Seemingly Happy
It was a somber and tempestuous night, summer was just beginning. I remember it like it was yesterday. Of course, I could never forget. I was on my bed, listening to music, trying to do tomorrow’s essay, but stopping every five seconds because I kept hearing the ding of my phone, due to the distraction of the thunderstorm going on outside. The wind was at least at 40 miles per hour. The rain was going really hard. It even started hailing. It sounded as if a wolf was howling. I was slightly surprised considering how it hardly ever rained in California, especially in the summer. But for some reason, I thought that this “ugly” weather looked beautiful, with the trees swaying from side to side. But anyway, I soon decide to give up, and write the paper in the morning or maybe the day after. I guess my procrastination was why I was put in summer school in the first place. Well that, and the fact I was missing school .. it’s not my fault. Anyone would miss that much school if they had a suicidal sister they’re afraid that might kill herself. I care about her way too much to risk her doing that. She’s the only real family I have left, I feel so privileged to still have her with me. I then shove all of my homework off my bed and just laid there, overthinking everything. But my thinking stopped, when I heard my sister say my name.


“Aa-aa-aron?!” she said in a shaky voice.


I run to her room hoping for the best but expecting the worse. Always have, ever since our brother lost the battle against depression. I’m afraid she’s losing it as well.
“Yeah? What’s wrong?!” I say in a worried voice.
“I-i-i need you,” she hiccuped. “I need your help.” It kills me to hear the grief in her voice.
As I walk into her room, I look around trying to find her, it wasn’t that hard, considering the fact that her room in plain black and white, and everything is always organized. Then I see her there, laying on the ground crying with a blade in her hand. I run towards her and hug her tightly trying not to cry.
“It’s okay. It’s okay. I’m here. Everything’s going to be fine.” My voice cracked.
I hate seeing my little sister cry. She’s only 14 and has gone through a lot lately.
“Please tell me what’s wrong with me,” she said “One second I’m fine, and then the other, I’m not.”
“Nothing’s wrong with you” I paused. “You’re just going through some hard times right now.”
I couldn’t lose her. Not today or anytime soon .. we both already lost a brother this year. I didn’t want to lose a sister as well. So there we both were, me holding her trying to be strong, while she wept and wept.
The next day, I called my father. He had been gone for about a week now. Of course, he constantly does that. Goes to work, sometimes, if we’re lucky comes home. Once, he wasn’t like this, a long time ago, when we were actually a family: my father, mother, Autumn, Jacob, our brother, and I--just us, five. But I guess he thought it was perfectly fine for him to leave since, shortly after our deceased brother was buried, our mother decided it was too much and just, left. Her excuse was that she had been around depression her whole life and didn’t want to deal with it now. That’s when he started drinking.
“Hello?” he said.
“Hey! Dad, where the h*ll have you been?” I almost yelled but stopped myself before I did.
“Hey kiddo um I don’t have much time ..” he said in a soft voice.
“Why what’s wrong? Where are you?”
“I’m in some county jail in Nevada ..”
“What are you doing in Nevada?” I asked in a shocked tone.
“Not sure, one second I was at a bar getting into an argument ..” he sounded so drunk.
“You got into a fight? What the h*ll, your daughter needs you now! ” I was growing impatient.
“Don’t yell at me boy, I’m your father!”
“Whatever .. when are you getting out?” I was growing impatient and angry.
“Not sure, may be for a while ..” Wouldn’t be the first time he did this.
“Seriously? You’re a d*ck, see you when you get here. Bye.” I’m so done with this guy.
And that was it. If my father wasn’t going to be the responsible adult, then I guess I had to step up. At least we had a lot of money left in the bank, so that’s one less thing to worry about. He called about three times after that, then after the third, he just gave up.
After that day, I never let my sister out of sight. Of course, I only left her alone when I went to my therapy sessions. I honestly hated therapy, but it was working, I was getting better and I believed that so was she; we just used different methods. But besides that, we became inseparable. I would take her to wherever she wanted to go, and I thought she was getting better. She seemed fine. She seemed so happy. Weeks passed and we heard nothing from him and summer was soon ending. Of course, she did have her moments. But the thing is, no matter how hard I tried to get her to go to therapy sessions, she wouldn’t want to come, she said that the antidepressants were working just fine. Everything that happened the rest of the summer, seemed simply amazing, but I had this weird feeling in my stomach.
Then summer came to an end. I had one more day left. I was falling asleep when a thousand things popped into my mind. At first, I thought of my sister and how her first day at her new high school was going to be and how I would pick her up, and things of that sort, when I remembered. My sister was going to be on a different schedule. She would leave every day 2 hours before I would. I’m worried. So just as I usually do, I knocked on her door and talked to her about tomorrow.
“Hey, can I come in?” I ask politely.
“Yeah, go ahead” she says in a grin.
“So, tomorrow’s a big day isn’t it” I smiled back.
“Ha, I guess it is,” she paused “So any advice?”
“Don’t stress out about things and do all your work and you’ll be fine”


