The Living Come to Mourn

The drive always felt longer than it should.

Ben gripped the steering wheel tighter as he wound along the narrow forest road. A steady mist streaked across the windshield, and though the wipers kept it at bay, the night pressed in - thick, silent, expectant. The trees leaned close, closing off the night sky. The radio had lost its signal miles ago, so the only sound was the rhythmic thunk-thunk of rubber over asphalt and the faint hum of the engine.

It had been twelve years.

Twelve years since the accident.

He wasn't the first to arrive this time. A dim figure stood beside the rusted firepit, half-lit by the glow of a lantern hung from a low-hanging branch. Ben eased the car off the road and killed the engine. Silence rushed in like water over a dam.

One by one, the others emerged from the trees or rolled up in battered trucks and hand-me-down sedans. Haley, tall and sharp-eyed, nodded in greeting. Dylan, wearing that same ratty army jacket. Marcy, arms folded, face pale. And Tess, her hair longer now, but still curling wildly like it had when she used to do cartwheels at the lake.

They gathered in a loose semicircle, no one quite ready to speak.

Every year, they came back here. To remember.

To mourn Jamie.

It had happened right here, this clearing near the lake, deep in the Virginia woods. A party that turned into something else. Alcohol. Rain-slick roads. Screaming tires. The crumpled guardrail. A fire. After that, just wreckage and sirens and Jamie’s name whispered, a secret between friends.

Ben glanced at the figure near the firepit again. "Who's that?"

They all turned.

The man hadn’t moved. He stood utterly still, his back to them, dressed in jeans and a hooded coat, hands hanging loosely at his sides. At his feet: small wooden crosses and metal markers, most weather-worn and crooked. The lantern’s flickering light cast a halo around him.

“Maybe one of Jamie’s cousins?” Haley offered, though her voice lacked conviction.

Ben took a step closer. “Hey,” he called softly. “You okay?”

No response.

Tess tried. “Sorry to interrupt. We're just here to… remember someone.”

Still nothing.

Ben frowned. “Can he not hear us?”

Dylan walked right up and waved a hand in front of the man’s face.

No reaction.

“Hey!” Dylan shouted.

The man didn’t flinch. Didn’t blink.

Something prickled along Ben’s spine. The air felt colder now.

Tess took a cautious step forward. “Maybe… maybe we should leave him alone.”

But no one moved.

Marcy’s voice was quiet. “Look at the ground.”

They all did.

There were five markers. Small, hand-carved wooden crosses, each staked deep into the soil. Names etched into them, faded, but legible under the lantern’s glow.

Ben knelt, suddenly short of breath.

Ben Marshall.

Haley Price.

Dylan Reeve.

Tess Gallagher.

Marcy Lin.

He reeled backward, scrambling away.

“No,” he whispered. “No, that’s not right.”

They all stared, frozen.

Ben felt his heart pounding like it would rip itself free. He turned to the others - Haley pale, Dylan gaping, Tess trembling, Marcy whispering "no" over and over.

Then the man moved.

He reached into his coat, pulled something out, a folded piece of paper. He knelt in front of the crosses and laid it down carefully, as if afraid the wind might blow it away. Then he stood there again, still, as though listening to ghosts.

Ben crept forward and squinted at the note.

Jamie’s handwriting. No doubt. He’d recognize it anywhere.

It’s been twelve years, and I still don’t know how to live without you. They said I was lucky to survive, but I didn’t. Not really. You were my family. My everything. I come here every year hoping to feel close to you. Hoping you’re somewhere better.

Ben felt the truth settling into his bones like cold rain.

They had come here every year believing they were the mourners. But it was Jamie who lived. It was Jamie who came to mourn them.

“We’re the ones who died,” Marcy whispered.

“No,” Dylan muttered. “That’s not… I remember the hospital. I remember being discharged.”

Ben shook his head. “You remember what you want to remember. What you need to remember. That’s how it works, right?”

“Dream logic,” Tess said, voice faraway. “You stitch together a life from scraps.”

“No,” Dylan repeated, as if saying it would change the world. But he didn’t argue further.

Haley stepped closer to Jamie. Her hand reached out but passed right through his shoulder. She let it fall, slowly.

Jamie suddenly shuddered. Not from the cold, but from a wave of emotion they could feel but not share.

He turned, finally, his face pale and worn, older than the boy they remembered. His eyes were red-rimmed. He looked toward them.

And straight through them.

His gaze passed over Ben, Tess, Marcy, all of them. Searching the trees. Listening to silence.

“I miss you,” Jamie said softly.

Ben’s breath hitched.

“We never meant to leave you,” Haley whispered.

Jamie turned back to the crosses. “I should’ve died with you.”

“Don’t,” Tess said, stepping closer. “Please don’t.”

But it wasn’t for him. It was for them.

Because now they remembered.

All of it.

The curve of the road, the scream of brakes, the metal folding inward, the heat, the flames. Jamie being pulled from the wreckage. The rest of them…

Gone.

They’d stayed behind. Or maybe they’d never known they left.

And every year, Jamie came back. To grieve. To ask forgiveness. To remember the ones he couldn’t save.

“Why are we still here?” Dylan whispered.

Ben looked up at the trees, the darkness stretching into forever.

“I don’t know.”

The night grew thicker, the mist turning to a gentle drizzle. Jamie folded his arms, as though protecting himself from the cold, and knelt beside the crosses. One by one, he placed a wildflower on each.

He lingered the longest at Ben’s.

Then, without a word, he turned and walked back toward the road, disappearing into the trees.

The lantern remained behind, flickering in the wind.

Ben stood there, staring at his name.

After a long moment, Marcy spoke. “Maybe we’re not here for him.”

“What do you mean?” Tess asked.

“Maybe we come back each year for us. To remember who we were. To hold onto each other. To let go.”

The wind whispered through the trees like an exhale.

Ben took a breath, looked at his friends, faded, glowing faintly now in the dim.

“Next year?” Dylan asked, uncertain.

“Yeah,” Ben said. “Next year.”

They stood in silence, watching the road Jamie had taken. Watching the night settle around them.

Waiting, maybe, for the moment they could move on.

But not yet.

Not just yet.