Soul of Soles

I couldn’t help but stare at them. As I did, memories of my twin overwhelmed my focus and my breath caught mournfully. The worn Doc Martens sat before me in a painful reminder of the world’s cruel truth, my sister was gone.

“How am I going to do this?” I softly questioned into the vacant space that was once our room- now left solely to me, along with everything in it that was once hers. My brain ached like a brain froze at the memories of me begging our parents for my own room.

Be careful what you wish for. I had gotten what I wanted in the most painful of ways.

“How can I do this without you?”

My head fell, as did my tears.

“Do it for me, La.” A voice replied distantly from the depths of the room.

It was hard to decipher if the sound came from my sides or behind me and my eyes widened, and ears rang as I tried to use the senses to understand what I had heard. La, pulsed in my head, and without a doubt, in my sisters’ voice.

Her laughter chimed through the room and, as if I was in a dream, soft purple fog that smelled of my sisters’ lavender, chamomile and rose body wash, manifested between my feet and throughout space. I stood unmoving in fascination and fear. Falmouth was sunny and 84 degrees today, yet the room was cast in a cool shadow lit by the lavender fog.

It continued to push around my legs and towards the ceiling with flickers of dark glitter shimmering throughout the smokey mass. As it lifted, a body- her body- slowly became visible in its place. The cloud morphed and rose quickly upwards, and by the end of mere seconds she had taken full shape and was now standing next to the boots. When the fog reached the ceiling, it transformed into soft glittering clouds of violet that shimmered above, and as the final cloud lifted, a black curtain of charcoal hair swept down over her shoulders and finally, I was left looking into the olive green of my deceased sisters’ eyes. For a moment all I could do was stare until my lungs began to ache from lack of breathing. For a moment all I did was sputter trying to find the right words.

“I feel like Cole Sear,” I finally gasped, letting the stale air inside of me out.

CLAP!

Her hands came together as she momentarily shifted forward and laughed at the comment.

“You’ve always been the funny one, La.” She chuckled.

I watched as she walked around me and sat on her bed, and if the shiver that went through me as she passed didn’t confirm she was still dead, the way the bed didn’t shift under her weight surely helped.

“How is this happening?’ I questioned, frantically running my hands through my own black hair.

“Why are you staring at the shoes Lola?”

Her sudden use of my full name dove deeply inside the murky depths of me and surfaced with painful truths. I began to sob. Collapsing to my knees, I sat with my head in my hands, trying to find the right words of which there were none.

“I’m staring at the shoes because what the fuck do I do now?” I suddenly shouted. She responded by sorrowfully staring at me in silence, listening, and inviting me with her gaze to continue.

“I should have been in that car with you. Maybe I would have told you that the light was red, and you wouldn’t have-.”

My voice caught before I could finish, but we both knew what I meant. Maybe she wouldn’t have run the light to enter a three-car collision and be later found dead inside of her prized, and now mangled, Subaru WRX.

“What am I going to do without you?” I breathed, letting out a cry that almost sent me hyperventilating into hysterics. She was so close, but so far and it ripped at every atom that made me.

She looked over at her old shoes, and back at me, before standing and making her way over to the boots and grabbing them. She placed them in front of me and knelt down to meet me at eye level as I sat wiping the nonstop tears that framed my face as they fell.

“Put yourself in my shoes and go forward knowing I will always be watching and listening. I will never stop. You have never been, and never will be alone, La,” she said softly. She looked at the clouds that had mostly dissipated and as she did I noticed the wall behind her- or rather through her. The clouds were leaving, and so was she. I grabbed her without thought and pulled her tightly against me.

“I love you Tori,” I said, my voice breaking.

“I love you,” she said, wrapping her own arms around me.

As she did, my body screamed at the sudden frozen touch. Amongst the aching cold, which sent electric waves throughout me, the warmth of holding her in goodbye gave me strength to not let go until I no longer felt her in my arms. One last guttural sob left me, and for a moment I just sat there surfing the painful wave as I shuddered regaining warmth.

I looked at the boots again. They sat there in front of me, where my sisters’ ghost had placed them before she disappeared back to her afterlife. I adjusted my position and put them on. The worn soles fit perfectly.

As I stood to look at myself in the mirror, my breath for another time that day, left me as I saw my reflection. Standing in front of me was the perfect replica of my confident, beautiful, bushy tailed twin. I laughed, and it was as if she was laughing with me. Joy and relief soared through me as I swept at my wet face and smiled at the reflection.

The reflection winked and gave me a nod that said, go get em, La.

I stood up straighter and nodded back. I was not alone.

She would always be with me.

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