Tell Me to Stop by Charlotte Byrd

Author:Charlotte Byrd
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9781632250506
Publisher: Byrd Books, LLC

20

When I try to forget…

Nicholas and I sit there for some time, each trying to process our own grief. I bury my head in my hands and try to keep my tears at bay but they just keep coming. After a few moments, I give up trying. Ashley was my best friend and one day she just stopped going to school. I called her phone, I called her house, I talked to her mom. Her mom said that she thought I knew because they’d all moved away, but that was a lie. Whenever we spent time together, we either went out to a local fast food restaurant, the library or, on occasion, to my house. I was always embarrassed to invite her to my place, but she said that there was no way we could go to hers.

After her mom told me that they had moved away, I should’ve gone to her house. But I didn’t even know where she lived.

Still, I should’ve tried to look her up.

I should’ve done some research.

Someone must have known something.

But I didn’t.

I was devastated and I missed her and I was a kid.

The thing about going through shit is that it makes you a very self-centered person. We were friends but we never really confided in each other the way we should have.

I could’ve been there for her, had she just opened up to me a little bit. And given what she had been through, I now know that she could’ve been there for me as well.

Instead, we just orbited each other.

Never really letting one another in.

“What happened after that?” I ask, my tears still wet on my cheeks.

“My mother said she got what she deserved,” Nicholas says, moving his jaw around from one side to another. “She refused to pay for her body to be transported back to Massachusetts. She said that our family didn’t believe in suicide.”

His words ring in my ears.

Didn’t believe in suicide?

What is there to believe in? It happens. People do it all the time.

Is it an option for some people? Unfortunately, yes.

Could it have been prevented had Ashley had a different mother? A different stepfather? A better best friend. Most definitely.

“How do you know me?” I ask Nicholas.

“We met once, in passing. I gave you two a ride back from school,” he says.

That doesn’t seem like enough of a reason to do any of this. I wait for more.

“She wrote about you in my email,” he says. “She told me not to blame myself for anything that she did. She said that there was nothing I could do to help her, but if I still wanted to help someone, I should help you.”

My heart begins to pound and then to swell.

“After that I got clean. I got on my feet and I’ve been checking up on you over the last couple of years,” Nicholas says. “You are actually doing really well.”

“Thank you,” I mumble, through the tears running down my cheeks.

My friend’s dying wish was for her brother to help me.

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