By M.D. Smith IV

The rain had been pouring in torrents that night, lashing the windowpane, a watery curtain veiling the streets in a blur. But the storm inside fourteen-year-old Tyler Matthews had started long before.

“Just this once, Caleb. I’m not asking you to kill someone. Just get me a damn bottle of vodka!”

Caleb, eighteen, taller, steadier, arms folded across his chest, shook his head. “No, Ty. I’m not helping you ruin yourself to impress a bunch of kids who won’t even remember your name in a year.”

Tyler’s voice rose. “You think you’re so perfect, huh? Just because Mom and Dad believe you walk on water. You don’t get it. You’re just a stuck-up asshole.”

Caleb frowned but didn’t speak. Forehead reddening.

“I hate you,” Tyler hissed. “I hope you die.”

Caleb flinched as if struck. “You don’t mean that.”

Tyler turned and slammed his door shut, his heart pounding with rage and shame.

Hours later, Caleb’s car hydroplaned on the soaked highway, spinning sideways into the grille of a freight truck. He died instantly. The police said the crash was unavoidable, the kind of accident no skill could prevent. The kind that makes time stop.

Tyler didn’t cry at the funeral. Not then. Grief encased him like a diving bell at eighty fathoms. He stood beside his parents, their faces sunken, eyes red, souls broken. But Tyler just stared at the coffin. The grief of losing his brother on top of the regret for what he wished he’d never said—overpowering.

 He couldn’t forget the hateful words he’d said.

“I hope you die.”

 ~

Exotic goldfish lazily drifted in liquid space in Dr. April Gaines’ office. After numerous visits, Tyler was finally able to relax in his therapist’s plant-filled room.

They talked about the fantails. 

Following a silence, she asked, “What do you regret the most?”

Tyler opened his mouth—and broke. Words flooded from him. Ugly, choked sobs. He told her about the party, the argument, the vodka, the rain, the truck. And the sentence.

“I hope you die.”

“It’s all my fault,” he wept. “I’m gonna be kicked outta school—no friends—I deserve it.” More tears.

Dr. Gaines didn’t interrupt. She just let him cry until the storm inside eased.

When he finally looked up, she said, “Tyler, you had nothing to do with your brother’s accident, but you need to visit Caleb at his grave.”

He blinked. “I can’t. I’ve never been. I can’t face him.”

“You already are. But it’s time to say what you never got to say.”

That Saturday, for the first time in over a year, Tyler and his father walked up the hill at Greenwood Memorial Cemetery. His father said nothing. Just put a hand on Tyler’s shoulder, then quietly stepped away down to the road.

Tyler stood before the granite stone. Caleb Matthews. Beloved Son. Brother. 2002–2020.

His knees buckled, and he sat cross-legged on the damp grass. The breeze stirred the willow trees as he looked down.

“I didn’t mean it,” he whispered. “Not any of it. You were right. You always were, dammit.”

Tears streamed down his cheeks.

“I just—I didn’t want to be the loser. I thought if I had the booze, people would like me. You were trying to protect me, and I threw it in your face.”

He sobbed. “I loved you, Caleb. I looked up to you. You always had my back. And I—I sent you out that night with hate.”

A gentle wind blew, as if shifting in response.

And then—not a voice, not truly—but a feeling deep in his chest, like the whisper of a memory, or a dream barely held onto:

It’s okay, Ty. I knew. I always understood. I never stopped loving you.

He cried again, but this time, a pressure lifted with each tear. The weight on his shoulders seemed to ease a bit.

His father came back an hour later and found him sitting peacefully—back straight. “You alright?” he whispered.

Tyler nodded, wiping his face. “Yeah…I think I am.”

At night, he sometimes dreamed of Caleb, not dead, but alive, smiling, reaching out a hand.

And in his heart, he held on to that whisper.

“I never stopped loving you.”