NINE YEARS AGO

MUSE sat cross-legged in her bed, staring down at her phone. She was fourteen years old. Ella should have texted her back by now. The time ticked to 9:01 p.m.

      She wasn't used to her new room. Sometimes Muse glanced up, and jolted at the difference. Aunt Aria and Uncle Darius had tried to make the move-in process as easy for her as possible after the car accident. Aunt Aria had helped her plaster David Bowie posters to the wall. Uncle Darius had even gifted her a three-foot Pikachu stuffed animal to add to her collection of Pikachu toys. (She didn't even like Pokemon―she just thought Pikachu was really cute.) They had also asked her what colour she wanted to paint the bedroom walls. She'd picked pink, to match her zebra-striped fuchsia bedcovers. 

      Before her parents died, Muse had begged them to repaint the pink walls in her old room a shade of green. She had told them the pink was "too babyish." 

      But now, even though she lived with her aunt and uncle―even though she could've started over―she couldn't bear to have her room any other colour. 

     Grief counselling didn't really help. It had been a year since the death of her family. It still hurt like yesterday. 

     There were nights she woke up, gasping, an invisible seatbelt strapped to her chest. In the dreams, she took her mother's place, bleeding out slowly in the passenger seat before the paramedics arrived. She always woke up in the moment of her last breath, but it still felt like dying. 

      It was even worse on the mornings when she woke up and simply forgot everyone was dead. She would lay in bed, eyes closed. She believed Mom would call her name any second, telling her she'd overslept.

     "Wake up, Muse," she would say. "You have school. Your brother's already ready. How is it that Liam is younger than you and still manages to be more on time? Please don't tell me you snoozed your alarm again."

      But Mom's voice never came. So the devastating, sinking panic always set in.

      And when Muse opened her eyes, sunlight shone from her right, not her left. She reached for her nightstand, and it was by the foot of her bed, not the side. She went down for breakfast, and her aunt and uncle waited for her. No more Mom, no more Dad, no more baby brother. That was how she knew she wasn't dreaming. Because even if she died a thousand times in her dreams, it still wouldn't feel as wrong as reality did.

     Her phone chimed with a text. Ella.

     Muse giggled as she read it. Ella had written about how much she hated their eighth-grade biology teacher.

     A knock interrupted her, mid-typing. The laugh died from her throat.

    "Come in," she said.

     Uncle Darius tentatively opened the door. He stood in the frame, nearly skimming the top with his head. He looked a lot like her dad: dark brown skin, soft hazel eyes, a nose with a bump in the ridge, and short curly golden-brown hair. She'd inherited the hazel eyes and the golden-brown hair, but her skin was a lighter brown like her mom's had been, and her features were softer. 

     "Hi, Muse. Is this a good time?"

      Muse flipped her phone face-down on the bed. "Yeah, what is it?"

      "You know, your aunt Aria and I were talking, and we―well, we . . ."

      "Is this about her work trips the past few months? Are we moving to Ohio to be with her more?" Aunt Aria was one of the top surgeons in New York City, but she gave a lot of medical-related seminars in nearby states. Her past few trips had been to Ohio specifically, each lasting a few days―even a week―at a time.

       She'd heard Uncle Darius and Aunt Aria whispering in the kitchen late at night, almost arguing, and she had tried guessing what they seemed upset about. The conclusion that made the most sense was moving.

       Even though Muse hated school, she didn't want to move. It was where she'd grown up, even if none of her classmates looked her in the eye anymore―and when they did, they gave her looks filled with pity. She hated being that girl whose family died. No one knew what to do with her. No one―besides Ella―wanted to be her friend anymore. After the accident, a boy named Topher had tried getting to know her, but only so he could know the details of the crash.

      "What was it like? Were you there?" he'd said, almost breathless with excitement. "Did you see them die? Was there a lot of blood?"

      She never spoke to him again.

      A lot of Muse's old friends had slowly started distancing themselves. She knew they didn't do it on purpose. She'd withdrawn into herself after the accident―she'd become quieter, stopped smiling. She'd rejected offers of going to the movies, roller skating, and hanging out at the park. One by one, the offers had stopped coming.

      She had felt better the last couple of months, though. A little more herself every day. Aunt Aria had taken her clothes shopping. Uncle Darius discovered her favourite dessert, and brought home macaroons for her after his shifts at work. Adjusting to this new life, this new home, eased slightly. But Muse still couldn't bring herself to repair her old friendships. Not when she knew the second she tried, she'd be met with the wide, sorrowful eyes of her peers, and they'd say yes to her attempts at hanging out―if only because they felt guilty saying no. The thought of that pity made her stomach turn.

