“She needed to let it out, Stryker. She’s been holding that in since the day it happened.”
“I know, Tank. I honestly thought she’d end up having a mental breakdown if she didn’t let it out. I should have been here for her when it happened. I feel like shit, man.”
“Don’t,” Jett tells me. “You were here to pick her back up when she needed you to be. I think if you’d have been here when the damn burst you would have felt the full brunt of her anger. She would have said things she didn’t mean just to hurt you.”
Maybe he’s right, but it won’t stop me feeling guilty.
“I can’t bear to see her so hurt. I don’t know what to do for her.”
I take the beer Tank offers me from my own fridge and chug half the bottle in one. I needed that.
“Just be here for her, Stryker. She needs you, brother. No one else will be able to get through to her the way you can.”
“She needs to grieve,” Jett picks up where Tank left off. “She’s held it in hoping it might not be true. However, it is true, it did happen, and now she’s finally let it out she can start to heal. It won’t happen overnight, but things will start to get a little easier from now on.”
“I’ve never been through anything like this before. I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing.”
“Me neither,” Jett tells me.
“I have,” Of course Tank has he lost both of his parents when he was a teenager. “I know just how Coral is feeling right now. It’s the worst fuckin’ feeling in the world, wondering why you didn’t say certain things when you had the chance, why you didn’t hold that person a little tighter while telling them how much you loved them before it was too late.
“This is a different kind of pain for my brother, we lost our parents, and that was hard, but Cindy was the love of his life. Coral has you to help her through this, Stryker, and she will come through this with you by her side, loving her. But Hammer is so fuckin’ broken I don’t think anything can fix him. In time, he’ll move forward a little, but I know he’ll only be living a half-life for the rest of his.”
He clasps my shoulder and squeezes. “Don’t let Coral fall down that hole, brother. Bring her back to the light because only you can do that.” I nod because he’s right.
“Why don’t we get the rest of this house cleaned before Coral wakes up?”
I chuckle at Jett and agree. We clean the place, make it as homey as we can after Coral practically trashed the furniture. Tank pops out to pick up what needs replacing. All the time Coral sleeps, and I don’t have the heart to wake her.
Coral slept all night. She didn’t wake when I shook her gently to tell her dinner was ready, she just grunted and turned away from me. By the time I crawled into bed, it was past midnight, and I couldn’t keep my eyes open. The events of the past month have taken their toll on all of us, especially my wife.
She curled up to me the second I lay down. I held her close to me as she mumbled how much she loved me. I know that she does. The past four years she’s shown me every day how much she loves me, and it breaks my heart to see her in so much pain.
All the time Cindy was here Coral was so happy. When she asked me if Cindy could stay with us for a while because she didn’t want to go home, I smiled and told her she never had to ask me something like that.
I loved seeing them together. They were so close it was almost unreal to me, I’d never known two sister’s to be so close. Brother’s, yes. Sisters? Nope.
I can’t say it didn’t affect me when Cindy died, it did. She was a special girl, an exceptional girl. Losing her the way we did, not just the club, but Hammer and Coral, has all but destroyed us. How do we come back from this?
I was around when Titus and Hillary, Hammer and Tank’s parents, were killed. This isn’t the first time I’ve ever experienced a death such as this within the club. However, this time it feels very different. Yeah, we’ve lost a brother or two in the years I’ve been a member of the Snakes, but this was a young woman with her whole life ahead of her, taken from us without cause or reason.
The funeral was awful. Coral’s parents were screaming at Hammer, blaming him for Cindy’s death. None of us blame him. He wasn’t to know Cindy would go out alone. We’d all made sure our women knew the dangers of going out without protection. Some pathetic, worthless club decided to pick a fight with us. Many small clubs think if they take on the big boys and rise to the top. However, scum on the top of the pond is always cleared away in the end.
Right now, I have no clue how the hell anyone will ever be the same after this. Sure, we’ll all move on in the end, but Hammer and Coral? I have no clue if they ever will be. Hammer is a shell of himself, my wife has finally cracked, and I don’t know how the fuck I’m meant to fix this for her.
I scrub my hands over my face and sigh. My wife is broken, and I don’t know how to mend her heart. I don’t want to lose her to grief. I need to find a way to help her.
“Mark?” I look up from my position on the couch. Coral strokes the back of my hair like she needs to comfort me. Not happening.
I take her hand, and she climbs into my lap, both feet planted on the right side of my body, and she snuggles into me, her head on my shoulder. I stroke her back as she sniffs back tears. If she needs to cry, then she can cry on me, I’ll hold her up when she has no strength to do so herself.
“Thank you.” She mumbles into my neck.
“For what?”
“For just being here. I'm so sorry about before I didn’t mean to trash the place, the anger I tried to repress just burst out of me.”
I wrap my arms tighter around her body and rock her gently. “You don’t have to be sorry, little bird, you lost someone special to you. I don’t expect you not to grieve, Coral.” She’s crying softly, and it hurts my heart so much. I kiss her head while stroking the back of her hair. “Don’t hold it inside, baby. Let it out.”
“I miss her,” She sobs.
“I know you do. You always will. But Cindy will always be alive in your heart, Coral. She may not be here with us any longer, but she will always be remembered, not one of us will ever forget her.” She nods against me, little hands clutching at my chest, making sure I don’t let go of her. There’s no way I’ll let go of her.
“Will this pain ever go away?”
“It will ease in time, baby, I promise. It won’t always hurt this much. It’s going to be okay, sweetheart.” I hug her closer. “We’ll remember Cindy always, and every year on her birthday, we’ll spend the day celebrating her life.”
Coral lifts up and looks at me. I stroke her hair away from her beautiful face. She looks exhausted from crying, even though she slept for hours. “And we’ll talk about her?”
“Yes,” I nod. “We’ll talk about Cindy, tell stories, even watch her favorite movies if that’s what you want.” I’ll do whatever she wants to make things easier for her. “You’ll be okay, baby. Not right now, maybe not next week, or even a month from now, but soon, you will.”
“As long as I have you, I know I’ll be fine. I just don't know if I can be strong right now, Mark, and I hate that. I tried to be strong for everyone, but it’s caught up with me, and I feel so weak right now.”
“Then don’t be strong, little bird. You don’t need to be strong right now. I can be strong for you. Lean on me, baby. I’m here for you.”
She doesn’t put up a fight like she usually would in other situations. She simply nods her head, kisses my lips softly, then lies her head on my shoulder again, letting me hold her close to me.
I can’t physically take Coral’s pain away. I wish I could, but she needs to feel it, to go through this process in order to heal. But fuck if it doesn’t kill me inside knowing how much pain she’s in.
But I know one day, she’ll smile again.
One day, her heart won’t ache thinking about her sister.
One day, she won’t wake up screaming because the visions of her sister being murdered are the only thing she sees.
>
One day, if we’re lucky, we’ll have a child of our own, and we’ll tell that child all about their aunt Cindy and how wonderful she was.
“I love you, Coral. My whole damn heart belongs to you, and I will do anything to help you get through this. Just don’t shut me out, baby.” Because this past month, she’s done just that without even meaning to.
“I won’t. I'm sorry. I love you so much.”
Wrapping her in my arms tighter, I hold her through the night, rocking her and letting her talk about her sister. Good times, bad times, I listen to them all with an open heart. This pain won’t last forever, and Coral will get through this, I won’t lose my wife to this.