Free Dealing With It (Two Short Stories) by Christina Channelle Page A

anger boil up inside me once
again.
    I grabbed three more glasses from the
cupboard and carefully set them each on the table, staring at them.
The middle one especially caught my eye as it used to be Jesse’s
favorite. It was a gift I had gotten him for Valentine’s Day a few
years ago. Simple, I know. But Jesse never asked much from me.
    He always said my smile was all he
needed.
    As I continued to stare at the familiar
shape of the glass, I imagined Jesse’s hands as he’d grip the
object. I concentrated so hard, I began to see every little detail
of what his hands looked like, right up to the little half-moon
scar he had at the base of his right thumb. Something he got when
he was a little kid, playing in the woods, he told me.
    Grasping the glass myself, I slowly picked
it up and gently turned it around in my hand, memorizing everything
about it. The simplistic square structure as my fingertips caressed
each side, the almost greenish tinge the glass had, ever so
slightly.
    Green was Jesse’s favorite color.
    At that thought, my lips curled inward as I
looked at the glass accusingly. Yes, green was Jesse’s favorite
color and it should have been Jesse holding this glass right now.
Not me.
    I felt resentment quickly build up inside
and with not so much as a thought, I raised my hand as high as I
could and smashed in down on the floor. It shattered into tiny
green slivers all around me.
    A slight noise caused me to look up and I
saw him, shocked.
    “ Jesse,” I breathed.
    Tears formed in my eyes, a sob caught in my
throat at the shock of seeing him. Such joy filled my soul. But it
was suddenly destroyed when I looked into his eyes and saw
beautiful baby blues.
    Jesse had beautiful hazel eyes.
    It was Ian standing before me, eerily
resembling Jesse. They finally looked like the identical twins they
were. Both were tall, blond and handsome—the only difference was in
their style and the color of their eyes. Today though, Ian was
dressed so similar to Jesse with his dark blue jeans and argyle
sweater.
    So different from his usual khaki shorts and
white t-shirts.
    “Why couldn’t it have been you?” I said
bitterly, picking up another glass and throwing it in his
direction. Ian flinched as it hit the wall next to his right
shoulder, stiffening.
    Shaking his head, he stepped forward, his
shoes crushing the broken pieces of glass around him as he
approached me. I backed up so my back rested against the wall and
slid down until I sat on the floor, looking dejectedly up at
Ian.
    “It should have been you!” My rage was
directed at both Ian and Jesse, still boiling up inside me. At that
moment I hated Jesse for dying and Ian for being here with me
instead.
    “I know.” Ian said this very quietly and sat
down next to me. He ignored the glass around us, my bloody
footprints, as we just sat there in silence, both lost in our own
thoughts. I looked on ahead, not really staring at anything in
particular as our shoulders touched. My hands clenched tightly into
fists and I heard Ian sigh beside me.
    “I know.”

Chapter
3
    BARGAINING
     
    I LAY IN my bed, eyes closed, deeply
breathing in the smell of Jesse’s pillow against my face. His smell
was still there—faint, but there nonetheless. Lazily giving a small
smile to myself, I imagined him lying next to me. He would stroke
my hair ever so softly to lull me from my sleep, tease me with the
tip of his fingers rubbing against my cheek. I would slowly open
one eye, then the other, and find Jesse staring at from me with
those gorgeous eyes of his. And then he’d kiss me on the nose, his
way of saying good morning.
    I smiled widely at the thought.
    I knew though, that if I were to really open
my eyes, this would end my beautiful daydream. So I continued to
keep them shut, not wanting my life to shatter into pieces yet
again. Instead, I imagined the day as it should have been: when I
opened my eyes and stared across at Jesse, he wouldn’t leave my
side after his nose kiss to