♡𝙲𝚑𝚘𝚜𝚎𝚗 𝙻𝚊𝚜𝚝- 𝚂𝚊𝚛𝚊𝚑 𝙺𝚊𝚢𝚜

𝓦𝓻𝓲𝓽𝓽𝓮𝓷 𝓫𝔂:
@GRIFFENPUFFCHILD

✧･: *✧･ﾟ:* 　　 *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

TW: This story has to do with grieving and dealing with the loss of a loved one. The story jumps between what's actually happening and what the main character imagines was happening to her during this time.

"Now, in order to solve for this angle, what do we use? Inverse of sine, or inverse of cosine?" At this question, five hands shot up eagerly, waiting for the teacher to pick them. I wasn't paying any attention to the class, just discreetly scrolling through Pinterest on my phone. I had no interest in this course and wanted the day to be over as soon as possible. Of course, I could just fake being sick and leave. But, I already did that twice this week, so that was out of the question.

"Miss Anastasia, would you like to answer this question?" Our math teacher asked.

"Huh? What?" I brought myself back to reality.

"I said, can you answer this question?" He asked again. I sighed and put my phone down. Meme Man and Orang would have to wait.

"Cosine inverse, Mr. Bryans," I said unenthusiastically. I hated being put on the spot like this. It wasn't that it made me uncomfortable or anything, I just didn't like unwanted attention, and the whole class staring at me while expecting me to answer a dang question sure counts as unwanted attention.

"That is correct! Mister Caleb, can you tell us the equation we use with cosine inverse?" He asked, finally taking me out of the spotlight. I let out a breath and got back on my phone, subconsciously checking the time. 2:35. Five more minutes and we were out of here. That was just one minute five times. I can live with that.

I went to go and check my messages for any notifications, and there were none. I was sad to say that it didn't surprise me. No one really messaged me, and group chat conversations would go on forever until I came in. But I was new to the group, and no one really knew me yet. They all have known each other for years. They all had inside jokes and everything and I kind of just sat there and listened.

The five minutes came and went, and when the bell rang, a massive sea of students flooded through the school's halls trying to escape this prison of education. I went to go and find my friends because we had planned to go out shopping for Christmas gifts after school. As I was walking through the halls, I got a notification on my phone. From my mom. I read it instantly, knowing her over protective nature. If I didn't read it and respond within the five seconds she sent it, she would have a panic attack.

"Honey, I don't think you should go shopping with your friends today." Was all the text said. Of course, I was confused, since she said yesterday that I was allowed to go. "Why not?" I responded. "I have some news for you."

"Okay," was my response, as I veered away from the group meeting spot and walked towards the parking lot instead. Once I sat down in my car, I messaged the chat, letting the girls know that I wasn't able to go due to a last minute emergency. No one acknowledged this. Not even an "okay." from anyone. It didn't really matter. It was a twenty minute drive from the school to my house. I was going to check my phone when I got home again, anyways.

All of a sudden, my phone began blowing up with notifications in the chat. I checked, and most of it was just playful banter between the girls, but a couple of them were addressing the fact that I wasn't going to be there. One was asking if everything was okay. I smiled and texted back, telling them that I'll let them know when I find out. It was great to know I had such a great group of friends.

School traffic was a nightmare. You have eight hundred beginner drivers all trying to navigate this tiny parking lot and get out onto the road. And the staff wonders why there are so many fender benders and other accidents near this area. It was just stupid. If only they actually got someone to monitor the traffic flow to make sure it doesn't take two hours to get out of here.
Luckily, my car was parked towards the front of the parking lot, so I was able to get out in about five minutes. Finally escaping the parking lot prison, I was on my way home.
Twenty minutes later, I was walking through the front door, lugging my backpack behind me. I went looking for my mom so she could give me whatever news it was. When I found her in the living room, she was really upset. Crying. I knew this was bad. Mom never cries.

"Annie, come here," she said, pulling me into a hug. I was so confused. What was going on?

"Mom? Are you okay?" I asked.

"Honey, I just received news that your Grandpa Donald died about two hours ago," she said, still crying. I was shocked. I didn't know how to process it. I hadn't seen my great grandfather in three years. And I would never see him again. I would never get to play the piano for him again. I would never get to tell him about what I learned in school again. I would never get another chance to say goodbye to him again.

"I, I just need a minute," I said, and ran up to my room. It all happened in a matter of seconds, but it felt like hours. Grandpa Don was dead. He was gone. I didn't get to say goodbye. Why? Why did God have to take him now?

Tears began welling up in my eyes as I subconsciously began putting my stuff away. My phone began ringing, and I went to check it. I wiped my eyes and saw it was a facetime call from Rosemary. I answered it, and she asked if I wanted to stay the night at her place.

