Page 5

FOUR

DIA

"When life becomes unbearable, channel the resilience of a grizzly." — Unknown

The sky is far too blue.

The sun is brilliantly shining down lighting up the day in a gorgeous way.

The clouds are fluffy bundles like cotton in a pillow.

It’s the kind of Carolina day to be relaxing on Emerald Isle, toes in the sand, listening to the waves roll in.

It is like the outside world is trying to give me a gentle kiss into the new day, this new world.

But I don’t want the sky to be blue or the sun to shine.

I don’t care about the clouds in the sky.

I don’t want to be outside inhaling the fresh air.

I want to be anywhere but here.

I want to be anyone but me.

And I want today to be anything but what it is.

My mom thinks this will help me.

His mom literally sent a legal paper, professionally served and all, to keep me and every Hellion away from Benji’s funeral.

Nothing will help me.

Yet, everyone around me says the words, but they don’t stop pushing me to do something.

I park at the top of the hill, the gravel parking lot crunching under the tires of my car.

Skye whimpers in the car beside me like she knows where we are.

I grab the flowers from the passenger floorboard, the red Dahlias with red Gerber daisy mix just for him.

The flowers we planned for our wedding next year.

I climb out of the car, flowers and leash in hand as Skye follows me out of my Camaro.

The wind blows against my cheeks sending a chill through my body.

Is that him?

Is Benji embracing me?

There is a cardinal in the distance watching me.

Is that him?

There is an old saying, if a cardinal appears a loved one is near.

I have always seen the red birds and thought about my grandparents that I didn’t meet but know they loved my parents fiercely.

I am named for my grandmother, Claudia Reklinger.

But seeing this cardinal, here, today, well, I would like to think it’s Benji watching over me this time.

I walk the path my brother drew out for me.

Since Benji’s mom forbid the Hellions from being part of his official funeral service yesterday, this is my goodbye.

While my dad and the club wanted to put pressure on her to let me take my place as his ol’ lady and make his last arrangements, I told them to stand down.

I overwhelmed Benji’s world.

She doesn’t understand.

All she knows is her son was straight laced, gentlemen, and always there for her since his dad died when he was fifteen.

Then he fell in love with a biker’s daughter.

My world didn’t make sense, but he embraced it fully and soon it became his world too.

A world she can’t understand.

Her goodbye matters as much as mine.

I didn’t want to taint this for her with more reminders of the son she lost because to her she lost him the first time the moment he fell in love with me.

I’ve always walked the line in between.

I know that in the outside world, she had the power.

As his woman, his property, I’m equal to being his wife with or without the vows, the ring, and ceremony.

In society norms, though, I was nothing more than a girlfriend.

I didn’t even have an engagement ring even though we were planning a wedding.

His mom is hurting too, though.

She blames the club.

If it wasn’t for the Hellions he never would have been out that night.

It doesn’t matter to her that if he hadn’t been there, the woman and child would be the ones in the ground, not her son.

And for him, knowing he could have done something and didn’t, well, this is how he would have preferred it to be.

It’s the kind of man he was: selfless to a fault.

The freshly covered mound shows me exactly where I need to be.

I walk to it where I see a small temporary marker.

Benjamin Henderson

“Loved deeply. Missed eternally.”

It’s all too raw.

Too new.

Too wrong.

I kneel, placing the flowers down delicately before I sit beside the dirt.

Will he hear me?

What’s it like for him, the afterlife?

Does he know how much I ache for him?

Does he know how much I love him?

“Hey,” I whisper, lifting some of the dirt into my hand.

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

Skye settles lying beside me staring at his name.

Closing my eyes I embrace the breeze like a hug from Heaven.

I let my mind go back.

“You want me to what?” he asks and I laugh.

Straddling the Harley-Davidson Sportster my boots are planted on the ground comfortably while Benji looks like he wants to run.

“You said you wanted to understand my life, my family. Well, welcome to your first experience.”

He stands in his driveway, eyes wide behind his glasses, hands on his hips instead of grabbing the helmet I hold out for him.

It takes a moment of hesitation before he puts it on.

That’s when I shift back making room for him in front of me.

“I’m gonna kill myself and possibly you too, Dia. I don’t know what I’m doing.”

“I trust you, baby. You’ll be fine. I’ll be fine,” I say with a wink.

“Besides this is basic. Get your balance, feel the bike. We aren’t leaving the neighborhood.

He studies the bike cautiously. “Why do you think this is remotely a good idea?

”

“You said you wanted to get it. Why my dad and brother love their bikes, why there is a passion in all of us when we talk about a ride. This is your chance to experience it.”

“Words can explain it.”

I laugh, “no they can’t. You have to feel it! And I see the way you look at the bikes. Like they scare you, yes, but they excite you at the same time.”

He smirks at me, “baby, you’re what excites me. The bike is just an accessory.”

“Humor me. Get on.”

He swings his leg over awkwardly as I put my hands on his sides loving the way he feels in front of me.

“Okay,” I take his hands and put them on the handle bars.

“The right is your throttle. It’s the go button. The lever you pull is the brake. You gotta make sure you can stop after the go.” I tap the gear shift with my left leg, “your clutch is the left hand with the shift lever to move gears happening with the left foot.”

