The day I found out what you did was fucked pretty much from the moment I got downtown from the lightrail. I was on the mezzanine and an old crazy lady walking by looked me in the eye and spat the word FATSO at me like venom. I was flabbergasted. I spent the rest of the day feeling ashamed of my body and broke into tears twice at work.

On the train home your dad called. I knew something was wrong because he was calling instead of texting, but he sounded so calm when he said he wanted to stop by that I figured it wasn’t that bad. I even thought maybe your mom just made him call and they just wanted to drop something for Z off.

When they got to the apt Z ran off right after I opened the door and I didn’t even see everyone who was there. I was in my house trying to offer seats when I realized your grandma Lo was there.

Your dad put his hand on my shoulder and smiled when he said “S chose to take his own life.” I immediately lost my shit, covering my face and repeating “No” over and over.

After a while I asked them to leave. I didn’t want them around me. After enough time had gone by I realized the look on your dad’s face when he told me is very disturbing. The fucker was smiling. He looked happy to be telling me. What a scumbag. It was the first time it dawned on me that your dad is not what he seems. He’s going through the motions of being a good Christian but he’s an arrogant mean person. Taking pleasure in another person’s sorrow is evil.

It’s about a week until our 6th Aniversary. I’m going to Alki beach to say goodbye and send you a lantern. I’ll send another on your birthday, and another on father’s day. I will do this twice a year with Z for the rest of my life. I will tell him all the good stories while he’s young and as he gets older we will get deeper into the rest of the truth.

I love you. I miss you and I wish you were still here. I have I feeling I will be writing you letters for the rest of my life too. Even though you’re not present on this plane I have a niggling suspicion you’re still getting them. Maybe that’s just craziness to comfort me but there are things in this life that give me pause and hope and belief.

I believe in God, and the universe and the endless possibilities within it. I think this belief is what carries us to the next life. I know that God is merciful and that you were sick and just the type of soul that needed saving. I believe that my love for you may even make you a brighter light in God’s eye.

I miss you because I’m selfish. I miss you for our son because I really hoped you would beat this for him even though I never wanted to admit it to myself out of fear of disappointment. I miss you because I love you so much and I always did, and I always will. I’m sorry for hurting you S. I’m sorry for letting you down.

A few days after I found out he was gone, something very strange happened. I was sitting on the couch watching Brave with my son. During the scene at the end when the girl has realized her mom is still a bear and tearfully states: “I’m so sorry, this is all my fault” I was thinking of how in Disney movies tears are magic and fix everything but I couldn’t bring S back with mine. I was thinking how much it was my fault he is gone, and I was miserable. At the end of her sentence a glass mosaic bird feeder S gave me fell 6 feet to the floor from a shelf it had been sitting on for 6 months and dented my floor but didn’t break.

A week or so later, I was sobbing hysterically in my dark living room after putting Z to bed. I was sobbing from guilt and fully accepting my own responsibility for S’s suicide. During this, the box that held his remains flew off the very same shelf and landed 3 feet from where you’d think something just sliding from a shelf should.

It’s really impossible to believe this was a coincidence. Especially since the box was wedged into the shelf so securely and the bird feeder had been sitting there untouched for so long. I’ve accepted that S wanted to comfort me and I think he was hanging around to do just that. You can call me nuts if you want to, I honestly wouldn’t blame you.

For a while it was a great comfort to know he was here but eventually I realized I was being selfish. I told him I was OK and he should go be at peace.

Since then, I can’t “feel” him here anymore. The house is empty and I know he’s really gone for good. I miss him even more now. I’m selfish and I wish he would come back.

I’ve stopped, for the most part, talking about S. It’s too difficult to explain to people who didn’t witness the things we’ve been through. Summarizing our relationship into caption sized blurbs for the sake of time make everything seem trite. I’m tired of seeing how little people understand or care. And it’s just not worth it.

Now a days I just wait till I’m by myself and talk to him directly. I don’t believe he’s here anymore but I do pray he gets my messages. I know I need to let go of him but I don’t want to. I did that once already and it fucking killed him. That’s probably an overly dramatic statement but it feels accurate.

I think about him everywhere I go. I realized today he took me to most of the places I’ve been in Seattle for the first time. He’s everywhere. And nowhere.

I just wish I could put my face on his warm naked back one more time and kiss him goodnight. I pretend that very thing as I go to sleep some nights. I’m trying to collect all these memories, but like wisps of smoke they slip in and out of my perception.

