* I'LL BE ALONE (OLLIE)

[charlotte noelle o'niall]

[atrb=border,0,true][atrb=style, width: 440px; height: 600px; background-image: url(http://i47.tinypic.com/25tugw4.jpg); -moz-border-radius: 250px; border-radius:100px 100px 100px 100px; border: 3px solid #ffffff;] they don't know me anyway

[/b] • [ded] • adjective
1. no longer living; deprived of life: dead people; dead flowers; dead animals.
2. brain-dead.
3. not endowed with life; inanimate: dead stones.
4. resembling death; deathlike: a dead sleep; a dead faint.
5. bereft of sensation; numb: he was half dead with fright. my legs feel dead.[/ul]

slam.

charlotte o'niall flipped over the dictionary's hard blue cover in a sudden flare of irritation. it had almost been a year--a whole fuggin' year, how could that be already?--and yet it was still too surreal, too beyond reach to wrap her brain around the fact that that word--and most everything beneath it--was her life now, for lack of a better word. she was "that word"; like, fuck everything she'd been told in her first few days here ("you're bigger than your death!" "your death doesn't own you!" "you're so much more than a corpse!" etc., etc.), not only did that shit sound like it should be written on a bumper sticker and smacked on the ass of a a smartcar, it was a load of bull. okay, so maybe dead was not everything charlotte was--and it wasn't, she was willing to give the grave lovers that much--but it was sure as hell a big something of what she was. she was dead, for fuck's sake, dead at eighteen. being dead wasn't just something you could sweep under the carpet. but she guessed that both she and the grave lovers could learn a thing or two from that sentiment--like, maybe she could try a little harder to accept that this was how things were gonna be from now on, that there was no going back to earth no matter how many times she shut her eyes to convince herself that this was a bad dream. and maybe the grave lovers could stop leaving pamphlets with titles like "so your heart's stopped beating" at the base of her door. after all, if there was one thing charlotte had learned in her years of existence, it was that it all came down to compromise, and it seemed that death was no exception.

it wasn't like charlotte wanted to be thanataphobic. at the same time, admittedly, the thought of becoming comfortable with her death was nothing shy of horrifying, but it had to be a hell of a lot easier than going through her days with that tight feeling in her chest, that ball of frustration that lumped at the back of her throat every time she thought of how the word "alive" could never be used to describe her again. and what was more was that this wasn't even a constant phobia. no, just as she would think that she was getting better, boom--without a warning, without a trigger, without anything, just out of the goddamn blue, there it was again, that feeling of despair, that feeling of hopelessness, and she would be right back to square one. and for what reason? if charlotte were to be totally honest with herself, "life" up here was so much better than her actual life had been--despite the fact that she missed her family members something fierce, even though she'd never dare to admit so, they weren't around anymore for her to worry about disappointing. though he ended up gone, though he still hurt to think about, she had been so lucky to have the love of a lifetime, even if only for a little while. and oh, right, she had friends now, too. that was definitely a plus. although she couldn't give any less of a fuck about what people thought about her, it was nice to have someone she knew she could count on. a girl couldn't have asked for a better friend than olliver henry hughes. it wasn't as if charlotte was anywhere near the easiest person to get along with, but regardless, ollie had stuck around through it all the past few months he'd been here, and there was not a doubt in charlotte's mind that he'd stick around for the rest of the months to come, however how many. as long as he did, lottie knew she'd never totally run out of hope. even if it felt like it, she always knew in the back of her mind that that was not really the case.

charlotte ran her fingers over the dictionary in her hands, pressing her lips tightly together. so maybe death wasn't totally horrible. she could admit that. but it just felt weird, and the weirdness of it all was an entirely different matter altogether. the horribleness would go away eventually--in fact, it had started to, or at least she liked to believe so--but getting the idea through her head? char wasn't in the slightest any sure that she could ever do that. it was just strange how things could change so drastically in a matter of a second--i.e., one second she was living, and the next she wasn't. one second it was the taste of vodka that filled her mouth, and the next it was the salty ocean water. and if things could change that much in just one second, how much more in an entire year? this time last year she probably had been lying out by her family's rock-lined pool, phone in one hand and a half-drunk bottle of strawberry hill wine in the other. she could almost taste the bitter pink fluid now, as if she was still there, as if nothing had happened at all. she could feel the hot arizona sun on her creamy white skin, and she could smell the familiar perfume of chlorine and sunblock dancing together beneath her nose, and she could hear the low buzz of a lawnmower going in the yard over, and she...

charlotte bit down hard on her lower lip, her eyes springing open to remind her of what really was. that--the wine, the pool, the lawnmower, everything--that was her past. this--death--this was her now. and, like a shot of hard liquor, lottie was just going to have to throw her head back, deal through the burn, and get the most out of whatever it had to offer.[/div]

there can be only one mikey! of caution 2.0

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