Katie's Angel (10 page)

“Well I don’t know what we are supposed to do but I know that whatever it is she is going to fight us on it,” her dad replied shaking his head.

“I don’t know either, but I think I am going to stay home tomorrow and spend the day with her.”

“I don’t know if that is what we should do. I think we should try another way.”

“And how exactly are we going to handle this?”

“I think you should go to work. I am going to go to work and instead of you coming home, I am going to come home early. This will give her and
I some time together and maybe she will talk to me. If she doesn’t want to open up then we will force her to go to counseling. Maybe that is something that we should all consider,” he said without looking at his wife. He was against talking to professionals himself, but if it meant that it got Katie some help, he was willing to do it.

“Okay that sounds good to me. She doesn’t listen to me anyway. I just hope this doesn’t blow up in our faces,” she replied completely out of ideas on how to fix this situation. She just wished that Katie would talk to them. It
would probably do all of them some good to talk as a family.

Chapter 13

The next morning Katie got up, opened her curtains and her window. She saw the sun shining and heard the birds chirping. She soaked up the warmth on her face as she closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She had slept very well last night considering everything that took place yesterday. She didn’t want to think about the previous day, because it still struck her in a way that bothered her in an extreme way.

Shaking her thoughts away, she turned and walked towards the bathroom. Along the way she noticed that her brush was lying on its
bristles and not on its back like she always put it. She stopped to fix it. Picking it up she couldn’t help but question how it was turned that way. She was way too much of a perfectionist to have left her brush like that. Maybe her parents came in this morning and she didn’t hear them, since she was sleeping so well last night. That didn’t seem like it was a plausible answer to her, so as fast as it came into her mind she shook it out.  This was just another one of those instances that made her wonder if she was alone. These days she was still feeling as if she was being followed all the time. It seemed like there was always someone or something there watching over her.  Yesterday at the library, proved her point. She couldn’t figure out who or what it was that was pushing her towards the library door.

Laying her brush back on her dresser, Katie once again blew off her thoughts, and went into the bathroom to brush her teeth, and get ready for her picnic date with Jack. It was so nice to have someone around her that didn’t want to constantly know exactly what she was thinking all the time.

After brushing her teeth, Katie came out of the bathroom to her closet and pulled out a shirt and a pair of jeans. After throwing her clothes on, she walked over to her bed and made it quickly. She couldn’t leave her room without having her bed made. After making her bed she walked over to the dresser and ran her brush through her long blond hair. Pulling her hair up in a ponytail, she walked out of her room and down the stairs to the kitchen.

In the kitchen, she went to the fridge and pulled out the crème cheese and a bagel. She took the bagel and put it in the toaster. She then grabbed a small glass and filled it with some orange juice. Grabbing a knife from the drawer, the bagel popped back up. She walked over and grabbed it out of the toaster and laid it on a paper towel. She generously applied crème cheese. This had always been one
of her favorite things for breakfast.

Taking a bite she thought about Jackson. Every year on her birthday, he would get up early and make her breakfast. He would always make sure that he put the perfect amount of crème cheese on there, and always brought two glasses of orange juice. He would bring it up to her room and they would sit on her bed, her eating one half, and Jackson eating the other half. It was the one thing that she would never forget about Jackson.

There was a knock at the door that made her jump. She looked at the clock, and it was only nine fifteen. It was too early for Jack to be here. Walking to the door, she swallowed the bite of bagel she had just taken moments before the door bell rang.

Opening the door Katie saw her
best friend Amy standing in front of her. She had not talked to Amy since Jacksons’ funeral. She and Amy have been friends since preschool and over the years became completely inseparable. They generally were at each other’s houses every day. That is until Jackson died. When Jackson died everyone including her best friend Amy stopped coming around. It was something that Katie couldn’t decide if she was really mad about, or happy that it meant one less person asking her how she was doing on a daily basis.

“Hi Katie,” Amy said nervously, with her hands shoved in her back pockets of her shorts.

“Hi,” Katie replied, not really sure what to say or why Amy was there.

“How are you?”

“I am okay. How are you?”

Brushing her long brunette hair behind her ear, Amy replied without looking at Katie, “I’m good. It has been a while since I have seen you, and I just wanted to check up on you.”

Katie felt like all her friends just abandoned her when everything started happening with Jackson in his last few months of life. They all seemed to distance themselves from her. They would often stop talking when she came up to them. It made her feel like an outsider and she didn’t like that at all. She only wanted everyone to treat her like she was normal.

“Katie, are you okay?”

“I am fine. Thanks for asking. If that is all you wanted I am busy.”

“That isn’t all I wanted. What is wrong with you Katie? You don’t talk to anyone, and you do not associate with any of our friends from school. This is not normal Katie, and I am really worried about you.”

“Well,” Katie responded in a snotty tone, “you can stop worrying your pretty little head off about poor little old me. I am no one anyone should worry about. If I needed you to feel sorry for me or worry about me I would have let you know already. But then that would mean that I would actually have to talk to someone who talked about me behind my back, and I just don’t have the time to deal with anyone like that.”

