Dear Marcie,
There's alot to say, but I'm never sure how to say it. I'm writing this letter to tell you everything. I'm going to tell you about the truth, the pain, the joy and the anger. I'm going to tell you what that I couldn't say before.
It's been almost nine years since you left. All this time and things are still unclear. Yes I know the story, and I know that you're sick. But I'm not that eight year old you used to play with in the park. I'm not that little girl anymore. She's still inside me, but she's changed. The world came at her too fast. It slapped her in the face with reality. She stopped playing in the park after you left. She stopped laughing. She stopped being herself. She stopped being.

Now here I am. A year in therapy has helped, along with the medicine and the truth that's been spilled. But I'm so different now. I'm somewhere in-between a child and an adult. I can't navigate on my own. There's no north, no south. There used to be just you. Now you're gone and I'm angry.
You have to know that I love you still, but there was a phone. There was the unwritten letter you could have sent. I didn't get anything. Sympathetic smiles and unanswered questions don't help you cross an ocean. But after nine years, questions have been answered, not by you though. You're still not here. The dinner table at grandma's is empty. There's uncomfortable silence that comes with the wilted salad and dry chicken. No one is there to eat my vegetables anymore. Birthdays are celebrated, but on your day it passes with tears and remembrance. I miss you. I want you back. I want you at the dinner table on Sundays, at Christmas opening presents, at Megan's cross country races, at Abigail's karate practice. I want you to see me drive for the first time and witness my realization of freedom. I want you to be the one who laughs with me in that way we always used to do. I just want you here.


With love and for all the broccoli you ate for me; Emy