Smiling through the tears

I visited the tower today. It was about five in the evening when I left Ryan's house and intended to head home. I went to the trail instead. I parked my car in front of the Nye's house, and I started to walk. I haven't walked down the trail since October 15th, 2007. That day when the camera crews filmed all of us under the tower. I think back, and I honestly don't know if the reality of Scott's death had hit any of us by then, a mere three days after he fell. Of course we all stood huddled together, arm in arm, tear stained cheeks, staring blankly into the camera lense or swallowing back our sobs as we turned our faces to the ground, but it hadn't settled in yet. The real pain hadn't hit me, atleast. But as I walked down the trail today, the pain had been settling for ten months. Though the frequency of the pain had eased up a bit, the sharpness of it could still cut like a knife. I looked out over the shingled roofs and rolling hills and moving cars of Kaysville city, and I wondered aloud "Was this the last thing he saw?" When I looked behind me and could no longer see the Subaru parked on the Nye's curb I began counting the electrical towers. One, two, was it the third? No, no. It's the last one. It was really hot and I was sweating through my tie dye. The dust began to rise and stick to my legs as I drew closer to the tower. I was walking pretty fast. As I used to tell Scott, I was "walking with a purpose." I kicked a loose rock from my path and waved away a moth, and there it was: Scott's tower. It was different than I had remembered. I didn't feel quite so small as I had the first time I had visited it. I ran my fingers over the bottom rails of the tower and the memories began to flood back. They had never left me, of course. They flooded back to me everyday, but as I stood under his tower, they came back strong. I could see my friends; all in tie dye, heads hung low, eyes searching for a way out of our nightmare. I could see myself; one hand holding onto the tower and one covering my mouth as I muffled my sobs. I circled the tower and began to read the messages that bordered the rusted beams. "We miss you, Scott." "I miss you, man." "You're always in my heart." All of these were familiar. "Long live Scott Nye. He was our Sunshine." I knew the last one to be Payden's message. Even though Payden had messed up the spelling of Sunshine I still liked the words that he had written, and I often found these words floating around in my head. I continued pacing around the inside and outside of the tower, and then I read a message I had not seen ten months prior. "Scott-I love you so much! Love, Mom." Up until this point of the visit, I had held back my tears with little effort, but when those words met my eyes, the tears began to flow. I just thought of Mama Nye and her smiling face; then the image of her that I wish I never would've seen. The image of her at the cemetary when we all began to say farewell to Scott. She stood wrapped in the arms of Papa Nye as Brandt, Bronson, and Seth stood at their side. She looked longingly at the casket. Almost as if she wanted to hold on to it, but at the same time hide herself from it. She stood crying for her son, and Papa Nye hugged her. I could tell that he was trying to hug all of the pain away. He was trying his best to make it all better for his wife, for his family. Oh, how I wanted it to be better for them. And as I read the message on the tower over and over again, I realized how much Papa Nye was still trying to make it better, and I realized how much Mama Nye still cried when she thought of Scott. I looked up from my memory and my eyes began to follow the power line that hung between the electrical towers. I wanted to know why Scott had climbed it. I wanted to know why God couldn't have just stopped him. I wanted to know if something could've saved him. I wanted answers. The questions had been piling up in my mind since October 12th, and I wanted to know: Why did it happen? And if it had to happen, why to my friend? Why to Scott Nye?

My time at the tower was brief, and within a half hour of arriving I was almost back to my car. The damp and sticky drying tears still clung to my cheeks as I shimmied my way past the "Authorized Vehicles Only" sign marking the beginning of the trail. The sensation of drying tears was one I had become accustomed to the week after Scott fell. However, I don't think my tears ever completely dried that week. As a group we could hold our composure pretty well, but once the slightest action, word, or thought hit one of us, within ten minutes all of our eyes would be brimming with fresh tears. By the end of that week we weren't afraid to cry. I rolled down the windows of the Subaru and waved good-bye to the Nye home as a U turned away and started down East Oaks Drive.

Whenever I would drive away from Fruit Heights I always caught myself imagining Scott sitting in the passenger seat. He would be flipping through songs on his Ipod and occasionally begin mocking my driving skills. I would just smile at his sarcasm and keep my eyes on the road. "Are you driving with a "purpose", Lizzy?" he would ask in a pompous voice. I would reply with a goofy insult and his puckish laughter would fill my car and be swept out of the open windows. If I became caught up enough in my daydream I could glance over and see a flash of red curls. Today I did see the flash of red. That was enough to keep me smiling the whole way home; even though tears still blurred my vision.