Sail

It’s strange and frustrating and intimate, being an hour late but the first to arrive. Anyone that knows me knows I’m a stickler for punctuality but for social engagements, I generally make an exception. Something about walking in alone and having no one waiting on the inside with the rest of the world enjoying the company of their friends and family makes me uncomfortable. So for Emily’s birthday, I thought arriving an hour late would suffice. I even waited in the parking lot for twenty minutes, considering who might already be there. Walking into the bar, I fell in love with it a little bit.

Emily’s aunt owned it; The Dakota Inn. It was one of those bars that looks like it’s weathered just about everything that life could’ve thrown at it, like it blew right on up from Nebraska during the Dust Bowl and landed on the first level ground it found. It was coated in the dirt fallen from blue collars and buzzed with the air of a Springsteen or Mellencamp melody. It was the kind of bar that begged you to just sit down and really talk to somebody.

Okay, it’s called a dive bar. But those are just my kind of bars. They don’t pretend to be anything other than what they are. They’re my people; the people that work hard, feel harder, and fall hardest into the wobbly barstools at the end of long days. But they get back up at the end of it all, even if it is just to talk to the tough bartenders doing the good lord’s work.

When I walked in, I scanned the dark room to find familiar faces but I saw no one. And then I heard the cheerful howl from Emily. “Marbear!” I turned to see where it was coming from and she was behind the bar, opening an Old Style for an old man. She came around to give me a hug.

“I’m sorry, I thought this was your birthday party. Are you going to be our bartender too?”

“Nah, I’m just helping my mom out, you know, slingin’ beers, pouring out those shots,” she laughed again. Emily was so good at just laughing. She laughed at everything and I’ve never heard a laugh so genuine. “So you’re the first one here. Congrats! Welcome!” She giggled again and then guided me around the bar to introduce me to aunts, uncles, her mom, and a few family friends. To be honest, I don’t remember any of them. I was still so preoccupied with being the only person there for the party.

We ended up sitting on the patio, smoking cigarettes with her dad for another hour before anyone else arrived for Emily’s party and then everything moved a little faster. Emily flitted from corner to corner, talking to and sparking everyone up. She was like this nucleus of pure energy that the entire bar radiated around. I loved watching her so happy.

Sometime between the feel-good buzz and the late-night drunk, I noticed a few large, healed cuts underneath her stockings. They were familiar looking so I asked her to come talk with me for a minute. Okay, I made her. I grabbed her hand and led her to the bathroom, her laughing and wondering the whole way behind me. I asked her about the cuts and she chuckled and scoffed. “I don’t even know. I was stupid and drunk and sad.” I nodded because I knew the feeling. So we talked about it.

I told her about how it was okay to feel stupid and sad sometimes. I told her how incredible she was and how I wish she would never ever feel that way. I told her how it broke my heart to know that she had found her way to that destructive place. I even told her about my own struggles. We ended up exchanging scars and stories. I rolled up my pants to show her my favorite of the healed scars, where the blade had cut through a large freckle and after the stitches healed up, it became one and a half.

At the end of the talk, she joked about how weird it was going to look, the two of us walking out of the one-person bathroom with tears in our eyes and our pants askew. I laughed with her again and we went back to the party.

That was one of the last times I saw Emily. I saw her again at our friend, Danielle’s birthday party. Emily was the same bubbly, charismatic, absolute sunflower she always was. And then that was it. I kept up with her through Facebook for the most part and two years passed. I had my first daughter and was just moved in with the father. My life was crazy. But I took my time to sip a glass of wine and scroll mindlessly on my phone in the middle of all the unpacked boxes.

I stopped when I saw a glowing portrait of Emily. It was a friend of hers that posted it and I thought “Wow, that is Emily. What a great picture.” I read the caption.

We’ll always miss you, Emily.

You were so deeply loved and I know you’re in a better place.

R.I.P.

I thought it was a joke so I kept scrolling. I mean, Emily and I always shared a dark sense of humor at times so it wouldn’t be entirely surprising that the rest of her friends did too. But something made me go back. Something stirred inside me and told me that this wasn’t normal. I looked at the picture again. I then frantically went to her Facebook page only to read several other posts and comments addressing her death. I didn’t know what I was supposed to do.

So I went outside to smoke a cigarette before calling Alex, another friend of ours. Emily’s absolute best friend was Danielle. They'd been like sisters since childhood. Danielle is my best friend too but I couldn’t bring myself to call her just yet if this all was really happening. If this was the first I was hearing of it, I knew I just wasn’t ready to hear it from Danielle. God knows what she would be going through and listening to her heart break would tear my own from my chest.

When Alex answered, my words caught in my throat. Was I really old enough to know someone who passed? “Alex, did. . . did Emily. . .die?”

“No one told you?” She sounded shocked and sorry. “Her memorial was tonight.”

The rest of the conversation was mostly a blur, a mix of questions and unheard answers. Alex told me that she was downtown drinking with her friends and she got into a fight with her boyfriend over the phone. Or maybe she was with her boyfriend when they got into a fight. Alex said no one was really sure but she walked in front of a car. Or maybe she didn't see the car. Or maybe she said a bus. Or maybe no one wanted to admit their own tragic suspicions.

I hung up the phone and I just paced the driveway. I hurt all over. It was this swelling, unbelievable and undeniable throbbing that coursed from my center to my limbs. I didn’t know how I was going to talk to Danielle. But I called her. I had to. When she answered, all I could say was “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” She just cried. “I miss her. I miss her so much. She was my best friend.”

The conversation wasn’t long and when we said our goodbyes and our I-love-you’s, I sat in the driveway to collect all the thoughts drowning in my head. Why didn’t anyone tell me? How could I have found out through Facebook of all things? I thought I was a good friend to Emily. Was I really so preoccupied with my own life that I wasn’t even on the list of people to call? After all the long nights, deep secrets, good laughs, everything, no one told me. Is this what starting a family meant, that I would be completely cut off from the friends that I love so much? And then I just crumbled. Because, god, what her family must have been going through, what her friends must have been going through.

I looked up at the summer sky and let out a long breath through a stifled sob before telling Emily that I loved her. And I walked back into the house and sat by my daughter’s crib to cry some more.

I just hurt. I hurt for my own loss. I hurt for Danielle’s loss. I hurt for her family’s loss.

I hurt for Emily.

Our favorite song to listen to on the countless midnight drives we took was Sail by Awolnation. She used to call me Mary Roads because I was the driver and I called her Emily Sails because of the song. Because of that one magnificent night, driving to an Indiana diner, Emily in the passenger seat, Danielle in the back, screaming at the top of our lungs like we were the kind of invincible that looked good in a picture and felt nice on our tongues.

Maybe I should cry for help. Maybe I should kill myself.

It hurts to listen to it, now. But I do it anyway. It makes me feel closer to her. I need to feel closer to her. Because nobody tells you how incredibly strange and frustrating and destructive it is to be the first to know but the last to find out.