BOOM – An explosion shakes houses, and the ground, and people; it destroys a house, and the lives of the people inside – six people dead, one childhood friend, one classmate, and four people I did not know. July 13, 2011 – a house exploded in Salem, New York, upstate New York – the real upstate, none of this Westchester bullshit, four hours north, probably more, on the border of Vermont – where all they do is smoke weed and ride four wheelers, stereotypical rednecks, dirt roads. My first love’s family was from Salem – they had a farm, a cow farm. I saw a dead calf once, it was traumatizing; I also saw the heads of slaughtered pigs, perhaps that was more traumatizing. When I heard, that there was an explosion in Salem, my first thought was – Amber – what if it was her? What if she was dead? What would I do? She’d been my first love after all, my best friend in middle school, the girl who broke my heart in high school – the girl who made me crazy, made me do things I now regret; but then again she didn't make me do anything, I am responsible for my own actions, I am the one who chose to drag those scissors across my hips, I am the one who chose to lie to my mother, and to continue to hang out with her and her new boyfriend, I am the one that chose to follow my sisters lead, so she wouldn't be alone.
The explosion. I remember hearing about it and wondering what she was doing in Salem, it didn't make sense – it’s been over a year and I still don’t know she was there; there visiting her boyfriend and his family – everyone said they deserved it because they were sinning, well not everyone, but some people – said because she was spending the weekend with him, because they were probably sleeping together, that they deserved to die in an explosion. An explosion, a house explosion – houses just don’t explode, there is nothing explosive about a house – except for the leaking propane tank in the basement, that some jackass tampered with to get back at the landlord – they changed her death certificate to homicide last winter – that was a tough one, it was so senseless to begin with – not a car accident or a something explainable – and then to think someone did it on purpose – but it turns out homicide isn’t murder, that man, he didn't mean to kill six people, but he did. It’s weird sometimes, how things work out – Amber, my first love, best friend, and bedmate – was also Claire’s best friend, they were friends later, like in high school – after I went crazy, Amber and Claire became friends, I mean, how shitty that the girl who stole my heart and then broke it, would then turn around and take my childhood best friend. I met Claire in first grade – we were fast friends it seems, we grew up with each other, I was always at her house, she was always at my house, we swam together, played together, hung out together – she had an older sister, Ashley – Ashley was a trouble maker so to speak, one time she told us about the boy she was with, they didn't really have sex, he just went in and out and that was it – I was too young to hear this kind of thing, maybe I wasn't maybe I was just sheltered. Claire and I grew apart, she got into culinary arts, I got into a new group of friends, high school will do that – we still ran track together, played in the orchestra, sitting just a few stands apart – but I think the real thing that drove us apart, was the fact that her father molested her older sister for six years, everyone said he did it to Claire too, but she’d never tell – Claire never believed her sister, she thought she was lying, but Bob confessed, he told the court he did it – but that didn't stop Linda from taking Claire and Zach and Gabby downstate every month to go see their father – but even worse than that, Bob wasn't even Claire’s real father, she went through all of that – but he did raise her. We grew apart because she didn't believe Ashley, and I knew Ashley was right – I knew she was telling the truth, but Claire wouldn't acknowledge that and that drove a wedge between us. When she died, I hadn't spoken to her in a while – maybe it had been months, possibly a year – maybe since graduation, I don’t know how long it was – but I did know she was going to the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, New York – I did know she wanted lots of children, because she loved babies and she was going to own a bakery; she was a great chef, a great pastry chef. But that all ended, with the explosion – we talked to her mother, by virtue of my own mothers insistence, and Linda told my mother that she was fully intact, she was just swollen, like she’s had her wisdom teeth out, maybe a little bruised, but still Claire, she still looked like herself. I thought she had been blown to bits, pink mist was what came to mind – but she wasn't She was still the beautiful person she’d always been, just dead, just bruised, just in a random explosion that happened to take place as she was in Salem, in a random house, where she wasn't usually – it happened the day before she was supposed to go back to school, what a twist of fate, what a tragic joke the universe was playing. At her funeral, the preacher said it was her time, and that God was calling her home – this didn't sit well with me – still doesn't sit well with me, what the hell does that even mean? Like honestly, she was nineteen years old, and barely at that – she was just able to give blood, she’d finally gotten her weight up enough, at nineteen, and then God calls her home, I don’t believe it, I don’t like it – She wasn't there, at the service, Amber didn't think so anyway, she was so mad that they cremated her. “She was intact, why would they do that? She was so beautiful.” – “I don’t know, it’s their choice.” – “Do you hate me still.” – “I never hated you.” – “You know you could call me to hang out.” – “Okay.” – I guess it’s just not like that anymore, I don’t want to hang out with her, I don’t want to think about her, she’s sad all the time – because her best friend died, and her mother, and her uncle who killed himself when we were in 8th grade, and I don’t want to be sad, I’m sad enough all by myself and I don’t need someone else helping me out – I don’t need to be reminded that we were best friends and that it can never be that way again –
Claire’s family keeps her ashes in a cookie jar, a nice cookie jar, but a cookie jar none the less – I hate this cookie jar, I hate that at her birthday celebration in June, they brought her ashes – so not only did we have to remember everything all over again, but we were also surrounded by her remains. I don’t like remains, they freak me out, I really don’t like dead bodies – they really freak me out, I’ve only seen two. My Great Grandmother died when I was 10, all I remember was my mother coming into my room in the morning and saying she was dead, I was like okay, and went on with my day unaffected. Then there was the wake, we went shopping and got nice clothes and my mother did my hair in braids, she warned my sister and I – “These people are going to want to hug and kiss you, okay?” – It wasn't okay, that was the last thing I wanted but it wasn't that bad. I saw her, lying in her casket, she looked bloated and like she had a lot of make up on – my mother said if I touched her then I’d dream about her, no thanks I’d rather not – my second cousin Chris had dreadlocks, so did his girlfriend at the time, my Uncle Phil told us – “They put shit in their hair, go smell it and see if it stinks.” – He’s dead now too. He died in June, he’d been sick for a while, years really, but that didn't matter, no one really saw it coming, 48 years old and he just dropped dead, my mother’s brother. It seems to be a reoccurring theme in my life – it was 5am, I was asleep, my mother came out much more frantic this time than she was ten years ago – she said “Uncle Phil died this morning.” – I just stared at her, what was I supposed to think, death is so surreal, here one minute and gone the next, it didn't sink in, it didn't mean anything – I’d seen him a few weeks ago, he looked fine, he couldn't be dead. Worse than that was seeing my mother and her family so sad – so broken, seeing my grandmother in tears and my grandfather barely holding it together, he was so tender, more so than I've ever seen him – maybe that’s how he was coping, by taking care of the rest of us. My mother forced me to go up to his casket, I didn't want to go, made an effort to be out of the room when my family, the four of us, were set to go up – I was talking to my other uncle, and some family friends when my father came to the door and waved me in, I was pissed – I didn't want to remember him that way and said so but my father said – “do it for your mother, she needs you to go up.” – Alright, fine. He looked good, better than my Great Grandmother, but still dead, and still not him – it’s just a body, and he wasn't in it, just like Claire wasn't in her casket.
