It was May 15th 2010.
“Haley, He’s gone.” My uncle Ricky who is usually pretty goofy said to me.
“What? Who’s gone?” I semi laughed, I thought he was joking and I was confused.
“Papaw”
“What!” I ran into the next room and almost my whole family was there. I looked around and everyone was crying or talking. I immediately went numb. My grandpa who was only 57 years old had passed away. My grandpa who I had just talked to the night before and he was fine, he was gone. Suddenly the living room in the house looked so unfamiliar to me. I walked over to my grandma and gave her a hug and we both were crying. She was crying because she had lost her husband of 38 years and the love of her life and I was crying because he was my grandpa and I basically lived with them I was there so much. I was so close to him and I still couldn’t grasp the fact that he was gone.
**
“Are you lost?” my grandpa asked.
“I might be” I giggled.
**
That conversation replayed over and over in my head. My grandpa jokingly asked me if I was lost the night before. He was fine. He wasn’t sick. I just didn’t understand how he could be dead when he was fine the night before.
I looked around the room for the first time since I had walked in there. The three couches were the same, the TV. was off. The front door was open and there was a police officer standing there. He seemed so out of place. A police officer standing there in a room full of people crying and mourning over someone they loved and had lost and he was just standing there, doing his job, with no emotion at all. It seemed surreal.
“Lee, he’s gone, your brother is gone.”
“Evelyn, Joe passed away”
I heard my aunt Desiree calling people and telling them the news. I didn’t bother listening to the whole conversations she was having though because I knew what she was saying and I didn’t really want to hear it more than I had to.

I sat there crying like I have never cried before. I was in a room full of people who all felt like me, but I felt alone. No one could understand the closeness I had with my grandpa. No one knew that the conversation that we had last night kept playing over and over in my head. I felt numb. I didn’t want to sit still but I didn’t feel like I could walk. Everything going on in the room was a blur. I heard everyone talking or crying but I didn’t listen to what anyone was saying, I just cried and I felt like I was never going to quit crying.

A man who I had never seen before walked through the front door. He walked over and sat next in the chair next to my grandma. He introduced himself as the coroner. I knew he was here to tell the cause of my grandpa’s death, he made it seem more real to me. “Are you lost,” My grandpa’s voice kept replaying over and over in my head. I knew he was gone but I just didn’t want to believe it. The coroner walked upstairs to conclude what my grandpa passed away of. I didn’t think about it though. I knew when he came down here and told us what had happened, it would be all too real to me. Suddenly I didn’t want to be in a room full of people anymore, I wanted to be alone, where I could cry to myself and forget about it all. I didn’t leave though because I knew other people were hurting too and I couldn’t just be selfish and think only about my feelings because everyone else was hurting to. The coroner walked down the stairs and sat back down next to my grandma. I knew it was time to listen even though I didn’t want to.
“Ma’am, I’m sorry but your husband passed away of a massive heart attack.” The words came out of his mouth but they had no emotion. He was just doing his job like he has done many times before, he didn’t know my grandpa, he couldn’t feel sad about it, I thought.
“I knew that’s what it was, but thank you.” My grandma said weakly.

They continued to talk and my dad walked through the front door because he had just got there. He didn’t look sad, he looked the same as always. I knew he wouldn’t let anyone know how he felt though. My dad and my aunt Desiree just kept their selves occupied so they wouldn’t think about it. Every person who walked in kept asking me if I was okay. I replied yes but I wanted to scream “DO I LOOK OKAY?!” I had just lost someone who was really close to me, there is no way that I was okay. My cousin Corey who was 16 and was like my brother and he usually would joke with me and insult me like siblings do sat down next to me. He gave me a hug and said “It’s going to be okay, I know you don’t think it is right now, but it will be.” I cried while he was hugging me. He had never been that sweet to me, it made me feel like things might really turn out to be okay.

There were probably about 20 people that were in the house at once. I just sat there. “Are you lost” his voice was still there in my head. I felt like I was going to sink into the couch and be stuck there forever. At that moment I wanted to sink into the couch and disappear. I sat there with a bitter taste in my mouth because reality had just come and hit me in the face. It was a wake up call if I’ve ever had one. Everyone was talking at once. It seemed like it was supposed to be so loud inside the house but it was eerily quiet. There were voices but everyone was whispering or talking quietly. The police officer had left. Moving on to his next job I was guessing. It seemed like I had been sitting there forever but it was only about 30 minutes.
“How’s Haley doing?”
“Is she okay?”
“How did she take it at first?”
Everyone was talking about me and how I was doing. No one asked me about how I felt they asked everyone else. It made me angry because they could have just asked me but at the same time I felt relieved because I didn’t really want people asking me if I was okay or if I needed anything because I would have just told them I was okay and I didn’t need anything because I didn’t want anyone to make a big deal of it.
I wasn’t as numb anymore. I was still hurting and upset but I realized I wasn’t alone. Everyone else in the room was just as sad as me. I seen a lot of people cry that day that I never would have thought they would cry, but when you loose someone who you never expected to so soon, it takes a toll on everyone. My 9 year old cousin Hagan walked in and I knew it hit him hard to. He was just as close to my grandpa as I was. He sat there and was trying his hardest not to cry. I walked over to him and gave him a hug.
“It’s okay if you need to cry, we all have and no ones going to say anything. It’s going to be okay, papaw is in a better place now” I told him.
“How is he in a better place if he’s not here with us”
I knew how he felt. I had the same exact thoughts but I guess since I was older I could grasp the concept easier than he could. I just hugged him while he cried on my shoulder. I knew at that moment that I was going to be able to overcome the sorrow and sadness that I felt. I felt so good being able to help my cousin and comfort him just like everyone else had done to me. “Are you lost” but this time I giggled to myself. His last words to me were a joke, he hadn’t joked with me for a while but that night he did. I knew that those words would always be there with me forever but instead of making me cry, I would smile because he’s always going to be there in my heart, I knew when my cousin told me it was going to be okay, that It was, maybe not at first but eventually.

When I was getting ready to leave I looked at the inside of the house. It seemed so different to me though nothing had changed. It was different because he wasn’t there. He was gone.
“I miss papaw”
My 6 year old cousin said.
“Me too”
“It’s going to be okay though I just know it.”
My cousin had just told me that she knew it was going to be okay. I gave her a big hug.
“I know”
And I did. I knew it was going to be okay. Even though he was gone I had spent a lot of time with him and I cherished the memories. “Are you lost” has become so much more to me than just words.