For Thomas

I stop running for a moment to take a look at my surroundings. I pause my watch and Strava before checking my texts. I have a new group chat created by cousins with pictures they sent of some homemade mac and cheese. It looks really good. I breathe in the smell of grass from the early summer air as the sweat drips down my face. There’s an excavator with a large pile of dirt not too far from me. There are trees luscious with green leaves all around. Doesn’t matter though. All I can think about is him. I try to slow down my thoughts and be present. I try to think about the cloudy sky or the bugs that begin to hover over my head but there’s only one thing racing through my mind – this isn’t fair. Sixteen is too young to die. 

In June of 2020, my boyfriend at the time, Andrew, and I decided we had had it with the hustle and bustle of Chicago and wanted to escape south. Six hours by car south to be exact. We grabbed an Airbnb in the heart of the suburban town of Murphysboro and planned to be there for a week to relax. On the second day of our trip, I woke up as I normally did. Groggy, craving caffeine. That summer, I had gotten into the habit of putting turmeric in my cold brew. I’m not entirely sure why. Made me feel healthy or something. I saw it on Instagram. I swirled the oat milk, turmeric, and coffee mixture in a glass and made my way to the front porch. Yeah, that’s right, we had a front porch. Murphysboro was the place to be. My phone vibrates. It’s a text from my sister asking me if I was awake. I wanted to say something smart about how “of course I was awake” it was eight in the morning after all but as soon as I texted back “yeah”, my mom called. 

I am the oldest of ten cousins on my mom's side. We’re as close as we can be for having such a big family but they’ve always just been my cousins. Nothing more than that. I don’t, like, go out of my way to talk to them. I can tell our parents want us to be closer but none of us are really sure how to. So, I hadn’t spoken to my cousin Thomas in a very long time. I was nine years older than he was – our common interests were few. I knew he wore fedoras to family reunions, one time when we were little kids I watched him eat sand as he played on the beach and kind of enjoyed it, and he loved fart jokes. That’s how I remember him. But he wasn’t a kid anymore. That summer, he was sixteen. Thomas was about to be a senior in high school. He was growing up. I didn’t know who this teenage version of him was. And I’ll never know. My mom asked if I was sitting down. She was crying, sobbing really. She told me that Thomas was in a car accident the night before and that he didn’t make it. 

After crying for a couple of minutes and talking to Andrew, I lace up my running shoes and started running. Because that’s what I had to do that morning. I had a run planned so I did that run. The streets were unfamiliar to me so I made sure to focus on where I was going. It didn’t matter how hard I tried thinking about the path I was on, it was no use. All I could think about was Thomas. I think about what will come next. What do I say to these people I’m related to but who are essentially strangers to me? Elizabeth, the fourth grandkid, created a group chat with her younger brother, Matthew the sixth, Justine my sister, the third, and me. This was the first time the four of us have interacted in this media. It’s fairly easy to comment on how delicious their mac and cheese looks but what do I say to them at the funeral? “Hey, how’ve you been the last three years? Sucks this kid died.” My stomach starts to hurt. 

The day after I found out about Thomas, Andrew drove me to the nearest airport, St. Louis, and I got on a plane to New York. I hate flying so I always try to distract myself with a movie. The plane didn’t have TVs though and I didn’t have the app downloaded to stream stuff on my phone. So all I could do was think. I fill my mouth with a Blue Moon and I try to think about the last time I saw Thomas. It was definitely a while ago. A while, a while ago. At least ten years. It makes me too sad to think about so I think about the last time my parents saw Thomas. It was at his sister’s high school graduation party the year before. I remember the picture my dad posted on Facebook. Thomas looked like a stranger to me. He’s tall, skinny, and handsome. He has one of those Macklemore haircuts. And he looks so unbelievably happy. I’ve never seen a sixteen year old smile this hard, especially at his sister’s party. I think about the man he would’ve grown up to be. I don’t know him so I can only imagine the job he’d have, the father he’d be, and how hard he’d roll his eyes at me after I go on one of my trademark feminist rants. All these pictures are now sad. When I go to my grandparent’s house and see pictures of Thomas, it’ll be in remembrance of him. God, that’s sad. With the last sip of my now warm beer, I close my eyes and try to imagine the hell that awaits me when I land. Everything is about to change. 

