I Was Fine Before...

• Jaimeelee Swansbra, Grade 9
• Short Story
• 2015

It was the saddest day ever. People dressed in black and crying till their eyes were red.
I sat there, wondering if I walked up to the box and looked, if she would look the same as before.
I knew the sick and frail Grandma, and I only saw pictures of the young and beautiful one.
I remember people talking, standing in front of us all, telling stories of her and the way it was before this day. None of them could get through a sentence without crying.
I remember my mum crying, my father with his arm around her. The sight of my older sister, still planted in my brain, sitting there with her hands in her lap, just letting the tears fall. That day was the first I ever saw my older brother cry, and after that he said that was the only time he cried and will be the only time he ever cries in his life. He was only ten.
Music played as the people spoke. And I sat there staring at the box, I wonderedq.
I stood up from the cold wooden chair and made my way down the aisle to the box. The person stopped talking and the music was the only sound. I stood on my tippy toes, my hands pulling me up to look inside.
She looked different. There was no life, none. It was just a shell. It had been pushed to the shore by the sea to lie and rest, all the life was drained out of it by the life it was made to live. The world had worn it out. It wasn’t even her anymore.
I stepped down, made my way back to my chair and sat. Everything went back to the way it was before I stood.
After everyone had spoken I sat there crying. It was all gone, the warmth, the caring, the love. It was snatched away by death. I knew it would be different now.
After the funeral people came up to my mum and dad and told them they were fine until they saw me crying.
A week later my mum drove to pick up her ashes, she was laid to rest in a green box, her favourite colour. When my mum got home she put the box on the shelf then walked to the kitchen to make some tea. I grabbed the box from the shelf, put it on the chair my Grandma always sat on and sat on top of it. My mum walked into the room and asked me what I was doing and I answered “I wanted to sit on Grandma’s lap”.
Nothing was ever the same after the saddest day I had ever seen, everything changed.
I guess we were all fine before…
I was fine before…