Fade Away

"If you don't want to die, you'll let go, Maxwell  ..."
Spider's voice rang in my head as the light faded. So this was death, cool, peaceful nothingness washing over me. It reminded me of dipping my toes in the little stream that ran through the university's campus, a reprieve from the summer's heat.
It was funny; I always imagined that I'd die the same way Andrea did, burned alive as a heretic, but here I was, being promised immortality, an eternity to live out her memory.
Memory....
"...let go, Maxwell. The ritual will fail if you don't."
But he didn't understand; no one did. A life without Andrea's memory wasn't a life worth living. But I'd promised I was over it. I'd promised I'd let go.
I'd push through. I wouldn't lose her. I would rather burn up, fade away, than lose my sister again.
Something went wrong with the resurrection ritual. I wasn't sure what; Spider never told me. I was only mostly changed, wrongly changed, and from that day on, smoke would leak from my pores whenever I got stressed or angry or sad. Perhaps some of me still longed to have died alongside her. Perhaps some stubborn memories refused to fade away.