homemade chocolate chip pancakes could make me eat. I put on my black fur North Face jacket. Zipping it up, I thought about how much the jacket would suffocate me if I could zip it all the way up.
“You’re not going to eat are you? I made your favorite. Not even just one pancake?” my mom pleaded as I stood by the door dipping each foot into my Ugg boots.
I shook my head no and leaned up against the side of the door. I waited for my mom as she turned the stove off and packed away the leftover pancakes. I looked in the mirror that was in front of our door. I envisioned Paul and I standing in front of it. Smiling and posing for a picture, I would later upload to my Facebook page. The picture receiving 27 likes.
“Alright, I’m ready, let’s go.” My mom drove me to the counselor’s office. She could tell I was in no state to drive. As I sat there waiting for my turn, I looked around the room. The 34in flat screen TV was projected at an angle so that anyone in the waiting area could view it. Pandora was on and playing from the TV. It was just my mom and I waiting. Other than the music playing it was quiet. The woman at the front desk sat behind her computer, looking engrossed in whatever she was viewing.
***
“Arabella Johnson?” A woman questioned.
I stood up and met the tall, elegant looking woman. Her short brown hair spiked in the back with her bangs straight in the front. The woman’s blue eyes and friendly smile were welcoming, but said it that she too had been through a lot in her years. She shook my hand with a contagious smile that I felt was unnecessary. There is no need to smile anymore. We proceeded to her office.
“You can have a seat on the couch,” she said as she took her seat in the comfy purple chair placed in front of the leather black couch.
Sitting down I looked around to see where the smell of cinnamon was coming from, causing me to crave a slice of apple pie. A febreeze air freshener sat on her shelf. She had a large plant in a gold vase in the corner of the room. The counselor’s tree trunk brown desk, covered in papers, her computer and a tissue box, took up a good portion of the room as it is set on a slight angle. Her certificates of being a counselor hung in their frames on the wall behind her chair. My examination was interrupted when she began our session.
“So how about you tell me a little bit about why you’re here?”
“My mother set up the appointment, that’s why I am here,” I said.
She chuckled and smiled as she continued, “Okay well that is a reason, but what is going on that your mother felt the need to schedule this appointment?”
I am so regretting being here right now. I don’t think I can handle telling this stranger my problems. What if she doesn’t feel Paul’s death is a reason to be this depressed? Which it is, it is a death. Anyone would be depressed. What if she doesn’t understand that my love for Paul will always be there? Paul is everything to me. This stranger may not even understand how I feel. I guess there is really only one way to find out and that is just to tell her. Here goes nothing.

-B