So that’s how Jun died.
She was shot in the back by her boss, betrayed while betraying us. Mark, in his typical cold way, asked me at the funeral if I didn’t find it poetic or some crap like that. I almost punched him.
He said sorry. It’s not his fault. We both know his brain doesn’t work exactly right.
But Jun was the one who was like me–the one who played air guitar too loud at night while I yelled screamo or rap or country lyrics or whatever we felt like pretending.
I wonder if she would’ve been happy to know that when we buried her, her body had morphed back to the state we all knew and loved. The lightning in the sky made her bright pink coffin look super-rad, just like she would’ve wanted. Buckets of shimmering rain washed out everyone’s tears, and we sang her favorite rock song, the five of us, with her orphanage director. The old Spanish-speaking pastor guy Robotman brought looked super-confused. She would’ve laughed so hard at his face.
I kept thinking she might suddenly pop out and tell us it was all a prank.
I still think that. It’s not denial, I hate it, I can’t help it! The details of her death get fuzzier every day. That’s why I’m writing this down–and who knows, I might lose this paper, too, because I feel like I wrote this down already…
See, at first we all agreed on what had happened. But now each of us in the team has a different memory of it. Not like, just slightly different, but like crazy different. We all agree the Scythe leader shot her in the back, but the why, we’ve all got different.
In one version, she chose us, took on the Scythe Leader to save me, and he kicked her to the ground, boot in her spine, and shot her as she fell.
In another version, Robotman had to blast her in the gut because she was killing Butterfly, and then as we escaped she lay broken on the floor, begging the Scythe leader to take her with him…and he shot her without even looking her in the eye as he walked by.
That version sounds awful.
What’s weirdest is that none of us actually argues about this. Every time someone remembers something, the others will agree, even if it’s the opposite of what one of us just said. It’s like we don’t know we’re disagreeing. Any story goes, it’s all subjective, and then everyone’s memories will change all at once again the next day. Like there isn’t an objective reality about what happened.
“She’s being edited,” he said?
I don’t want to forget Jun, but I’m afraid soon we all will.
***
