The Phone Call

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I jump as the phone rings.~0~ This could be the call that changes my life.~1~ Maybe I'm not ready to pick up the receiver,~2~ maybe I should walk out the door and leave this to one of those,~3~ "nearly made it moments."~4~ How many attempts have I made to get back into the business of living?~5~ Life should not hurt this much but the absence of living it shreds one till there is not even the desire to open one's mail box.~6~ I'm now reaching out for help.

~0~

~7~

A small frission of hope gently touches me.~8~ A joy of past friendship being renewed leaves me feeling energised.~9~ I can do this.~10~ After all I'm going back to what was the happiest days of my life. How can I not succeed? Lee's friendship has always been something I've cherished, sure I feel some guilt at not keeping in touch the last few years but I also know, no matter how much time passes, we will always fall right back into the special friendship we've had since being toddlers.

"Mandy, is that you?" As I sit down I recognise the strained voice, it's Lee's mum.

~1~

"Hi Mrs. Rose thanks for calling me back. I was hoping to get Lee's phone number?" I wait for the older woman. A silence stretches out and fills me with a dull ache. Something always goes wrong when I try to help myself. I wait for the new obstacle.

~2~

"My poor Lee died eight months ago Mandy It was a car accident while she was on holidays with friends at the Snowy Mountains. Their car hit black ice. She died from head trauma. We tried to get in touch with you but you had moved..." Mrs. Rose stopped speaking. She could barely contain her emotions. Here was a childhood friend of her beautiful daughter, someone who could bring back so many memories.

~3~

I could not speak. I found myself standing and somehow across the room. The phone line stretched taunt. I've never been comfortable with someone who's grieving. What could I say? Then it hits home, this is to be my grief also. Darkness clasps my heart and sqeezes. My best friend I've loved, is dead. The silence swirls around us, it's an unspoken companionship, the only thing we both understand, and the only thing we need to understand. Anything else would just add to the hurt. Before the silence becomes an embarrassment Mrs. Rose speaks. Already her voice is stronger.

~4~

"Do you still carry your camera everywhere?" I hear her voice hold a soft sad smile of a glimpsed memory. where are the photo's from those days?

~5~

"I'm not sure I even know where my camera is anymore Mrs. Rose," I acknowledge another lost part of my life. I pull back my hair, tears welling, and choking me.

~6~

"That is a shame Mandy. Lee cherished those photos. Especially those of you kids clowning around."

~7~

The pain and effort of talking is draining me. I begin to feel the all to familiar wall go up between reality and myself. I want to escape my old friends mum, and maybe even Lee, though I knew this would be impossible. I barely felt in control of my words. I have to end the call quickly before Mrs. Rose notices anything strange about me, the girl she once knew as bubbly and always smiling.

~8~

With no thought and feeling to yet another failed attempt to find joy in living, I instead search out all my old photo albums. I had to feel this pain. I wanted it to wash over me in all its agony. Explore it, for it seemed there was more involved in my grief than I was yet aware.

~9~

(This is just the start, feel free to condem it, you won't be the first, LOL)

~10~