He holds up his hand.

“Hold on.” He pauses, “you’re telling me, I have to use my hands and my feet? Simultaneously?”

“God help us both,” I mutter with a laugh.

“Yeah, like driving a car. Use your feet, your hands, your eyes, your ears, and your common sense.”

“Have you met me? Common sense isn’t always my thing, babe.” We both laugh.

“I believe in you, Benji. This is gonna be fun. Just relax into it and listen.”

“Good thing I’m a fast learner,” he jokes with a proud smile.

He wasn’t a fast learner, but he was determined.

It took two months before we could leave the housing development without him stalling.

I remember every wobble, every curse, and every time he looked at me and asked, “why do you do this and call it fun?”

I sit up, staring at the pile of dirt.

“I miss you.”

Skye whines.

“I don’t know how to breathe knowing you aren’t coming back.” I admit.

“You put in the effort. If it mattered to me, it mattered to you. How am I supposed to go on without you?”

There is no reply.

“I don’t know how to forgive the world for this.” The wind blows again.

I can almost pretend it’s his hand brushing through my hair.

“I’m angry. I’m scared, Benji. Sometimes I think I hear your voice.” A tear falls down my face, but I don’t care.

“Then I worry I will forget. I will forget what it sounds like to hear you say my name. I worry I’m going to forget what your hand on my thigh feels like. I don’t want to forget a single second, but I can’t stop the memories from fading. It shouldn’t be this way.”

The ache in my chest is sharp, sudden.

I drop my head and let all the tears fall.

I sit in silence.

A bird chirps from a tree not too far away.

The wind settles.

Everything feels still.

In the stillness, I finally share the thing that scares me the most.

“I don’t want to move on. I don’t want the days to keep passing,” I whisper.

“Because moving on even for a moment means leaving you behind.”

After a moment, I cry out.

“I didn’t ask for this!”

But that’s the thing about grief.

It doesn’t wait for permission.

It just plants a seed that grows a root inside you.

And it doesn’t ever leave.

In time it withers some, but it won’t leave.

“I loved you, Benji. I love you.” A sob wrecks through me.

“Always,” I whisper.

With every broken piece I had left, I loved him.

Not in the na?ve way I love Justin.

No, Justin “Toon” Miller owns a piece of me I can’t get back.

Or maybe I never want to.

But it doesn’t change that I loved Benji.

No one can take that away from me.

Not his mom.

Not a memory.

Not time.

I will forever love Benjamin Henderson.

No one can invade that, it’s ours alone.

Not even Toon, even if he shows up thinking I need him.

I don’t hear him pull up, but I do hear the gravel crunch under boots.

Heavy footsteps make their way from the parking lot to the grass behind me.

I don’t look up.

I don’t care.

It doesn’t matter who it is.

I stare at the mound of dirt.

The person stands a little ways behind me, not approaching.

Well, it’s not Benji’s mom.

She would have marched right up here and told me this was her place, not mine.

I’m sure that woman will hate me until the day she stops breathing.

The wind blows and I catch a small scent.

A familiar one.

His cologne.

Of course it’s him.

Justin “Toon” Miller is the only one stubborn enough to come out here and stand in place without saying a word.

“I told you when I left my condo not to follow me.” He was literally sitting at my doorstep when I exited.

Who does that?

He’s been gone for years.

Now, I lose the man who literally wasn’t afraid to stick around for me and this man, the one who has a piece of my soul comes back for what?

“Didn’t follow you babe,” he mutters the rasp in his voice takes me back to easier days with him.

“Went and got coffee, then came.” His voice is low, sandpaper rough, but warm and gentle.

“Figure it wouldn’t be fair to Clutch to sit back and watch you like a creeper.”

I say nothing.

He waits it out a few seconds.

“You want me to go?”

“Yes,” I whisper as new tears fall from my eyes and I still don’t look at him.

There is a pause.

Then I feel him coming closer.

He stops right behind me.

He doesn’t sit down.

Doesn’t crouch.

Just lets the moment sit heavy between us.

“I know you miss him. We all do.”

“You didn’t love him like I did. Yes, he was a brother, but he was mine.” I say sharper than I intended to.

“No, I didn’t love him like you.” He pauses.

“But I loved you. Still do.”

His words break something inside of me.

I inhale a deep breath, that comes out in a sob.

A full, raw, guttural sob through my throat.

Everything I have been holding inside escapes me.

I cover my face with both hands, shoulders shaking.

He drops to the grass beside me, wrapping his arms around me pulling me into his lap against him.

He holds me tight.

I don’t resist.

No, I collapse.

Right into him.

My forehead against his chest, my fist clutching his cut like it’s my lifeline.

“I can’t do this,” I cry out.

“I can’t go on without him.”

“You can,” he whispers.

“You can because Clutch would want you to.”

“It hurts, Justin.”

“I know so let it out.”

I cry against him as he sits there rocking me.

We sit like this for a long time.

Just me, a grave, the man I lost, and in the arms of the man who has never wanted me to be anyone but me.

Even now, when there are expectations for me to talk, to press on, Justin doesn’t ask anything of me but to be.