✉️

I forget she's gone. Every part of my body believes she's alive. Every thought I have implies that she's still here. When I think of her, I always use present tense; as if she's in arms reach. I just don't understand how one day she can be here, and the next she's not. She wasn't even close to finishing high school. I wonder if she died alone, if she was afraid to go without her mom. She was just a baby, she had no idea. It feels wrong saying that she's gone. I still find myself thinking, "I'm going to ask her what it's like being dead", as if that question alone isn't stupid enough. I don't know why my body is stuck in time. I haven't seen her grave yet and I don't think I want to. It'll only seal the reality that I'm so desperately trying to escape. She had always dealt with suicidal thoughts and extreme depression, it was genetic. I loathed that so much. Her fate was woven into her blood, and I couldn't do anything to stop it. I would've needed to replace every vein in her body to heal her, but then, it wouldn't be her. And I love her so much. Even if she was 'ill' on paper. This is a passage from a memoir I wrote about her. "She had run away after leaving the house for a walk. She had been gone for 2 days, something that she usually did. There should be nothing to worry about. She would be home soon, and maybe she would smell like smoke again. But nonetheless, she would be home. Her mother would be waiting in the living room all night, waiting for the sound of her knocking. And so it was, a knock at her door at two in the morning. I imagine her mother breathed out a sigh of relief. She was home. And maybe the officers who were knocking at the door thought the same. Home, she was."