Seventeen’s the Limit
Maddie Eckrich
A normal person would’ve noticed the golden beams of sunlight, streaming through the leafy canopies above her head, would’ve felt the soft grass cradle her as she lay sprawled on her back on the clearing floor, would’ve listened to the leaves swaying like ocean waves breaking on a beach. However, I’ve never been a “normal” person, so the very first thing I noticed as I laid there, was the gentle aroma of strawberry scented perfume.
The scent wasn’t unwelcome, just out of the ordinary. Suddenly, I realized that the small clearing in which I lay was The Place, an area in the large woods surrounding my house. In fact, The Place was my place, a quiet spot for alone time if and when I needed it. Only one other person knew about The Place, so when I felt something graze the top of my head and I rolled on my belly to see whose scalp had just rested on mine, whose perfume filled my lungs, I wasn’t surprised. Still, my eyes widened with shock, causing only one word to slip through my lips.
“Aimee?”
My best friend, also sprawled on the ground, tilted her head up to look at me with hazel-green eyes, and her long, red-brown hair, which dulled the brownness of my owned, framed her gorgeous grin.
“Hey, cutie-pie,” she said.
I stared for a while; I didn’t know what I was supposed to say – or do for that matter. I managed a, “W-what’re you doing here?”
“Cheering you up of course, Emmie daaarling!” She giggled. “You’ve been really depressed lately.”
“Yeah, ‘bout that…”
“Oh God,” she said as she rolled her eyes and sat up. “You’re not seriously gonna mope around forever are ya?”
“Maybe.”
“That’s not what my Emmie would do.”
“I know.”
Aimee frowned as we sat in silence for a few moments. I felt her arm creep about my shoulders in comfort. “Emmie, you’ve got a life to live.”
I looked at my shoes, frozen in my place. Here she was, worried sick about me, while she was the one who…how could she still fret over me in this situation? I should be the one doing the fretting!
So I just couldn’t resist asking.
“Um…what’s it like?”
She raised her eyebrows, “Huh?”
“I mean…you know…”
“Oh,” she caught on. “Ohohoho!” She fell back on the ground, giggling madly, “It’s a secret, silly! I’m not supposed to tell!” I laughed with her for no reason; she’s so contagious.
“But seriously, Aimee,” I said, calming down a little, “You’re alright?”
Aimee looked up at me, smiling brilliantly again, and said, “Honey, I’ve never been better.”
“That’s all I needed to know.”
Aimee sat up again, her smile loving but her eyes grave. “Emmie, I really wish this could be like old times, but I’ve gotta go soon.”
“No!” I gasped.
“Yep.” I sat silently for another moment while she gathered the words to speak again. “I know I wasn’t here long enough for a real talk, but I think I’ve finished what I needed to do.”
“Well, I don’t!” I replied feebly.
She grinned sadly. “Emmie, I hafta go.”
“Why?”
“Because I don’t belong here anymore.”
At this point, the beautiful sunny day turned gloomy and gray like a dark scene in a film noire, and the warm breeze began to chill my lips. “Aimee,” I whispered. “Aimee.” She took my hands and spoke softly to me like she used to when I was upset. Some things never change.
“Emmie, darling, you’re my best friend and I love you, ok?”
“I…” I could hardly say it, even though I desperately wanted to. “I love you too.”
“Bye, love.” And with that, she began to run out of the forest, in slow motion, while I could only stand there with my arms extended towards her shouting, “Don’t leave me again!” Then…
Darkness.
Five minutes passed before I realized where I was: my bed.
It was only a dream.
***
The morning after, with a jacket on my back and a paper rose in my pocket, I set out for The Place – the real one. Unlike my dream, the world around me hinted at snowfall in the near future. The walk would take a while, but I didn’t mind; I needed to think.
My dream about Aimee unnerved me a little: the thought of her coming to me and talking to me again frightened and amazed me all at once. Ever since her death a month ago, I only dreamed of her – dead, cold, and lifeless. I constantly saw her body, covered with a sheet, set over flames, turning from body to corpse, bones to ashes, then nothing.
I shivered in the cold breeze. My nightmares frequented the darkness but I hadn’t experienced a peaceful dream about her since she died. Visions from my dreams swam through my mind as I trudged deeper into the forest.
I thought maybe my dream meant something more; perhaps Dream-Aimee really was Aimee. Maybe she wasn’t just a phantom from my mind. However, the facts pointed to “no.” Aimee never kept secrets from me, and surely she wouldn’t change her ways in death. When I tried to ask her, “What’s it like to be dead?” she simply said, “It’s a secret.”
I’ve never been so frustrated by my brain before. At least I thought Dream-Aimee would say, “Well, you do see a bright light, but that’s because the aliens are about to abduct you ‘n stuff,” and I would’ve accepted that. My dreams tend to be odd.
With my feet crunching the leaves on the ground around me, I walked quickly into The Place. I couldn’t bear to look around. Besides, my eyes were fixed upon a tree with a cross carved on it and red ribbons tied around the trunk. Seventeen ribbons for the seventeen years Aimee lived. This was Aimee’s Tree. I designated it as a memorial site after her funeral; she told her parents that she wanted to be cremated and placed next to her grandpa’s ashes five states away. They didn’t refuse. Without a grave to visit, her tree was the only memorial I had left for her. I tucked the paper rose behind one of the ribbons and leaned against the tree, closing my eyes.
Not
even my dreams could satisfy me now. I supposed
I’d have to settle with, “It’s a secret.”
However, my mind didn’t seem to agree.
In fact, I preferred to think of her now as nothing over not knowing
where she ended up, and that’s exactly what she was: pure, endless,
unadulterated nothingness.
I snapped myself out of it, my
eyes glaring at a tree ten feet from me.
How dare I think of her as nothing?
My best friend, gone? Oh no! Aimee could never die; her life had burned
into the hearts of too many people, she had fused her memory into the brains of
everyone she knew, and most of all, she had been with me too long to ever
leave. No, Aimee could never die, not as
long as I still remembered and loved her.
But the dream was still just a dream, right?
My heart stopped as the breeze caressed my face, filling my lungs with the scent of strawberry perfume.
Perhaps she knew I would figure out the secret anyway, or maybe she just thought I would be better off not knowing. Whatever the case, as soon as I could breathe again, I knew where to find her.
I reclosed my eyes, calling to mind a memory where Aimee is driving down a deserted country road with a freshly baked license in her purse. I’m sitting in the passenger seat and we’ve got the windows down and we’re singing into the wind as the speedometer creeps toward seventy-five when we’re only on a forty-five and she wonders if someone will call the cops on us and then we laugh when we hear the distant sirens starting up and I start getting nervous so I ask, why are you driving so fast, Aimee?
“Because I’ve just gotta live, Emmie. I’ve just gotta live.”