Standing there in shock Amy couldn’t say anything. She was so baffled by the way that Katie was acting that she couldn’t understand what exactly was happening. This is not the Katie that she had grown up with. She never would have talked to anyone like this, much less Amy. 
Trying her hardest not to cry, Amy took a deep breath, and said “I don’t know what you are talking about. I have always been your friend, Katie. You became secluded and you didn’t want to talk to anyone so I gave you the space that you seemed to need. And I wasn’t talking behind your back. I was trying to keep everyone else from asking questions that I knew would hurt you in a way that I knew you didn’t need.”

“Well I didn’t need your sympathy then, and I don’t need your sympathy now!”

Amy had tears streaming down her cheeks now. She had never been so hurt by someone and she couldn’t believe that the person hurting her so fiercely was her best friend. The one person she considered to be her sister. Deciding it was time to go Amy looked at Katie, shook her head and without another word, walked off. 

Katie watched Amy as she walked away and after she reached the sidewalk, Katie closed the door. This definitely was not how she expected her day to start. Balling her hands up into a fist she walked back to the kitchen, furious that Amy refused to take any responsibility for her actions.

Katie finished her bagel and her orange juice. She grabbed her jacket and then headed to the one place she knew she would get some peace.

As she got to the cemetery she noticed that the grass smelled freshly cut, and there were fresh flowers on Jacksons’ home.
That meant that mom had been there early this morning. She always knew when mom had been there because she always left Jackson some flowers. While she was looking at the headstone, she realized that she still had not brought the one thing that would make this non-homey place more like home for Jackson. She decided that she would remember to bring it with her the next time she was there.

Sitting down she did her usual kiss of the headstone, and started immediately talking about how dinner went and how nervous she was about her mom and dad deciding what she needed to do and what she did not need to do.

The more she talked, the madder she got about the whole thing. She just didn’t understand it at all. Sometimes she just couldn’t wait to grow up so that she didn’t have to worry about anyone telling her what to do.

After venting to Jackson for about twenty minutes, she decided that it was almost time for her to get home so that she could get ready for
her lunch date with Jack. She kissed the headstone again, and said goodbye. Then she got up and walked away, reminding herself to bring something with her the next time.

As she hurried home, she tried to decide what she was going to make for the picnic. She finally decided that she would make turkey sandwiches.

When she got home she started getting everything out for the sandwiches. She grabbed the meat and the bread. Reaching into the drawer by the sink, she pulled out four sandwich bags. She wasn’t sure how hungry Jack would be but she had decided that she would make sure there was enough in case he was very hungry. She pulled out the condiments and sat them on the counter. She wasn’t sure exactly what Jack liked on his sandwiches so she decided that she was going to put a little bit of mayonnaise, mustard, and ketchup in a snack bowl that mom always used when they would go on road trips as a family when they were kids.

Then she grabbed the chips out of the cabinet that they used just for the snacks. There was always a wide variety of snacks in the house. She put a handful of chips in two separate Ziploc bags. Then she decided that
a picnic wouldn’t be complete without some sweet tea to drink. In a thermos that she has had since she was in grade school and filled it with some sweet tea. Remembering that Jack drank milk, she grabbed Jackson’s Spiderman thermos and filled it with milk. After putting some lettuce in a bag and some turkey meat, she decided that should be enough, she grabbed the picnic basket that her mom bought at a yard sale, and added everything in it.

When she was
sufficed that everything was set to go, she went up to Jackson’s room. As she turned the knob she had to take a deep breath. As she walked into his room, and looked around, she realized that she had not been in his room since before he died. She stood there and looked at how everything was the same. She thought mom had come in here and put some of his stuff away. She didn’t realize that mom was just coming in his room for something else.

As she took a step towards the bookshelf that was in his room, she knew exactly where she would find what she was looking for. When she got to the
shelf she grabbed Jackson’s favorite thing in the world.  As she held it there in Jackson’s room she felt a presence so strong, she felt a tear roll down her cheek. This time the tear was not a completely sad tear. She felt like it was all going to be okay. Things just seemed so hopeless to her lately. Her parents wouldn’t leave her alone and she really did not want to talk to anyone about what she was feeling. Wiping the tear away, all she knew was that she felt more hopeful right this moment, than she had in the last few years. It is really hard to be positive when you watch your best friend and brother in so much pain.

Katie composed herself and walked out of Jackson’s room. With one more look of the room, she closed the door, hoping no one would notice that she had been in there.

Chapter 14

Walking back down the hall to her room, Katie quickly laid the item in the drawer of her night stand. She didn’t want anyone to know that she had taken it out of Jackson’s room.

She went back downstairs, and went to the kitchen. She emptied out the dishwasher and loaded the few dishes that were in the sink into it. She wasn’t sure what her parents wanted for dinner, but she knew that if the kitchen was clean that was in her favor.

As she started
to wipe the counters down, the doorbell rang. She finished the counter quickly and threw out the wet paper towel. She grabbed the basket and went to the front door. As she opened the door, she couldn’t help but stare at Jack. He had on a pair of jeans, and a blue t-shirt. He looked so good that she was almost embarrassed that she was staring.

If Jack noticed her staring he didn’t show it. He looked at Katie and asked, “Are you ready?”

“I will be in just a minute,” Katie replied as she grabbed her hoodie off the banister, and walked back to the door.