"Sorry, but I just don't think that would work today," I said, a lump starting to build up in my throat. I didn't want to start crying now.

"Oh? How come?" She asked. I didn't answer, trying to calm myself down before I started crying. It was too late. There were so many tears in my eyes, I couldn't see, and if I opened my mouth to talk, I would start crying, which I didn't want to do, so instead, I opened up my messages and texted her about what happened instead. It was so hard to do without misspelling every single word, since I was blinded by the tears.

Once I sent the message, I got an instant notification saying Rosemary had read it. She gasped and said, "Oh my God, I'm so sorry, Annie! I really understand if you just want to take a couple of days to yourself. Would you like me to let everyone else know so they won't worry?"

I came back to the camera and nodded, tears streaming down my cheeks. I felt really bad for not staying the night at Rosemary's, but I was really upset and would've been a huge downer the whole day. I didn't want us to not have fun because of me.

"Okay, well, I have to go now. I'm really sorry, Annie! I hope you and your mom feel better soon!" And with that, Rosemary hung up. Then I really started crying. I hated it. I hated the underlying guilt I felt. The guilt of not telling him goodbye. I always assumed I would get another chance. I never knew how wrong I was.
✧･: *✧･ﾟ:* 　　 *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

When I woke up this morning, I felt sick, and I didn't want to go to school. I didn't know if it was because I cried myself to sleep last night, or from eating all the sugar I could find, or if it was just the guilt causing me to feel like crap. Probably a combination of the three. I dragged myself out of my room to get ready for school, only to be in the bathroom five minutes later, bent over the toilet, with my "dinner" from last night making a reappearance. It wasn't even an actual dinner. It was just a bunch of expired chocolates from a box I got on Valentine's Day and a Trenta Pink Drink. Now I knew for sure that I wouldn't be going anywhere today.
I dragged myself over to my mom's room after flushing what I had thrown up down the toilet.

"Mooommyyyyyyyyyy," I said, drawing the word out as much as I could. "I threw uuuuuppppp." I always found it hilarious how normally, I was actually pretty tough, and didn't complain much, but the second I got sick, I turned into an absolute infant. I was helpless.

"Honey, I told you to eat some real food," she said, getting up out of bed to come and check my temperature.

"But I was too SAD for real food!" I whined, as I held back another wave of nausea. "Mommy, my tummy feels icky." And right on cue, I retched violently. I didn't have time to run back down the hall, so I went into mom's bathroom and bent over the sink. Thankfully, I just dry heaved. It was a false alarm.

"No schooly, pleasey?" I asked. God, I was miserable.

"Absolutely not. Come downstairs, Annie. I'll get you a cup of ice and a bowl." Thank God. I would've been miserable all day at school. Not that anyone would have noticed or anything. It's not that I was good at hiding my misery. I was absolutely horrible at it. It was that no one really ever paid much attention to me. I didn't really care though. I couldn't imagine being one of the popular kids at school. So much attention and only because they posted a cute selfie on Instagram that one time. If they were sick, their inboxes would explode with notifications and get well messages. If I had that kind of attention, I feel like it would go to my head super quick. Either that, or I would forget about it all entirely in the next five seconds because ADD.

I went downstairs and my mom had gotten my bowl and ice cup ready. I sat down on the couch and started sucking on one of my ice cubes. I had a feeling nothing else would come up today, but I wanted to have the bowl just in case. I turned on the TV to Auction Kings, and then texted the group chat good morning. As I expected, no one acknowledged it. As the chat started to flood with messages, everyone asking where everyone was, someone asked where I was. I responded, saying that I was home sick, and the person started a FaceTime call. Even though I felt like crap, I picked up, and was greeted with the faces of six girls, each one in a different spot on campus.

"Hey Annie!" one of them, Haley, said. I smiled and waved, too tired to really say anything. "Where are you, girl? I'm looking all over for you!"

"Haley, did you not read my message in the chat?" I said, laughing. "I'm home sick!"

"Oh no! Are you okay?" Gina asked, walking past the band room.

"Yeah, I'm good. I just ate crap last night. And kinda cried myself to sleep."

"What happened?" Dana asked, as she found Rosemary. Rosemary took the phone and explained it to everyone, knowing what would happen if I tried to explain it. Instantly, my phone's speaker exploded with noise, all of it condolences.

I almost started crying again, and then I felt another wave of nausea. "Uh, girls, I gotta go before I throw up again. I don't think you wanna hear that on your phones."

"Oh, goodness no," Cecilia said, nearly gagging herself. I laughed, said goodbye, and hung up the phone. As if it was right on cue, I gagged, and retched. Fortunately, it was only a dry heave. I definitely wasn't going to be eating anything anytime soon. I just decided to watch Auction Kings try to sell a framed collection of signed drumsticks, while I sit here and mope over being the odd one out in a group of friends.