We arrived at the wake 15 minutes late because no one in New England can drive. I get out of my dad’s 2012 CRV and see Beck, the ninth, standing by the entrance and nearly sob right there in the parking lot. He’s so grown up. So cripplingly aware of what we had to do, he pulls me into a hug and places his head on mine. I breathe in his old spice deodorant because my face sits right by his armpit. We pull away and head into the funeral home. Thomas’s sister, Sophia the seventh, walks over to me in a black dress and gray cardigan. Unlike Beck, I feel no time has passed since the last time we saw each other. Her round, beautiful face still looks like it did when she was a kid. Her big, blue eyes full of water opened wide as she ran over to me. She didn’t think I’d come “all the way from Chicago”. 

I kneel down and put my hands to my chest in a prayer position only to remember I’m not religious anymore. Doesn’t really matter though – I’ll take whatever I can get right now. I rest my hands on the casket and come to the conclusion that I have absolutely no idea how to move forward from this moment. He was so young. Just a kid. This is like the most unfair thing in the world of unfair things. I keep trying to pray but it’s really not working. It’s no use. I just have to figure out how to cope with this on my own. I get up from kneeling and look down on the casket one more time. Closed, thank God. Tears stream down my cheeks as I say goodbye. I’m not even thinking about crying anymore, it just happens. I walk over and stand next to Justine. I grab her hand and hold it tight.  

The wake happens in a blur. I guess when a freak car accident kills two sixteen year old boys the whole town has to come and say their prayers. I don’t blame them, really. This is messed up. The funeral happens even faster. A sea of masks and tissues whirl by me and I hug everyone I talk to. And then, it’s over.

We end the day with a roaring bonfire, all the cousins sitting on those soccer mom chairs in a circle. I’m on my third or fourth White Claw and I do not plan on stopping there. Sophia is telling us her version of how the day they found out about Thomas went. I listen intently as she goes through everything. Sophia really helped her parents keep their heads on during these past couple of days. She’s the strongest person I’ll ever know. Elizabeth yells at Beck for picking his toenails during her story. It’s disgusting but in his defense, he was listening. And we really, really needed to laugh. 

The bonfire ends with all the cousins, all nine of us, in a circle holding each other and scream-singing “Country Roads”, Thomas’s favorite song apparently.  It was awful and we should be ashamed at how badly we botched that song. Uncle Jeff, Thomas’s dad, even shouted from their porch how he’s laughing down at us in heaven. We’re laughing and crying and trying as best we could to get through the day. The sun has set but it’s far from over. The adults knew we had a night ahead of us so they drove us all back to the hotel, left us in the Marriott Courtyard, and went to bed. The night began with me and Elizabeth, splitting an entire bottle of Rose we bought from the hotel lobby, with cups we took from the hotel bathroom, and talking about our history with eating disorders. I had no idea she’d ever had an issue with this – I have a feeling she thought the same of me. Through tears, we hugged as we finished the last of the wine. It was still cold. We finished it before it could adjust to the summer night air. The rest of the cousins came back from their rooms to join us. We drank a lot of beer from the mini fridge in the hotel lobby. We talked about everything. Everything we could’ve possibly talked about that night was talked about. Then, Beck, only 19 at the time, began to puke into all the cups that held our wine or beer. We tried to clean as much of it as possible but it was clear some help would be needed in the morning. The next moments are fuzzy but I come to as Matthew and I are laughing so hard on the hotel floor there are tears in our eyes. We locked ourselves out of our rooms. 

I woke up the next morning with one of the worst hangovers I’ve had in my life. I didn’t feel that sad anymore. I still felt awful, don’t get me wrong, but something was different. I still had absolutely no idea how I was going to handle this but this time I knew I wasn’t alone. I had my new friends by my side. As we met with the parents in the lobby, they asked how our night was. We all groaned and complained about how badly we needed Dunkin. Before we walked to our cars, I grabbed my mom and dad and told them I had to tell them something. I told them I puked in the courtyard. There were some “Jesus, Holly, you’re an adult!”s and  “Come on!”s but other than that they took it well. I smiled to myself as I thought about Thomas. If we ever got too drunk at a hotel and he puked through the tables in a courtyard, I’d cover for him too. Maybe that’s how I would get through this. Talking, drinking, and becoming friends with my family. Maybe a little less hotel Rose next time