      Ella had just moved into the city from California a few weeks ago. Muse hadn't planned on talking to her. Eighth grade was almost over; high school would be a fresh start.

      But on her first day, Ella had pointed at a Pikachu sticker on Muse's water bottle and asked, "Do you like Pokemon?"

      "Not really," Muse had said.

      "Me neither," Ella had replied brightly. "But isn't he so adorable?"

      It was then that Muse had noticed how pretty Ella was. Straight black hair, cut to her shoulders, and dark brown eyes. When she smiled, everything else disappeared. Ella sat down next to her, and from that moment on, Muse had her first real friend since the crash. 

      Uncle Darius shifted from foot to foot. He didn't move from the doorframe, didn't come any closer. "No, Muse. Your aunt . . . she hasn't been going on work trips, exactly."

     "What, like no seminars?"

     "No seminars," he said gently. "She's been in the hospital."

     The ominous way he said that didn't make sense to Muse. "Yeah," she said. "Because she works there."

     "You know about the miscarriages, right?"

     Muse blinked at the change of topic. She knew Uncle Darius and Aunt Aria didn't have any kids, but that they had tried at least a dozen times. All ending in a miscarriage. "Yeah, why?"

      "Your aunt, she . . ." He dragged his hand over his face, a sigh. "We didn't want to tell you. But she has a lot of internal bleeding. Her health is failing, and the hospital bill is . . . it's too much. We can't take care of you anymore."

      Time stopped. Muse would forever remember that moment, as crystal clear as if it were a film in her head. The glow-in-the-dark butterfly stickers on the doorframe above Uncle Darius. The soft whirring of the overhead fan, fluttering the edges of the posters on her pink walls. The chime of her phone, as Ella sent her another text.

      "What do you mean?"

      She didn't know if she actually said the words, or if Uncle Darius merely saw the question in her eyes.

      "Your mother's mother―your grandmother―is willing to take you. It'll just be for a little while your aunt and I sort out the hospital charges. The prognosis isn't looking so good. But it will be okay eventually, Muse."

      "You lied to me? About the work trips?"

       "We just didn't know how to tell you, Muse. I'm sorry. Aria and I both knew it would hurt you. We didn't want to create any unnecessary stress and instability for you after the accident."

       "You lied to me," Muse repeated. "You pretended Aunt Aria was on work trips while she was in the hospital. I would've―I would have wanted to know the truth."

       "I know," said Uncle Darius. "I know, Muse. I'm so sorry. We knew it was coming to this―we just wanted to keep it from you as long as possible. So you could have a normal life."

       "I haven't had a normal life since my thirteenth birthday," Muse said, her hands shaking. 

       "You're still only fourteen, Muse. We didn't think you'd want―"

       "You should've given me a choice." 

       "Muse, I'm so sorry for lying. I'm so―"

       "Where's Aunt Aria?"

       She knew the answer already. Aunt Aria should have been on a work trip. She'd kissed Muse's head goodbye, and told her she'd be back in three days. "I'll bring back a souvenir for you from Ohio," she'd said.

       Uncle Darius looked at her with those eyes―brimming with pity, as if she were nothing more than a child who didn't know better. "They're running diagnostic tests on her in the hospital."

       Muse nodded slowly. A sob caught in her throat. An urgent desperation gripped her. "Please don't make me live with my grandmother. Please, I don't want to move again. Please, Uncle Darius."

       Muse barely remember her mother's mother. They'd visited her a few times, but Mom had always seemed tense, on edge, around her. She was old-fashioned. And she lived far―upstate New York, an hour's drive away.

      "It's already been decided, honey. It's not just about the money. Now that Aria's in the hospital permanently, we won't be able to be home as much, to provide for you anymore. Not in the way we should."

      "I don't care," Muse said, almost frenzied now. "I'll make food for myself. I won't be a burden to you. I can walk to school. You don't have to take care of me, really. Just please don't leave me." 

       Uncle Darius only gazed at her, so sadly she knew it was already over, that she'd never had a chance. The choice had already been made.

      "Please don't leave me," Muse whispered anyway.

      "We'll still visit you," he said. "Hopefully, when things are better, we can adopt you and it will be permanent this time―"

      "Get out." Her voice broke. "Just get out."

       Uncle Darius paused, as if he wanted to say more. As if he knew there were a million things he could say. But, in the end, he must have realized none of them could make it better. He turned, and closed the door softly behind him. He died a month later, the morning after Aunt Aria passed of health complications.

           And Muse started to believe she really was cursed―to watch everyone she ever loved leave her, one by one, until she was alone once more. 

***

I haven't seen my gf in twelve hours.

From the moon and back,

Sarai