by Ken Locke

Created on: November 12, 2008   Last Updated: November 26, 2008

My daughter just killed herself, after fighting with her best friend. It had been two months since I'd been brave enough to walk up the stairs, into her room. Even though it had been two months, it did still absolutely feel like it just happened. Had I gone to work at all? Had I eaten? Had I spoken to anyone? I can't imagine having had any reason to speak; what could possibly matter? My wife and I loved each other still; we just didn't speak with words. We gauged each other's day by the new furrows in our brows, by the amount of new tissue boxes on the kitchen counter, by the colors we wore.

I remember the funeral, the planning with the pastor, black suits, ties, dresses. Words of consoling; but, if I heard them, they didn't work. I was a numb shell. I felt like a bee sting looks. Endless casseroles flooded the fridge, and now the fridge was empty, so time must have passed and I must have eaten. I have no memory of anything after, well, this is where I usually get stuck. I know I came home first, before my wife, possibly the one blessing in this entire horror story. As I said, up the steps, two months ago. The last trip up there before the ambulance, the police, the suspicion (of us - her parents!).

Lately, as in the last few days, I'd been aware of the house again. I needed to paint, I needed to pull weeds, and I can only wonder about the bathrooms, carpet, trash, newspapers. Before I did any of that, though, I pushed myself to consider the stairs. I pulled a scrap of memory into my head, one where my bright shining perfect little girl laughed at the tooth fairy's gift under her pillow. "That's a lot of money, huh, daddy?" she chortled. When did that happen? Yesterday, that's when. All this was so... "just yesterday".

So, heaving a shuddering sigh, I took the first steps toward my past, her life on earth, our painful loss. She smiled at me all the way up the stairs, aging year-by-year in her school portraits. First with tiny little teeth in a cherubic grin, then gap-toothed, then perfect, straightened and whitened teeth for her senior pictures. She'd just moved away, less than a year ago, but, of course, "just yesterday".

I faced her closed bedroom door then, and searched for the courage to turn the knob. Someone else's hand at the end of my arm reached out, turned, pushed. A sunbeam brought warmth, both to her dusty things and to my shivering spirit. I sat on the edge of the bed; grateful for her time with me.

I wept.

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