mainsqueeze's Diaryland Diary

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your life and nothin' more

*****,
You daughter is here now and she is brown as a nut and giggly and loud and she reminds me of you so much that when I saw her I made her hug me ten times and kiss my forehead and then each cheek and then my chin. I picked her up and swung her in circles because it felt like having you back for a minute. If you were here now you would be making vacation plans with us and you would probably want to drink coffee with me like we used to and I would bug everybody to play 31 because I love traditions and I love that we have one. What really scares me now more than anything is that my life is starting to feel normal again and if everything is normal, am I still going to remember you? Three or four nights ago I pulled out the family photos and looked at each photo of you to see if you looked happy in them, and you didn't and I wanted to kick myself for not noticing when it would have made a difference. And I cried, too, for the first time in a couple of weeks or so. All of the experts on this sort of thing say that it is natural for families to feel guilt and to blame themselves but what they don't say is that we deserve to feel guilt, we should, because we ignored it and we were selfish and we killed you, we as good as killed you with our own hands. Ed said the other day he thought I still blamed myself and I wanted to say, yeah, duh, of course I do. I turned my back on you when you needed me, and I will never stop being sorry. But sorry doesn't matter and there is no you to make it up to. So, fuck, Nik, where do we go from here? I mean, when I watch a movie I automatically label it as "before," as in when you were here, or "after," as in after... after you made your choice. Dad and I talked a lot while I was there for the funeral and we kept asking ourselves if maybe you hoped somebody would find you before it was really too late, if somebody would care enough to save you. And I asked, what if I had called that morning to talk shit and tell you I missed you? What if I didn't stop being your best friend? You bitch, you fucking bitch, if I ever see you again I am going to kick your ass so hard and then cry and laugh with you because isn't this a mess? I love you and I'm sorry.
-A

1:38 a.m. - 2002-01-01

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