The Leaving

TUESDAY

He was born Tyler Madden. Her name was Hope Columbine.

“Hello?”

“Hey, Hope.”

“Hi, Tyler. What’s up?”

“Sorry for calling you so late. I just needed to hear someone’s voice.”

“Tyler, are you okay? You sound weird.”

“No, I’m not okay. I’m so sorry, Hope.”

“Tyler, what the hell are you doing? You’re freaking me out.”

“Don’t worry. It’ll be alright.”

“Seriously, Tyler, cut it out!”

“HA! Hahahahahaha! Cut it out! Hahaha! Cut it out!”

“Tyler, you’re scaring me.”

“I’m sorry, Hope. I’m really, really sorry.”

“Tyler, what are you doing?”

“Bye.”

“Tyler? Tyler, what are you doing?! Tyler, talk to me! Tyler! TYLER!”

After he had done it, Tyler floated somewhere, unseen by human eyes. He could see his body hunched over on the desk. The blood from his wrists and throat still streaming over the old math assignment, the failing Spanish, science, algebra and history grades that somehow didn’t matter anymore, dyeing them red. Hope’s frightened voice still echoed in his silent room. He was sorry he’d called her. It wasn’t fair to make her go through that, especially with all the pain that would come with his suicide anyway. But Hope had always been strong, much stronger than himself, as the scene below him proved. In fact, knowing Hope, she would probably call his parents as soon as he stopped talking, in the hopes that Tyler would still be alive. She hoped in vain. The blood dyeing his desk and the floor a deep crimson was just excess, leaving his veins. His heart had stopped beating long ago. Before the knife ever touched his skin.

***

“Why? Why? Why! WHY? WHY!?”

“Shhh. Shhh. It will be alright.”

“No! No, it won’t be alright, you bastard! It won’t be alright! My son is dead! He’s dead! You can’t understand that!”

“He was my son too.”

Hope had called the ambulance first. Anna Madden was grateful for that. If Hope had called and told Tyler’s mother first; she would have passed out. Maybe forever. Her little boy... her poor little boy.

The paramedics had to break two windows to get in. When they got to his second story bedroom, Tyler was already dead. They brought him to a hospital anyway. It would have killed his mother to see his room with the body it. How many times had she told him to pick up after himself? Tyler was always leaving messes everywhere he went. And this one she couldn’t clean up.

ONE WEEK EARLIER

“Tyler, why are you ditching math?”

“I hate math.”

“You’ve always hated math. You never ditched before.”

“Whatever.”

“Tyler Madden, I’ve known you since kindergarten. Don’t whatever me, you asshole.”

“Oh, yeah, Hope! I’m the asshole! Who put you up to this?”

“Nobody put me up to this! I’m your friend! I’m worried about you!”

“Yeah right. I bet my mother put you up to this. That fucking bitch…”

“Your mom is worried about you too. She thought I could talk some sense into you.”

“Well, the bitch thought wrong!”

“Don’t call your mom a bitch!”

“I’ll call my mom what ever the hell I want!”

“What the hell happened to you, Tyler?”

“Nothing happened to me.”

“You call this nothing? Who are you? I don’t even know you anymore!”

“Fuck you, Hope! Fuck you! Goddamn right you don’t know me! You want to talk to me about ditching, Hope? You ditched me to go to some goddamn private school!”

“You said you were okay with it.”

“Oh, did I? Well, I’m not okay with it!”

“So what? I’m just supposed to put my life on hold?”

“Yeah, maybe you should!”

“Fuck you, Tyler!”

“Fuck you right back! You ditched me to go to some private school with your fucking football champion boyfriend! Friends don’t do that!”

“Don’t do what? Don’t date? Don’t pursue opportunities? What should I do? Wake up every morning and think, oh! How best to please Tyler Madden?! What can I do to make Tyler Madden feel like a god?! What should I try to achieve in this world that revolves around Tyler Madden?! Is that what I should do?”

“Maybe! Maybe you should think a little more about your best friend and a little less about the wonder boy Aaron Thompson!”

“No one is forcing you to hang out with Aaron!”

