What Happens Next

Amber watched from behind the curtain as Jesse's car pulled into the driveway. She chewed absentmindedly on her bottom lip, and her fingers pulled at the sleeves of her faded and threadbare sweatshirt.

She hadn't been watching the time; she hardly kept track of the time anymore, but it still seemed like he'd been gone too long. For a normal work day, anyway. He never acted like there was anything strange about it, but she wondered where he went. Maybe it was a ruse. She wondered if he was hiding something from her.

Oh shut up, Amber, she said to herself. Don't be stupid.

Either way, she knew this much: he would come in like he did every other day and act like everything was fine. He would ask how her day had been, and why she was still wearing the same worn out sweatshirt and the old jeans she'd had since high school.

He came up the walk and moved out of sight of the window. She turned away, and heard his key in the lock, heard the knob turn and the door open.

"I'm home," he called out. She didn't answer. "Am?" A pause. "Am, are you here?"

"Of course I'm here," she called back from the front room where she'd been waiting. His footsteps came through the hall, and then he was in the doorway. There was rain in his hair, and a questioning expression on his face.

"Where else would I be?" she asked.

He gave her an uncomfortable half-smile.

"Hi. Right. Yeah," he said. Then, with what she took to be feigned brightness, "How are you? How was your day?"

Raising her eyebrows, she looked around the room meaningfully in answer, then back at him. She tried to wear an equivalently meaningful expression. Something that would say, It was exactly what you'd expect from a day spent inside the same house.

He continued to look at her with a hopeful expression, waiting for her to answer. Either he didn't understand her look, or he didn't want to understand it.

"It was fine," she said. "You know, just kind of hanging around." She looked down at her fingers, which were picking again at her sleeve.

"Right," he said, nodding appreciatively. "Well, you know," he continued, "you should try to get out. Go for a walk, maybe. You could at least change out of that ratty old sweatshirt."

There it was.

"Yeah, no, I don't think I could really do that."

He nodded again.

"Okay," he said. "I just mean, it might make you feel better, changing something."

She didn't answer.

"Well, have you eaten?"

Amber shook her head. "I wasn't hungry."

"Well. . . I'll throw something together. You really should try to eat something."

Before she could insist that she still wasn't hungry, he had left the room and she heard his footsteps going to the kitchen.

She heaved a sigh. The coddling, the worrying. Tiptoeing around her, checking up on her, but never adding anything particularly substantive to their exchanges. Never, she thought, really listening to what she was telling him.

She heard him in the kitchen, opening and closing cabinets, rummaging in drawers. The telltale sound of the refrigerator door. The rustle of a plastic bag. Then chopping. Carrots, maybe.

With a slight groan, she pushed herself to her feet and followed the sounds of industry.

He had finished the carrots and had just started peeling an onion.

"Jesse," she said, taking a seat across the counter from him.

"I'm just gonna throw together a quick one-pot with some chicken and veg," he said, not raising his eyes from the cutting board. "Nothing fancy."

"Jesse, I need to talk to you."

"Hmm?"

"Jesse, I need you to talk to me, too."

The knife stopped cutting, frozen halfway through the onion, and he raised his eyes to look at her.

"Jesse, I'm not hungry."

"That's okay. Like I said, I'm just gonna make a little something simple–"

"No, I mean, I'm not eating."

"Amber, you've gotta try to eat something," he said, laying the knife down. "I mean, you're gonna waste away. You hardly eat anything anymore."

"I don't eat anything."

"I know, hardly anything."

"Nothing, Jesse. Do you hear me?"

"Yeah, Am, I do, and what can I say? I'm really worried about you. I'm sure you don't want to go into it, but you just haven't been the same since–." He trailed off.

"Since the accident. You can say it, Jesse. I haven't been the same since the accident. And you're wrong, that is exactly what I want to go into. We need to talk about the accident."

"Okay," he said quietly, and paused again. "I'm sure I can't even imagine what it was like for you–"

"No, I don't think you can."

"–but I don't want you to worry about the car, I told you we can get you a new car–"

"Jesse, I'll never ride in another car, ever."

"–and that's okay, I understand. I'm sure it's perfectly natural for you to be anxious about driving, after what you've been through, but I want you to know that I'm here for you–"

"Jesse, what do you remember about the accident?" she asked.

He looked at her with a startled expression, then turned his eyes down to the onion again, his brows furrowed.

