happy birthday, k

***Reposted from one year ago***

It's amazing how quickly people forget. How quickly people move on, and expect everyone else to do the same. That people don't understand how I can miss someone I never got to know.

K is my big sister. Today is not only her 30th birthday, but also the anniversary of her death. Even though I never met her, she's still very much a part of my life. I will always wonder how my life would have been different had she survived.

When I was in high school, I wrote a short story about my interpretation of what happened that day. It was my way of dealing with the emotional overload that only a teenager can know (or so it seems at the time). I submitted that story to a writing contest, not expecting anything to come of it. Imagine my suprise when I got notification that I had won. K's story was then published in a nationally released anthology that sold nearly a million copies.

Don't ask me for the name of the book. I don't know what it is. I've never seen it, or if I have, it was in passing on a bookstore shelf where I didn't recognize it (since I don't know the title of the book). Looking back on it, I should have ordered a copy.

Even if I never find a copy of the anthology, K's story will always be a part of it. Someone will read it and hopefully tuck the story away in their head. Maybe that person will think of her the next time they see the tombstone of a child.


You're not alone,
No matter what they told you, you're not alone.
I'll be right beside you forevermore.

And as we lay in silent bliss,
I know you remember me.

"Like You" by Amy Lee