“How can I not hang out with him, Hope? I don’t even know what you look like anymore… you’re always plastered to his face! When he has to piss, you unzip your pants! Does he keep you on a leash when you’re at school or do you just follow him around? He’s got you trained like a god damn sheep dog! You should see yourself, Hope! It’s disgusting.”

“I’m disgusting?”

“I didn’t- You’re not gonna fucking cry, are you?”

“No! I’m not gonna fucking cry!”

“Hope… don’t do this to me, you god damn-”

“I hate you!”

“Yeah! Get the fuck out of here! That’s what your good at, right? Go! Go back to your boyfriend! He’s not an asshole like the guy who’s known you your whole fucking life!Get out of here!”

Hope cried her self to sleep that night and Tyler regretted the things he’d said to her, like he regretted every word that came out of his mouth in those last weeks before he ended it all. He had made Hope cry. Even if it was true, what he said about her boyfriend. He would lie again and tell her he hadn’t really meant it and he was sorry. Only a half lie really. He’d been lying so much lately, one more wouldn’t hurt him.

MONDAY

“Bye, Hope!”

“Bye, Janie!”

“Hey, Columbine.”

“Hi, Aaron.”

Great, the boy toy entered. Tyler hid before Hope could see him.

“You wanna get together tonight?”

“Sorry, baby not tonight. I’ve got homework.”

“Me and my genius girlfriend. What about this weekend?”

“No. I need to call Tyler.”

“Tyler Madden? After he was such a dick to you? Screw ‘im!”

“I’ve known him since kindergarten. You can’t just say “screw ‘im” and walk away from that.”

“People do it all the time.”

“Not people like me. There’s something wrong with him.”

”I’ll say.”

“No, I’m worried about him. He needs me now. I’ve got to help him.”

“Some people just can’t be helped.”

“I have to try. I’m afraid he’s gonna hurt himself.”

“You can’t do it, Hope. I know he’s your friend but people like that are never going to change.”

Tyler didn’t stay to hear what Hope said. It didn’t really matter what she said. The words had struck a cord with him. Aaron was right. There was no hope for people like Tyler. Poison hearts will never change. He walked away.

***

“Hope?”

“Tyler?”

“Listen, I’m sorry for those things that I said. I didn’t mean them. It’s just…lots of stuff. I’m stressed about school and parents and- I don’t know why I said those things. It’s been so fucking crazy lately and I’m just really, really-”

“It’s okay, Tyler. You’re my best friend; you can take stress out on me if you need to. Just not a lot okay?”

”Okay, Hope. Thank you.”

“No problem.”

“I won’t ditch any more. I’ll never ditch again as long as I live.”

“Okay. I’m glad.”

“Hope?”

“What?”

“Will you miss me when I’m gone?”

“What?”

“Nothing. Look, I’ve got to go. I’ll call you back, I promise.”

“Okay.”

“Bye.”

“Bye.”

WENSDAY

Hope didn’t want Aaron to come over. For hours after Tyler called her and she numbly called 9-1-1 and Tyler’s Family, she had sat at her computer, too shocked even to cry. The tears would come later. So many tears, Hope thought every bit of moisture in her body was cascading through her eyes. It hurt to cry that hard. Her body convulsed and she gulped in air between the sobs. She thought she might be drowning but really, she didn’t care. She wanted to die and go to where ever it was that Tyler had gone. Go where Tyler had gone and kill him herself. How dare he murder what was rightfully hers to kill?

“Hope? It’s Mrs. Madden.”

It was the first phone call Hope’s mother thought she should hear. The boy, Aaron, had called twelve times but Hope did not want him. Tyler’s mother’s voice was choked with tears that were no longer with in her.

“Mrs. Madden?”

“I wanted to thank you for calling me. For telling me about Tyler.”

“I’m so sorry. Did he?”

“There wasn’t any note. The police want you to give testimony but I told them not to bother. It’s obvious now… why he did it.”

“Not to me.”

“Tyler…Tyler had been sad for a very long time. The week before he did it…he seemed almost happy. I should have known something was wrong when he seemed happy. Now that I think about it, Tyler was never really happy. Why didn’t I know? Oh god! Why didn’t I know?”

