December 8th is coming

I can feel it as it stealthily approaches
I know it is hunting me
I know it is haunting me

1 year.
The one year anniversary of your death.
And I see you everywhere.
And I don't believe you are dead.
It's impossible that such a thing could be true.
Dear sweet cousin.
15, this year, you would have turned 15

I will be at a family reunion, for my fathers side.
December 8th.
I will be at a Christmas party
while your body lies buried in the ground.

I wanted you to read this crazy story I am trying to write.
Selfish I know, to think of that now, when there is so much stuff, so much life you didn't get to have.
But I wanted, needed your help. I trusted you to read it
(I still do, if you wish to peer over my shoulder)
Knowing you would be incredibly kind but also perfectly honest.
That you would tell me simply, what doesn't work
but also I hoped, you would know and feel, what it was I was trying to say.

I miss you.
I miss the days when we all went trick or treating, and spent Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter together.
I think of your sisters, your mom and dad. I would miss you enough if it was just that you weren't here with me, but knowing you aren't there with them either. That they sit before a holiday table with an empty chair.
Well I hope you don't mind, but I find I can not think of it, to think of it is too much to bear.
You are not here, and your aren't there, but you must be somewhere. For it is not all of you that is in the ground. Does that life, that spark become nothing? Or does it just leave one home, to go find another? I do not know what I logically believe, but I must believe in heaven, I have no choice. It is hard enough to try and accept that you will never be here with us again, but to think of you as no longer being, not existing anywhere (but in our hearts), that is something that I can't believe . I can't believe that and still be able to breathe.
So while I pretend that I am not thinking of you, while I pretend that you are not dead, I sit here and grieve.