Truth

The vile builds up in my throat as the words are repeated to me. I’m no longer paying attention, instead my mind has chosen to block out what they're telling me. I back away slowly, the room around me closing in, the people’s voices becoming further and further away. I want to scream at them, I want desperately to tell them to stop lying to me. I just want the truth!1

I look around but I’m no longer in that stuffy room, instead I’m somewhere in a hospital. I look around at the realization that it’s the waiting room. My mom has tears in her eyes and I ask her what’s going on.2

“Gabby, do you remember what happened in school today?”3

I try to think, wondering why it’s so hard to remember. I was in a class, my math class. The phone had rung and the teacher told me to go down to the guidance office, that they needed to tell me something important. Suddenly it all comes back. The guidance office, and my guidance counselor telling me what had happened. I swallow hard, suddenly realizing why I’m at the hospital.4

“Where is she? Where’s Lily?”5

My voice is urgent and I suddenly begin to panic. My mom comes over and tries to calm me down but I don’t. Instead I start hyperventilating, and asking where Lily is. Nobody seems to be giving me my answer. I ask them where she is louder and still nobody responds.6

My tears ruin my make-up, and my vision is completely blurred. I try to manage to ask where Lily is again, but this time I can’t. My voice is too hoarse. I fall to the ground, my body no longer able to hold itself up. My older brother Owen kneels down next to me, pulling me into his arms. He’s crying too. I ask him where Lily is and he just whispers to me that everything will be ok. Something tells me he’s wrong though.7

Hours have passed and nobody tells me anything about my sister. My mom and my brother still have tears in their eyes, but instead I just stare at the wall, thinking about anything I could. I think about the last time I had seen Lily. We were getting out of her car and she smiled and waved good-bye just as I walked into school and she stood outside with her friends. I try to think about something else, but my mind is only thinking about Lily.8

Owen walks over to me and wraps his arms around me. I ask him what happened and he took a deep breath. I could tell he was trying to figure out the words to explain it.9

“Gabby, you know how Lily was going to go home after fourth block, because all she had was study halls the rest of the day?”10

I nod, my mind already ahead of him. I fear the worse, knowing what it going to come out of his mouth next.11

“Gabby, there was an accident. The road was totally silent; no other cars were on it. Lily was driving and another car came speeding right towards her. They whipped around the corner blindly and smashed headfirst into her car. The impact caused her to hit her head, and the doctors are trying everything they can to keep her alive.”12

My breath gets caught in my throat and I don’t speak. I don’t cry, or make any motions at all. Instead I stare blankly in font of me, my mind trying to comprehend what my older brother had just told me.13

Only moments later does a doctor come in calling for my mom. She takes her to another room, the nurse telling Owen and I to stay here. I squeeze my eyes shut and send a quick prayer up to god that Lily is ok. I lean against the wall, wishing this would all go away and I would wake up from a terrible dream and Lily would be sleeping peacefully on her bed across the room.14

My mom comes in, trying hard to keep her composure. My brother and I rush over, Owen being the first to ask about Lily. My mom starts to cry hysterically again and my brother tries to comfort her. It doesn’t work. After what felt like hours later, my mom finally says what I had feared all along. 15

“She’s gone guy’s. They did all the could, tried their very hardest…but they still lost her.”16

The next thing I know I’m waking up in my bedroom. I once again don’t know how I got there, and my mind flashes back to what my mom had last said. I look over to Lily’s bed, praying to god that it was just a terrible nightmare. It’s the same as it had been earlier, just before we had left for school.17

I lean against my headstand, realizing that none of this was a dream, that everything that had happened was real. I close my eyes and allow the truth to swallow my body whole.18

Lily, my eighteen-year-old sister…is dead.  19