Musings on Life from a Dead Girl

September

The summer I turned 10 my grandfather killed himself.

He got in his car; with the books my father had given him to pass the time and drove to a graveyard.

I don't know how he did it.

I've heard murmurings but it doesn't really matter now.

All that matters is he is gone.

I was a kid and I blamed myself for it for many foolish, childlike reasons, in an attempt to justify the extreme pain that now plagued me.

 The truth is that the me that existed then, couldn't have saved him.

I was a child.

I didn't know what depression was.

I didn't even know he was sad.

The me that exists now, wishes she could wrap her arms around his neck.

Tell him that it will all be okay.

Tell him that the pain won't last forever and that one day he'll have a granddaughter that loves to read just like he did.

That is quiet like he was.

That eats too many sweets.

A granddaughter that would give the world twice over to have him back.

I don't see much of him in my face.

I see him plainly in my mother though.

She is becoming like him, both good and bad with each passing day.

She is quieter now with less to say.

With his smile and thin nose.

I wonder if he'd thought about the carnage he left behind, or if he thought nobody would care.

I guess we are alike in that way.

I just wished the same people, the people that failed him, weren't failing me now.

One thing is for sure though.

I won't fail myself.