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deduction

    Suicide is a heavy word. It is the person you pass by every morning during your daily routine. It is the never-ending, pestering, itching feeling that something was left undone or out of place. It is the house guest that insists on staying longer than they are welcome. It never truly leaves. It is the droplets of water forming the cloud outside my airplane window, a dead weight trailing behind my suitcase, a melancholy judgement laced within the whispering of distant relatives. I haven't even seen them before.

At first, it wasn't real. I was experiencing all of what's expected- what's typical- but it was nothing more than a rehearsal. My mind violently rejected any implications that my father was dead. He was hiding in the closet. He was on a business trip. He was out getting his favorite shake at Winstead's. He could even be trying to hide from a secret government organization, causing us to fake his death. Anything. Then I saw his face.

It was an open casket, thanks to my mother's protests.