“Damn it, Tyler.”

“I’m sorry, Hope. I shouldn’t do this to you. You’ve got enough pain.”

“Mrs. Madden, I’m sorry.”

“Thank you. I have to go now. I have to make the arrangements. The funeral will be on Saturday. If you want to bring someone, feel free. Of course, your parents are invited.”

“We’ll be there.”

“Thank you.”

SATURDAY

The funeral was cold and outdoors. Hope hadn’t ever been to a funeral before and she cursed Tyler for making this her first. What right had he, to drag her out of bed on a Saturday to listen to an old man talk about someone she didn’t know? How dare he steal her best friend? How dare he make her listen to this wrinkled old man?

Hope couldn’t listen to the rest of the elegy. She got up and scooted past five people to run and hide in between the tomb stones.

“Damn it, Tyler.”

These were old tombstones with moss and cracks. She traced the cracks with her fingers, trying to forget him. All the cracks led back to Tyler.

“God damn it.”

Tyler watched his best friend crying among the tombstones. So he’d been wrong about Hope. She did miss him. It seemed, now, he was wrong about a lot of things. There was a mass of people at his funeral a few yards away and an old man telling lies about him. How he was a good boy who had just lost his way. The old man didn’t know what he was talking about. He was Mrs. Madden’s preacher, not Tyler’s. The one who should have been up on that podium, cursing and telling how Tyler really was for all their shocked ears to hear in silence, was crying among the tombstones.

“Hope.”

“Tyler, you fuck!”

“Hope.”

“Where are you?”

“I’m here.”

“Where? Where, you asshole!? Did you fake it? Did you fake suicide? You better not have! You better not have faked it- because if you did- I’m gonna fucking kill you.”

“I didn’t fake it. I’m dead.”

“So what? You’re a ghost now? After everything you’ve done to me, Tyler, you’re going to haunt me? You dick. You big fucking dick.”

“I am so sorry, Hope.”

“If you were sorry, you wouldn’t have done it.”

“I was sorry before I did it. I was sorry for everything.”

“Sorry doesn’t cut it. Sorry doesn’t work after you pull something like this! Where are you? Will sorry bring you back?!”

“Sorry is all I have.”

“Your lucky you’re dead, Tyler. You’re so lucky you’re dead. You don’t have to feel anything anymore. You don’t have to feel it.”

“I feel it, Hope. I’m so sorry.”

“What is that going to change? You’re dead!”

“I was dead a long time before I slit my wrists.”

“What should I do?”

“There’s nothing. Just keep breathing. You’re not like me, Hope. No matter how dark things seem for you, they’ll get better. You’re stronger than I am, Hope. You always were.”

“What should I have done?”

“You did everything you could have. You cared. I just couldn’t see you. You can’t see the sky once you’re buried.”

“Where will you go now?”

“I don’t know. I never really paid attention in church. Where will I go?”

“Most religions say you’ll burn.”

“Oh.”

“Oh.”

“Listen, I stayed because I wanted you to know I was sorry. Do you know I’m sorry?”

“Yes.”

”I shouldn’t have put you through that. I shouldn’t have put my parents through that. If I could come back and fix it… fix me, what ever was wrong with me, I would. I’m so sorry.”

“I don’t think you’ll burn, Tyler.”

“Thank you. I have to go now.”

“Okay.”

“I’ll be watching you. No matter where I end up, Hope, I promise you, I’ll be watching.”

“Okay.”

“See you.”

“Goodbye Tyler.”

EPILOGUE

A day later, she broke up with her boyfriend. It wasn’t fair to him. A week later, she could face her class mates. Six months afterwards, she went out for the fall play, A Christmas Carol.

“Hey, Hope.”

“Hi, Janie.”

“How are you? Really.”

“I’m okay.”

“Hope, don’t lie. He was your best friend. You can’t get over that in six months.”

“No, you can’t get over it at all. Tyler was fucked up. He found a way out. You can’t ever get over something like that. All you can do is keep breathing and… get to a place where you’re okay. And I’m okay, Janie. I really am. I can sleep again. I can laugh. I’m okay.”

He died Tyler Madden. She lived Hope.