“Okay then” she smiled weakly. Ah, there it is. Her fake smile. Something’s wrong.
“Are you going to be okay?” I asked in a worried tone.
“Yeah, of course.”
“Um okay then, if you need anything, I’m here, goodnight little sis” I gave her a quick hug.
“Goodnight big brother” she hugged me back.
I closed her door and walked to my room. Of course, I couldn’t sleep at all. I kept thinking and thinking about what I was going to do to ensure that she was going to be okay, or at least, alive for another day.
The next day, I woke up and remembered that it’s the first day of school. I got dressed and ready and woke my sister up. After we took the bus to school, I walked her to the office so she could go meet the person that was going to .. well .. in a way, babysit her to make sure that she’s safe. She stopped me right before we got in.


“Hey, um do I have to do this?” she asked.
“Do what?” I replied.
“Go and get my babysitter, don’t you trust me?” she looked at me seriously.
“I trust you, I really do.” I can’t trust her thoughts though, I know how they work.
“Then why? I don’t want one.”
“Think about it in a good way. Don’t you want to live?” I asked. I was getting kind of frustrated.
“Yeah, of course” she lied. I know she did.
Then we went inside. I met her ‘babysitter’ there. She seemed nice.
“Well I better get to class now. Have fun sissy.” I gave her a quick hug and left.
“Okay. See you at home” she said half-heartedly. She was mad. I knew she was. She didn’t want a shadow. But it was for her own good.
That day went by quickly. I learned absolutely nothing. The bell rung. I couldn’t stop thinking about my sister. When the bell rung, I took the early bus home. Just as the bus was leaving, my best friend, Alexis, who I hadn’t spoken since the beginning of summer got in the bus and looked determined. Now let me tell you one thing about Alexis, she’s about a stubborn as a mule, and has the attention span of a goldfish, but she’s the only other person I trust, besides Autumn. We’ve known each other since we were little, she used to be my neighbor, back then when it was just my father, mother, and I. She’s the only one that was always there for me before, and after my brother’s incident. Once she saw me, she scowled at me, and started questioning me.
“Where have you been? Why didn’t you call? I left you dozens of voicemails and so many messages ..” She went on and on. Geez, she out of all people should’ve figured out why I went completely M.I.A. She was there when I got the phone call telling me about my younger brother, deceased at only 13, and when I would break down crying at my therapy sessions.
“You know where, and why,” I responded.
“No, I don’t” she said stubbornly.
“I was taking care of Autumn, ever since Jacob .. she hasn’t been the same.”
“Oh .. I’m sorry .. you’re right. How is she .. how are you taking this in?”
“I’m fine. We weren’t that close .. I barely knew him .. he was my half brother.”
“Your half brother? What do you mean?” God. How could she forget?
“You know, the son of some lady my d*ck father cheated on with my mother..” I hated talking about it.
“Oh right ..” she said kind of awkwardly and embarrassed. “Sorry.”
“It’s okay .. like I was saying, we weren’t that close .. but boy did Autumn love him. I guess she thought that since they were both only one year apart, they had a lot in common.”


“Oh. Okay. Hey, speaking of, where is she?” she asked as she looked around.


