It was a queer and sultry summer day. The car was speeding along the freeway and the windows were rolled down, as always. Charlie made us a playlist specifically for this day, from Taylor Swift’s ‘Cruel Summer’ to the usual Little Mix hits. Charlie likes spending time with me despite his hatred for my actions and I couldn’t care less that he’s always thinking about death ever since our parents left, though I’d probably beat him there first. They told me it was cancer… I think? All I know is that my entire body projected on the screen lit up like a Christmas tree during my CT scan. It’s the kind where they tell you you’ve only got about 6 months left and, at this point, people usually bury themselves into their parents’ arms with tears and snot. The only difference is I can’t afford that nor would I want to, not with my parents laying in the morgue next door.

When they died, my dad left us a fortune and my mum, well, left us with no more of her life lessons. Mum and her never-ending lessons on compassion and courtesy. Her departure affected Charlie the most that he wept so much that day. As for me, I’m known for being cold-hearted. 

The dead silence was detailed with the faintest whispers as I tried to gather my senses. The muddy canvas before me transformed into a white-tiled ceiling as my vision cleared. There was a blanket cocooning me in its warmth as I stretched my rock-solid body that felt as if it hadn’t moved in weeks. I examined my surroundings. There was an IV drip connected to the back of my hand, the nurse next to me realised my awakening, said with much delight, “Welcome back, love.” That’s when it dawned upon me, I’ve just awoken from a coma.

My doctor arrived not long after, summoned by his will to help the injured. I gave him the stink eye as he examined my blood pressure, “Where’s Charlie?” I asked him coldly as I didn’t care much for the doctor., I only wanted to see my brother. “He died in the crash two weeks ago, Adelaide.”  Though I never cared much for him, a shiver and a sense of numbness crawled up my body, robbing me of my words. My eyes pooled with tears and for the first time in so long, I felt something I swore once upon a time to never encounter again. “He was your only family left and now he’s gone as well?”

I was informed I had to be bedridden for at least a month due to the impact. They placed me in a shared room with another girl. I'm not lying when I tell you I hated her for the first few days, she was the complete opposite of Charlie. I despised her and her need to engage me in her positive aura. I want to be left alone so I can grieve, or perhaps I had one more trick left up my sleeve, a dark realisation that there are sooner ways to see him again, painless and swift indeed. 

But she never gave up, and she was the kindest and sweetest person to me. Courteous would be the right word, funny isn’t it? She’d talk for hours about how wonderful life could be if we gave it a chance while I laid there in silence with a smile, acknowledged as a secret between me and her. She was there for me when I was feeling my lowest and didn’t think I could go on. But she made me see the light mum was always going on about through her kindness and warmth in just the way she speaks to me. Now I want to live, and not just for Charlie, but for me.

She never told me her name. In fact, I’m not sure what was even her illness. Perhaps she was just meant to show me how to live in the light.

I got to learn that her name was Grace, how fitting. Grace was so full of life yet she gave away hers for me to live, and so I will. I’ll live and breathe and smile with the distant memory of Grace and Charlie far away, but never forgotten. Mother said courtesy costs nothing but buys everything, she was wrong.

It cost Grace’s life and it bought me a new beginning and a second chance to live. A dawn that came too late, my delayed zero o’clock. Maybe in another universe, in the upside-down, I’ll see them again.