Passing Over

• Aleisha Naughton-Watt, Grade 10
• Short Story
• 2007

The two teenagers stood in the dark at the base of a hill. They both looked up then looked back at each other. As they were about to walk their separate ways, the boy grabbed hold of the girls’ hand and spun her towards him.
“Will I see you tomorrow?” he asked urgently.
“Always,” replied the girl. Once again they strode their separate ways, this time he didn’t pull her back.
As he walked home, Blake thought about what an interesting girl, Maddison, had become. As he approached his front porch, Blake felt the tension in his shoulders get stronger as he was about to face his mother. Before he had even knocked on the door, his mother was out the front screeching at the top of her lungs, yelling at her son to get inside the house. As soon as he stepped inside, Blake’s mother, Sharon, started questioning him.
“Where have you been?” she demanded.
“I was with Maddison,” he said, keeping his anger clamped right down.
“Maddison has been dead for five years now.”
“No, she hasn’t,” Blake shot back, almost spitting at his mother in disgust. How could she say such a thing?
“You have to move on,” his mother replied gently.
As Maddison made her way down to her house, she started floating.
“Not again,” she muttered to herself. As she stepped into her grave, Maddison became transparent and then completely disappeared. As she laid her head down for the night, she remembered a time, five years go, when she had been alive and in love. Maddison remembered how she had been dating Blake, the same Blake, and how she had been so in love with him. While walking to see Blake, she struggled to continue the thought, she had suddenly been dead. Although it was only five years ago, Maddison couldn’t remember how or why it happened. From then on, Maddison had vowed to love Blake until the day he died.
When Maddison and Blake met up again, Blake was confused about what his mother had said the night before. He asked Maddison,
“Are you dead?” The look of shock on her face told him the answer before she answered. As he turned away, she whispered,
“You know I died you just don’t want to believe it. I still love you. I always have, always will. The day I died, I vowed to love you until the day you died. I have kept the promise I made to myself, I just need you to love me for who I am.”
“I’m sorry, Maddison, but I just can’t.” As Maddison tried to stop him, Blake turned and walked away, leaving Maddison heartbroken, but finally able to cross over.