It was over and I had survived it all on my own. I did it through sheer power of will, mind over matter. Alice would be so proud of me.
I took her photo off the moldy wall and looked at her face clearly for the first time in almost eight years. We had the same eyes, a bright green color that I’ve never seen on anyone else. When we were young we would tell strangers we were identical twins, we’d always get a kick out of it when they would try to explain that being a boy and girl makes it impossible for us to be identical. Our mom called us her little mutants because green eyes are supposed to be some kind of genetic mutation and, with as green as ours were, she said we must be some kind of mutants. I’m sure I look like a real mutant right now. I just woke up with my elbow in butter, my skin-and-bones elbow that is, already saturated in grease. My dirty, smelly, old, ill-fitting clothes were engulfing the rest of my body, enhancing my skeletal shape. I guess I had forgotten how to eat in the last eight years, nothing really mattered with Alice gone.
Alice was always the better of the two of us. She would have never let me get so lost that I would end up in a dump like this, an extended stay motel with grime on every surface and bed bugs and a stain that looked remarkably similar to dried blood on the carpet. She would be appalled to see me now, wasted away to nothing with roaches scuttling about my half eaten toast and spiders dangling from the ceiling. Had she been alive to see my life spiral this out of control she would have been so heartbroken. Then again, maybe if she had never died I would have never had a reason to spiral.
We had always been best friends, even during the stages of growing up where most twins bickered and grew apart, where the boy twin starts hanging out with boys his age and the girl does the same with girls. We had friends but we always shared them, which made Alice a tomboy in a way. When it came time for pee-wee sports our mom had to find co-ed teams because we refused to be separated. It was like that for most of our lives, we just did everything together. Our bond was unique but the best.
I looked down and saw the filthy, midnight black, stray cat that wouldn’t stop following me around laying at my feet. This cat somehow always managed to sneak in the door any time I walked into my motel room even though I did everything to keep it out. Alice had always loved cats and I wondered if she sent it to me. I mean despite the fact that it made me sneeze like crazy it still stayed by my side through all the pain and torment of withdrawal and detox. It was a friend when I needed one even though I didn’t ask for it. Maybe Alice wanted me to start my new drug and alcohol free life by saving this poor animal. It would be a very Alice move seeing as our whole lives growing up she was always saving strays, nursing them to health, and finding them loving homes. She had a good heart, the best heart, and I missed her so much. I decided to name the cat Alice if I found out it was a girl, Al if it turned out to be a boy.
First thing I needed to do was call my parents and tell them I was sorry for the past eight years, sorry that I let one accident take both their children’s lives. I needed their help to get back on a straight path, their help to live how Alice would have wanted me to. I had to live for her, do all the things she would have wanted to do if her life hadn’t been taken so early. I’d start with the cat and as I slowly got stronger and healthier I’d find a job and save up and get a real place to live and save another stray, probably a dog though. One day I’d climb Mt Everest, one of her biggest dreams, but for now I had a call to make.
No comments:
Post a Comment