"What do I remember? God, I'll never forget it as long as I live." He paused. "You'd just run out to the store, and it was raining a little bit, just a drizzle, and you said you'd be right back, and you weren't back, and I was getting worried, and then I heard the sirens, and I tried your phone and you didn't answer–"

"Okay, but what do you remember about what happened after the accident?"

He looked up at her blankly, then furrowed his brow again.

"I mean, it was all such a blur," he said, picking up the knife and starting to cut the onion again. "Honestly, I think I was in shock, after seeing the car like that, and just being so thankful that you were okay."

"But that's the problem. I wasn't okay. Jesse," she said, reaching out and stopping his hands. He looked at her again with an alarmed expression. "I'm not okay."

They looked at each other in silence. She was sure her eyes looked crazy as she scanned his for some indication that he might finally understand what she was saying.

"I know, Am," he said, his voice even quieter than before. Slowly, she withdrew her hands. "I know. It's been really hard for you to get back to life the way it was before–"

She groaned loudly and rolled her eyes.

"–and I should probably just lay off and let you take your time with getting better–"

"Jesse–"

"–but I just can't help it, I don't think it's healthy for you to never even go outside–"

"Jesse–"

"–and I just think you'd feel so much more like yourself if you'd change out of that old sweatshirt–"

She couldn't take it anymore.

"Jesse, listen to me! I can't change out of this old sweatshirt. And I can't leave the house. Don't you get it? Don't you understand? I can't just get back to normal, Jesse. Not because I don't want to, but because I cannot do it."

There was a moment's pause, but she could tell he was about to continue. It was time to just come right out and say it.

"Jesse, do you know why you don't remember what happened after the accident? Do you know why it's all such a blur?"

"I mean, it was such a traumatic experience, and–"

"Traumatic? You're goddamned right it was traumatic, Jesse, because I didn't survive the accident."

He just stared, his mouth half open.

"Jesse, I'm sorry. I'm sorry to just blurt it out like that, really I am, but I keep trying to tell you and you don't want to hear it, and I just can't keep pretending anymore."

She could see him thinking, trying to find a way around it.

"But Am, that doesn't make any sense. Because I remember you coming home–"

"No, Jesse, you remember me being home. By the time you came back I was already here. I don't know how that happened, but I've been here ever since."

His expression was confused, which she totally understood.

"But you were so happy to see me, and by the time I figured out what had happened, I just couldn't bring myself to tell you the truth."

"And this is the truth?"

She nodded.

He shook his head as if to clear it, and began to make careful slices in the halved onion.

"But Am, if that's true. . . if you're saying you didn't survive the accident, then that means. . . that means you're. . ."

She saw tears begin to well up in his eyes. He sniffed, and blinked, and they ran in streams down his cheeks.

"Ugh, these onions," he said.

"Jesse," she said, her voice gentle.

He looked up at her again. His eyes were red and the tip of his nose had turned pink.

"But, Am, I don't want you to be–," he started, but he couldn't say it. He sniffed again and took a deep ragged breath, his eyes looking away as he tried to regain his composure.

"I don't want you to be dead," he managed, his voice a trembling whisper.

Amber knew the feeling.

It had taken her some time to figure out what was going on. Why she couldn't leave the house, why she couldn't change her clothes, why she had no appetite. The eating had manifested as a very simple lack of any interest in food. But the other things had been much more strange.

It was true, she was feeling pretty strange in general. Her brain felt foggy, and time seemed distorted. She had very little interest in going outside, but thought she might at least change her clothes, swap out the old sweatshirt and jeans she'd been wearing the night of the accident for something less desperate, less morbid.

So one morning after Jesse had left for work, she had rummaged through her drawers and picked out a plain t-shirt and a comfortable pair of pants. She had thrown the sweatshirt and jeans into the laundry, though she considered throwing them in the trash.

And when she looked at herself in the mirror, she was surprised to see that she was wearing the old sweatshirt and jeans again.

And at that moment she knew that she had to get out of the house. Even if she didn't have a great desire to leave, she needed to force herself to do it, to overcome her fear, or anxiety, or whatever was making her feel like she shouldn't leave, because it was obvious that she was cracking up staying indoors.

She practically ran to the door, opened it, stepped across the threshold, and–

–immediately found herself back in the hallway, staring at the inside of the closed front door.

She thought she must have blacked out. Or browned out, or just zoned out. Her subconscious wasn't ready, right? The accident had been quite a shock, and she would need more time to readjust.