✧･: *✧･ﾟ:* 　　 *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

After about five episodes, my phone rang with a message in the chat. It was from Rosemary. Her birthday was in a few days, and she was throwing a party this weekend. I had eaten some noodle soup, despite my stomach's protests, and also took some Pepto-Bismol to keep the nausea down. Now that I had some food in my stomach, I was feeling a lot better. The medicine helped too. My fever had gone down and I wasn't gagging and retching anymore. My nose was still stuffy, though. That was from our Christmas tree.

I messaged my mom and asked her if I could go to Rosemary's birthday party this weekend, and she said it was okay, as long as I kept my distance from everyone else, since we didn't know if what I had was contagious or if it was just cause I was stupid last night.

I turned off the TV at some point, and just sat there, alone with my thoughts. Naturally, they drifted back to Grandpa Donald. I felt so absolutely horrible. I was such a brat in eighth grade, thinking I was cool for not getting into emotional stuff like goodbyes. I still played the organ he had in his house, but it was because I thought it was cool. I didn't understand the sentiment behind it. Grandma Lorraine used to play it all the time. Now, as a Junior in high school, I realized what I did was wrong, and I wanted to fix it. Except it's too late. There's no way I can fix anything. I probably won't be able to go to his funeral because of school.

I started crying again, but not because I was sad. I was crying because I was angry. I was angry at everything. Myself, school, my friends, God, my mom, my father. Nothing would be able to appease how angry I was at the world. In a fit of misjudgement, I turned around and punched the wall, my fist going straight through the drywall. I didn't even care about the amount of trouble I would be in for putting a hole in the wall. I didn't care about how much my hand hurt. In fact, the physical hurt took away from the mental hurt. I must've put at least four more holes in the wall before I hit the wooden frame under the drywall. Up until that point all I saw was red.

When I hit the post, I heard the sickening crack from my knuckles, signalling that they were broken. I clutched my fist in my other hand while I screamed. I screamed because I was angry, because I was hurt, because I was sad.
"WHY??" I screamed towards the heavens, hoping an angel, a spirit, or even God himself would hear me. "WHYYY?!!!" I kept screaming until I heard a knock at the door. BANG BANG BANG. I picked myself up off the floor. Three loud knocks. Must be the local PD. Neighbors must've called them while I was screaming. *BANG BANG BANG* I brushed the drywall off my pajamas as I kept walking down the hall to the door. At this point, I was so done, so tired, I didn't care what would happen.
BANG BANG BANG. "OPEN UP THE DOOR!!" I heard a gruff voice shout. I didn't pick up my pace. I didn't slow down, I just kept walking. I reached the door, and pulled the lock. I turned the knob, and opened it slowly, making eye contact with the three officers standing on my porch. Two male, one female.

"Good afternoon, officers. What seems to be the problem?" I asked, in a deadpan voice. I wasn't trying to be disrespectful. But I could only hear static in my mind.

"We received a call about possible domestic violence. Are your parents home?" The female officer asked.

"No."

"Did you have any encounter with a dangerous family member?"

"No."

"Are you injured?"
"Yes." I wanted to lie. But I couldn't. I was in robot mode. My phone started blowing up with texts. I pulled it out, and it said, "yoo there's police cars heading to Annie's house." I put the phone away and continued my conversation with the officers.

The younger male officer asked me where I was hurt and how I hurt myself.

"I punched the wall and broke my hand," I said. Rosemary's car pulled up to the house, along with two other police cars. "Why are there more police cars?" I asked, confused.
The other officers seemed just as confused as I was. They looked behind, and there were no police cars. One of the officers in the new cars had a K-9. Rosemary was pleading with them, telling them that I was just grieving. "They have a K-9. What is going on?" I was getting scared. Rosemary was at school. She's struggling against the officers, trying to hold them back.

"Miss, I need you to look at me," the female officer instructed. I looked at her, and she had a worried look on her face. The K-9 started barking, and I heard Rosemary scream. Did the dog bite her? "Miss, there is no K-9. There are no other officers. Just me, Jones, and Michals. We are here to help you, do you understand?" I heard a car door close, and I saw the officers advancing. "Miss?"

At this point, I was lost in my confusion. Rosemary was banging at the car windows, the K-9 was getting excited. Rosemary is at school. There are no other officers. The three officers all had their weapons drawn and were aiming at me. The three officers don't even have weapons. "Annastasia, why didn't you say goodbye?" Grandpa Donald said, standing right there. Grandpa Donald is dead.
I didn't understand what was going on. It was getting so hard to discern between fantasy and reality.

✧･: *✧･ﾟ:* 　　 *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