Seven
Colton
Thirteen years old
My mom’s sniffling echoes in my ear as her hand tightly grips mine. Everyone in Lake Starlight is holding their loved ones closer these days after the deaths of Tim and Beth Bailey. Typical small-town mentality says that something like this doesn’t happen here, but it did.
My family, along with a lot of Lake Starlight, sits across from the Bailey kids and their grandma at the burial plot. Some people chose only to attend the church service.
The woman behind me whispers to her husband that Denver’s missing. I noticed that too, but more because they left the chair between Juno and Rome empty. Whether it was planned or not, I don’t know, but they sat in birth order.
The dark sky over the cemetery feels like a sign that we’re all mourning the deaths of Tim
