The gray sky, covered in clouds

Made the world dark, stars blocked out

In the time right before dawn

The sun reluctant to rise

Sun dragged itself out of bed

Seam in the world appearing

Egg of the gray shell open

Exposing an orange glow

The amber gap now showing

Opposite of orange peel

Taking away the outer

Not so harsh awakening

Something worth getting up for

However faint the sunrise

Showy or just a glimmer

The day will begin at last

She knelt at the gravestone for the first time, wishing she never had to. As the leaves of the trees fell around her, she felt her love falling as well. It encompassed him, buried in the ground, as she tried not to think of it. She poured out her love to him in a stream of tears and unattractive snot, wishing he was still there to wipe her tears and assure her she was still beautiful.

The leaves piled up around her, like the leaves they played in together as kids, and that he’d never again get to play with. Everything seemed to remind her of him. The pizza boxes that her parents ordered with increasing frequency lately, too lethargic with grief to cook anything else, echoed with dares and tears of the pepper that accompanied it. The lemonade stand the kids across the street had set up, one he’d never get to buy from and reminisce fondly the times they’d gotten rich off of twenty-five cents a cup. The coffee cup everyone seemed to clutch in the mornings, seeming empty without his snarky remark of dependence on the caffeine.

She was so lost in the memories they’d shared and wouldn’t continue, the life she’d now have to go on to live alone, that she didn’t recognize the obvious- a bouquet of flowers on the grave, wilting mildly. They must have been recent, but she couldn’t think of anyone who would’ve left them: Their parents certainly weren’t up to coming here. She doubted they had been since the burial, one through which they had barely held themselves together. Their grandparents lived far away, and they weren’t the sentimental type to bring flowers. Their grandfather would likely make a tasteless joke about how he’d somehow managed to outlive him. He didn’t have any friends, she had to be frank. He was the kid at school who ate lunch alone in the library, refusing her attempts to bring him to her table. She’d never seen him interact with anyone unless forced, where he’d look down at his ratty Converse until they went away, mumbling the answers to their questions.

She puzzled over the flowers, with no one to have placed them. They were the wrong kind, anyway. He had hated roses, laughed at them and the fact that they were a symbol of love when he often found them in the trash at school, more the symbol of love gone wrong. She couldn’t think of what kind of flower he would like. Daisies? Mums? Tulips? He hadn’t shown any preference, only making disparaging remarks about the entire concept. She resolved to find the right kind.

He looked down at his chest, at his beating heart. He could almost imagine him down there, punching his chest to beat it. There was no question that he was there. He had been ever since the accident. He would bounce around, lounging in his lungs and making it harder to breathe, or sitting in his toe, only to jump up in protest as he stubbed it. He cringed, worried to hurt him more than he already had. He realized that, taking full advantage and stretching out in his intestines as if they were his own.

He made it so he couldn’t escape the grief. He did the only thing he could, even if it felt terrible. He practically stalked the guy, finding all about his old life. Sometimes he got so caught up in the information that he forgot that it was his fault that this life wouldn’t continue.

He saw a picture of the family, of a young, pretty mother and a sturdy-looking dad. A sister, maybe a twin. A dog. He stared at this grainy picture, at the point of their lives when they hadn’t been torn apart. Before, he imagined, the dog began running circles around the house looking for him and the sister lost the other half of herself and the mom aged thousands of years and the dad became frail.

He realized that in most movies about grief, people sought closure. Maybe he could get some too, even though he didn’t deserve it. He looked up the cemetery where he was buried. Even though it felt like an intrusion on his part, he decided to just go.

He brought roses. He didn’t know what kind, but roses seemed like a good concept. They symbolized something, didn’t they? Love or whatever. Couldn’t go wrong with them.

He appreciated the flowers. Every week a new kind, more and more, the two fighting and one-upping each other, without realizing. He saw it all, and laughed, but he loved them.

She wanted to ask his favorite type of flower? Whichever she picked out.

He thought it was all his fault, that he’d done an unforgivable act. He forgave him. He wished he would forgive himself.

I saw my life flash before my eyes. I saw my twin, identical to myself, giggling as we dressed up identically for Halloween. I saw us entering kindergarten together, graduating together, smearing cake on each other’s faces at our first birthday party. I saw the wild teenage parties, the nail-biting season finales, the matching college letters. I saw it all, and only when I reached the end and saw the lonely memories I did not share did I realize that this was not mine. It was my twin’s. I meant the most to him- and I’d taken him for granted. And now, as I watched the life run out of his no longer cake-streaked face, I realized it was too late.