Free Aaron by J.P. Barnaby Page A

his lap, his expression was hard and cold as he wrapped his arms around himself, almost as if he were trying to hold himself together, or as if he wanted to curl up into a ball so tight and so small that he would just disappear into it. Aaron saw his mother glance periodically at him as they headed for East Park Cemetery.
    She pulled off the side of the road near where Juliette’s grave must be. Aaron knew that his mother had been here a few times since Juliette’s funeral. Each time he stayed home and his father tried in vain to distract him. After turning off the ignition, Michelle sat waiting for Aaron to speak or move. He did neither.
    “Aaron, honey, do you want me to go with you?” his mother prompted, but he shook his head. Aaron needed to do this alone, especially since he was unsure how he would respond to actually seeing Juliette’s grave, knowing she was buried there. However he reacted, his mother didn’t need to see it. She saw enough. After taking one last long moment to look over the small rolling hills of green, he opened the car door. The smell of freshly mown grass flooded over him, and he climbed out of the car. It didn’t take him long to find the small monument signaling the entrance to Juliette’s part of the cemetery. His mother had described the statue as a marble angel with a lamb at her feet. His friend’s parents had chosen to bury her in the children’s section. Maybe they wanted to maintain her innocence, or it could have just been that the plots were smaller and less expensive in this section. Whatever the reason, she was here, somewhere to the right of this statue.
    The cemetery was silent, almost eerily so considering it was a nice summer Saturday afternoon. The only sound to be heard was that of a mower in the distance. Grass seemed to stretch on for miles around him, but for all its airy solitude, the place made him feel claustrophobic— almost as if there should be a grave here for him, like his grave was calling for him. He should be buried here, right alongside Juliette under the
    granite eyes of God’s chosen messenger. Sometimes it felt like he had joined her, suffocating, trapped inside his own head.
    Balling his hands into fists, he forced himself to take slow, measured steps toward the grave, his breaths coming in quick, sharp pants. Goddamn it, he couldn’t go to pieces. He wanted to do it, needed to do it, needed to see what he could get out of this physical reminder of his own fleeting mortality—maybe it would make him want to live again. Being careful not to step on the graves of other poor dead children, he followed the dates of death marked on the headstones, year by year, until he saw her name.
    JULIETTE ANNE MARTIN AUGUST 14, 1991—OCTOBER 9, 2008 BELOVED DAUGHTER
    There were no bears or blocks or even angels, as he had seen on the other headstones while he had looked for hers. It was dark gray, marble, and very elegant. All at once, the realization that his friend, his Juliette, lay dead at his feet, caused his legs to buckle, and he landed hard on the soft earth next to her. The forgotten flowers fell to the ground, and dry heaves wracked his body. He wouldn’t cry; he knew that. He’d been unable to cry since that night. Just as he couldn’t stand to be touched, he was also not allowed the small measure of relief that crying would have afforded him.
    It took a long time for him to finally get himself together. Remembering the flowers, he moved them to the grass just below the marble marker he could no longer bring himself to look at. Aaron considered just standing up and going back to the car, having done what he came here to do unassisted. Glancing over his shoulder, Aaron noticed that he couldn’t see his mother’s car from here, and he wondered if she was starting to worry.
    “J… Juliette, it’s… it’s Aaron,” he whispered, feeling fairly stupid for addressing the flowers and a patch of freshly mown grass. Running his fingers gently along the