But the days and weeks went by, and she kept thinking back, and piecing together what she could, and becoming very bothered by just how much she could not make it all make sense.

The fact was, she couldn't remember anything about what had happened after the accident. She remembered the wet road, the thump of the wipers, a flash of headlights, and a visceral feeling, like a surge of panic–and then nothing, until she found herself standing in the middle of the living room, hearing Jesse coming in through the front door.

And it was true what she'd told him–he seemed so happy, so relieved to see here there. At the time, she was so disoriented, that it didn't occur to her that he had seemed so weary; that when he had first come in the house, she felt like she was seeing some secret side of him. He had just stood inside the door, his head down, his shoulders slumped, looking worn out and. . . broken.

He had given a start when he heard the sound of her moving as she walked toward him, but the look of absolute joy and relief on his face when he saw her made her forget all about that secret moment when he had first come in. Reflecting back on it later, it all made sense.

Well, it was still crazy and impossible and the whole situation made no sense at all, but it made sense in the context of what was going on.

She never wanted to see him looking like that again, and here she was, doing it to him on purpose. But the truth was the truth, right? And she just couldn't keep it from him anymore.

Because Jesse, for his part, seemed to have a legitimate mental block when it came to her fate in the car accident. When she finally began to realize what had happened, it occurred to her that he must have gone to a funeral, interacted with friends and family, and accepted condolences and all the normal things that people do when they lose a loved one.

But every day he came home as if she was supposed to be there. It was almost as if her continued presence in their home negated anything he might experience outside that suggested that she was anything but fine. "Amber dead? No, she's waiting for me at home." So whenever he came home, he checked in with her, asked again and again about her day, and continued to encourage her to take some small steps toward improving her life.

Her life.

The words stuck in her throat. And then the comedy kicked in, the cynical irony that functioned as her one coping mechanism.

Her life had ended violently and she hadn't even noticed. Talk about your sad punchlines.

Amber could see that Jesse was having a hard time coming to terms with what she had told him. He couldn't seem to bring himself to look at her, and was staring down at the half-diced onion in front of him. After several moments of silence and ragged breathing, he spoke.

"I guess, somewhere inside, I must already know. I mean, I went out that night, I saw the car, and I must have. . . I must have seen–" He broke off again and clamped his mouth shut with a half-choked sob. She waited, and he continued.

"The more I try to remember, to really reach back, the more the details slip away. I mean, I remember following the sirens and the flashing lights, and I even remember seeing your car. It looked like it had been folded around one of those big trees along the edge of the main road."

He closed his eyes and shuddered.

"But the next thing I remember is this enormous feeling of relief, seeing you waiting for me when I got home. That's when I knew it had all been a mistake. You must have gotten back while I was out, and that was all. It's just–it doesn't seem like either of us remembered how it happened."

Amber listened, a pained expression on her face. It was fair to say that she had the worst of it, being the one who had actually died, but it still hurt her to see him so conflicted, and hurting.

He took a long, deep breath, let it out slowly with something that sounded very much like resignation, and raised his eyes to meet hers.

"I know this is all really messed up, but I'm glad you're here for me to talk about this with," he said. "I would have a much harder time hearing it from anyone but you."

He gave another half smile, which she returned. Then his face got serious again.

"So. . . are you a ghost?"

Amber returned his gaze, then shrugged.

"I don't know," she said. "I don't actually know what I am, or why I'm here." She shrugged again. "Or what happens next. The thing is, it feels kinda weird, but I don't actually feel that different. I think a lot of what's been bugging me was knowing that I'd been in this horrible car crash, and trying to figure out how to move on with my life."

She sat back from the counter and stretched her arms above her head, then let them drop into her lap.

"Now that I know that's not an option, I actually feel a lot less weird about it. As far as what happens next, I guess we'll just have to wait and see."

Jesse raised his eyebrows.

"Do you think something else is going to happen?" he asked.

Amber shrugged again. There seemed to be a lot to shrug about.

"I don't know. I mean, I don't assume that all the dead people are just walking around, so there must be something else, besides just being stuck at home with nowhere else to go. But I don't know when that is."

Jesse's eyes started to get watery again.

"I'm sorry you've got nowhere else to go, but I'm glad you're here."

"Well, I mean, I assume I came back here because you're here. So I must've known somehow that you wouldn't want me to leave without saying goodbye."

"And do you think we're gonna have to say goodbye?"

Amber smiled.

"Not yet."