As time passes the grief is getting worse. I assume this tide of pain is rolling in so slowly because you were, for all intents and purposes, gone before you decided to leave for good. I’m still realizing that you’re truly gone little bits at a time. And until the tide has come all the way in it cannot go back out

It’s a blessing and a curse, an ache that resonates deep within my core, but one that can be set aside for later, when it’s appropriate. I’m not rending my clothes with unbearable sorrow. I’m just ever sad and always ready to greet the pain in any quiet moment. Moments of reflection are mirrors depicting your hazy silhouette.

I miss you with a insufferable longing. I remember you with a terrible clarity and I feel you with illusive sensors. Where did you go? Is there a candle burning somewhere with your light in it? Are you out there? Are you aware of me, of the love I emit for you?

Every night I put our son to bed, I give him a flashlight and tuck him in. Kiss him goodnight and sweet dreams. Then I spend the evening quietly sobbing over you. Everything was so complicated, still is even. I miss you more each day. I hurt for you, deeply.

Two nights ago I begged God to please send you back to me. I have so many regrets to live with. I just want to curl up behind you and press my face into your warm back and feel that connection we shared when things weren’t broken.

I’m missing you. I missed you before you gave up on life and ended yourself. The longer I had without conflict the more I remembered why I loved you and how much. Now that you’re dead all I can do is remember how loving you were even when you were driving me crazy.

Our communication was inherently flawed. The passion and the pain were equally powerful.  No one has ever or will ever love me as much as you did. I haven’t forgotten all the turmoil and the rage and the fighting or the threats, but that wasn’t you anymore. You were consumed by your addiction and it was taking your mind and your soul away from us.

I should have called you that Sunday. I will have to live with that. I don’t know if I could have prevented you from taking your life but maybe hearing your son’s little voice would have been enough. I believe it would have.

I believe it could have been enough. I believe that God was telling me to call you. I believe you came to me to help alleviate my pain and I love you so much for that. I will raise our boy the best I can. I will continue to miss you and love you for the rest of eternity.

Sometimes being strong is a disability. Or at least it can seem like one. It can make you feel cold and numb. Sometimes, it can steal away all the pain and leave you with the taste of dismay like ash in your mouth. Dismay for the comfort of not tearing yourself apart with grief like a good woman should. Is any of this even real? This veil of calm. Perhaps I’ve repeated myself into a banal postcard of grief. Perhaps I’ve come to terms with myself, your decision, your assumed place in the halls of eternity.

If I stop telling people, maybe I can keep you longer. But you’re gone. I sent you away and talked myself out of inviting you back several times in a day. The day. The last day. I failed you. Maybe this. Maybe that. Maybe nothing. Maybe 20 more minutes, or 20 more years. It’s all locked away in the inaccessible past. In a moment in time that only you were ever aware of. The secretest of all secrets.

Ten years ago I would have burned flesh and tasted salt for months on end. I would be shut in the dark surrounded by a cacophony of aching melodies. That would feel more appropriate. That would be proper.

Not these days. I’ve grown. I have responsibilities. I have a special room for my bleeding feelings. I bleed in, not out. The pool ebbs and spills when there is a lull. Not being obliterated seems like a badge of shame on my face. Is this really a strength or is it a mark of poor character. Am I just being an adult who is more comfortable being childish?

Can you please come over and tell me I’m OK? Can you please come back and make a scene like in the good old days? Can we have a chance to make friends again in a world where you got better? Can we  still time travel if you’re dead? Can we please go back home and I cry in your neck while you wrap me up and make everything be OK again?

PLEASE?

This isn’t how I pictured this. This wasn’t supposed to happen.

The death certificate states that it was “minutes” from the time of onset to death. That’s a long time to think about things while you suffocated. I’d give almost anything to know those final thoughts.

I remember everything now. From the beginning to the last time I saw you out my window in the front of my apt sitting on the curb waiting for the SPD process server.

I remember how silly you looked dancing with me the first night we met. Singing to you in my bedroom the first time I told you I love you. Time traveling at Woodland Park. I remember you rubbing my pregnant swollen feet and nesting for me. I remember begging you to get treatment and all the screaming and all the pain.

I never stopped loving you. I missed you so much. Now I never get to tell you all those things. My unsent letters left behind to haunt me with regret and a horrified void.

How could you do this to yourself? Your son left behind fatherless. Everything lost.

I will love you forever, just like I always promised.

I miss you.