Without You

Spring was your favorite season. You would always tell me that the start of the warm weather was like a new beginning. A chance for anything to happen. I never understood why your favorite season had to be spring. It was always picking fights with people with the allergies, the temperamental weather, and the bugs. Oh, the bugs. I never did like them. But because it was you who loved spring, it was beautiful. Only not as beautiful as you. The one thing I think I miss the most is your laugh. I remember when you would laugh and it would fill the room no matter where we were. Your nose would scrunch up and your eyes squeezed shut when you laughed really hard.

It was what I first fell in love with. Everything else came after. Your dark chocolate eyes, and black curly hair. The freckle above your right eyebrow that I would always kiss when I saw you. I loved the way I could wrap myself around you, breathing in the scent of your lavender perfume.

I thought I wouldn't be brave enough to come and see you. I knew it would be too painful. Memories of you, of us, would come flooding back that I believed I might drown. Not that I don't ever stop thinking about you. Only one thing was needed to remind me of you and it became hard for me to breath. Soon you were filling the entirety of my life and I couldn't do anything else without crying. I thought of killing myself one day, thinking if I did that I could be with you. I stayed inside all the time, my life slowly wasting away. It was some time after that I realized this is the exact opposite of what you would want me to be doing. You wouldn't want me wasting myself away. The same thing that had happened to you before you died. This is when I finally decided to be brave and start living.

It's been one year since you have died, and I promised myself that I would finally visit you on the first day of spring. Today was that day. I bought you your favorite flowers and a stuffed teddy bear. I've never done this before, but I hope I'm doing it right. It's not the easiest thing to look up on the internet: what to bring to a cemetery. I take the five-mile drive to where you were buried in Westside Cemetery. I now start to realize the things that happen in spring most people probably take for granted. The things that you must have loved about it. The blooming flowers, and the changing of the leaves. I roll my car windows down and let the fresh air fill my lungs.

As I draw more near you I can feel my heart racing. This anticipation is nothing I've felt before, and I start to regret that I didn't come to see you sooner. I roll up onto the gravel pathway and park. The birds greet me with their songs as I climb out of my car. The sun beating down on my back makes my skin tingle. I look up to the cloudless blue sky and take it all in. Everything here was so real, so alive it almost made me laugh at the irony of it considering where I was. As I start to walk the gravel crunches beneath my feet and I pass by other people. Some people are leaving, others are coming in, others I can tell have been here awhile. The caretaker comes by mowing patches of grass, creating a smell in the air. I realize I'm trying to find anything to distract myself as I come to your grave.

I think you knew something was wrong, but you didn't want to say anything to worry the other people in your life. But then you got sick, really sick. How did you think that made everyone feel? Nobody should ever ignore themselves if they think it's for the benefit of others. Maybe I'm selfish because I wish you were still here, but every day you got worse something inside me started to die too. I never understood why you let yourself get so ill. Each day I came to see you, you were slowly fading away. Getting thinner, more tired and weak. You weren't getting better like the doctors said you would. You knew your time was coming soon. If you had said something sooner you might still be here with me.

The huge oak tree under which you are buried looms closer to me. It's when I finally see your grave that I think I stopped breathing. It was the most beautiful thing I had seen in the longest time. Standing there in front of you made all the memories flood through my mind. From the first time you finally noticed me, to the last kiss I ever gave you and told me it was okay to love again after you were gone. Tears pooled in my eyes as I set down the daffodils and the teddy bear next to your tombstone. I stood there for a while before I sat down with you. I took the time I had and decided to tell you all that you had missed in the past year. I told you that your sister graduated high school, and was moving to California to study art. You two were always so good at painting. I also told you about my new dog that my mom got me. She was supposed to help me deal with your death. I think it's working considering I finally made my way to see you. I hope that you're not mad at me for waiting so long. It just took me a while to be strong enough to see you. But now I am here and I realize there is nothing I should be scared of anymore. This is something I will be able to get over, and will make me stronger for it.

Yes, I think a new beginning is starting for me, and spring has just started. Unfortunately, it will be another spring I have to go through without you in it; one which may not be as warm without you here. I can only hope I can get through it. Grieve may be strong but my love for you was stronger and I know no matter what happens I will never stop loving you. Goodbye my love, until next time.