“F*ck. I forgot.” I was scared. Terrified. She had been home alone for almost two hours now. When the bus got to my stop, I ran without saying goodbye.
I ran and ran and didn’t stop until I got home. As I opened my door, I went straight into her room. There she was, on the floor, doing homework. She looked up.


“Can you knock?” she said kind of rudely.


“I’m sorry.” I said, closed the door, knocked and went back it.


“Happy?” I said in a sarcastic way.
“Yes, I am” she grinned “so why did you walk in out of the blue?”
“Oh, nevermind, it’s nothing.”
“Um okay..” And that was it.
That went on for almost a year. I checked in with her about every five minutes like I usually do. I felt like I could trust her a lot more now.
Then, about a month before school ended. I remember waking up that morning and getting this weird feeling in my stomach that people usually get when something bad was going to happen. But I ignored it, I was stupid for that. The day went by as slowly as it usually does. Then, on my bus ride home, these idiotic jocks decided to comment on the fact that I run home. I don’t understand why though, I’m the kind of person who just stays on the low at school, trying not to catch anyones attention. But I guess I did catch theirs.

“Hey loser!” One of them said, “How come you always run home?”
“You don’t need to know,” I responded.
“Actually, yes I do,” he said back. “Now tell me why.”
“I have nothing to explain to you” I said and moved away.
“Hey! I didn’t tell you you can walk away!” he yelled.


Of course, I tried avoiding him, but oh was I wrong and stupid for doing that. Because, once I got off, they followed. I ran, but they ran faster. It happened so quickly. They punched me, attempting to get the answer out of me, when they saw that they couldn’t get it, they left me there and ran away. Still, bruised and bleeding, I attempted to run home. When I realized I couldn’t, I stopped, and walked.
I thought my day couldn’t get any worse, when I walked in to my house, and noticed it was strangely quiet. I ran into her room, and she wasn’t there. I looked all over the house, I checked every room and bathroom and closet in the house, but for some reason, I couldn’t go into hers. As I attempted to walk into her bathroom, I realized the door was locked. ‘Oh no’ I thought. I hit the door, like people usually do in movies, and finally, bursted into the bathroom. There was an odd feeling in the room. The floor was wet, and there was something in the water, it wasn’t just clear, it was mixed with .. blood. I realized that the bathtub had overflown, and it was going onto the rest of the room. Scared, to see what was behind the curtain, I slowly open it. I want to scream for what’s in front of me. But as I try, nothing comes out, I’m speechless. But there she is, my sister, my little sister, dead. There she is as pale as snow with both her wrists slit. For a minute or so, I just stood there, unable to move, cry, or speak. For some reason, my first instinct was to get my phone out, and call Alexis.

“Hello?” she said.
“Alexis .. Autumn .. she’s .. gone ..” I finally said.

“Oh .. my .. have you called 911?” she asked.
“No .. I can’t ..” I said. Why can’t I? Why didn’t I? I’m not sure.
“I’ll call right now .. be there in a minute..” she didn’t sound shocked.
“O..k..a..y..” I said. And she hung up.


After the phone call, I got her out of the bathtub, and hugged her, I hugged her as long as I could. Then the ambulance came and took her away from me. Strangely enough, I didn’t go with her. I just stayed there. On the ground .. not believing what I had just seen. No matter how many times I said it, I couldn’t believe it.

“My sister .. she’s dead ..” I said about 20 times before Alexis came and gave me a compassionate hug. We both cried for hours. I didn’t go to school for about a month. I just stayed in my room all day, just laying down. Doing absolutely nothing. But when I did, I couldn’t focus. On my bus ride home, one of the jocks sat next to me. I swear I was about to punch him when he started talking to me.


“Hey” he said.


“Hi” I replied.


“I’m sorry about my friends” he apologized.
“It’s fine.” I said coldly.
“So why do you run to your house every day?” he asked.
“I used to” I said weakly.
“Then why did you used to?”
“Do you really want to know?”
“Yes.” I wasn’t in the mood to talk.
“Fine. I ran every single day to my house because I was afraid my sister would kill herself if I didn’t get there early enough. I ran every day, except for the day your friends jumped me. She killed herself before I got there.”


“Wow man, that’s intense. I’m sorry ..”


“It’s fine, it’s just hard to forget those you love..”