I don't even know what to do with myself anymore. In the grocery store the other day a little boy in line behind us started patting his hands on a pumpkin and talking to his mother excitedly. My first thought was that, with his blond hair and blue eyes and button nose, he looked just like you used to. My second thought was that you would not be here to witness the 16th Halloween of your life. The tears soaked my cheeks, my stomach churning threateningly, as the rest of the world looked on. I wondered if they knew my pain. Did they look at me and just somehow understand? Could they see that the most important thing in my life was gone and that my sobbing in the middle of the checkout line was perfectly justifiable? Did you see?

We drove for fifteen hours to make it back to North Carolina where every sidewalk and every country road bore your footprints. I walked as a ghost among the people who loved you. And I thought I would be so strong for them. But when those doors opened and I read the words "Robert Lee Pittman III April 03, 1987 - September 23, 2003" everything inside me crumbled. Every stone erected fell and every reason I had for holding it together lay forgotten outside the front door.

It was a beautiful casket. Black fading to silver with gold clasps around the handles that would fit into the hands of the men in your family. I was told they had to seal it in order to fly it in from Georgia. I was told it wouldn't have looked like you anyway. But for one panicked moment all I could think of was pushing it over onto the carpeted floor. Prying the lid open with my bare fingers just to see for myself that my baby brother was really dead. Dad looked like less than a shell of himself. His muscles and body were gone leaving barely a skeleton of the powerhouse he's always seemed. His cheeks were sunk so far in I wondered if his mouth existed anymore and his eyes were as black and tired as a man who'd just drove his only son into death. He told me that he'd had your fishing pole sealed in the casket with you. Did you see?

I sat beside the man I love, a borrowed black dress stretched over the mound of my belly. Due any day, I heard people say all around me. People from my past. People who knew you. And some who had no business being there. They stood around and made small talk and watched me from the corners of their eyes. I didn't want to meet people from my stepmother's work or friends of friends of family who never knew what a wonderful kid you were. They were all impostors. They were all trespassers. I sat beside the man I love, alternating between debilitating sobs and a mind-numbing disbelief that had my eyes going a little dead. I was slowly going dead inside and all I could wonder was, did you see?

The plot where you were buried was beautiful. Just a few feet away from a tree and in between the one reserved for your grandmother and myself. There were no birds fluttering their wings. No butterflies to give us peace. Just a cold breeze and your mother in my arms beside herself with grief. She rocked her torso up and down in the seat and cried out loudly over the sound of meaningless eulogies. Your childhood friend walked up to your casket and slammed his fist on top, screaming, "I love you man!" Did you see?

I left before they put you in the ground. After placing a white carnation over your head. I couldn't stand there like the rest. I couldn't speak aloud of my pain and how much I would miss you. I just left the flower and a fading handprint before walking away. It would be easy to be angry at you right now. But instead, I choose to be angry at myself. Did you know I loved you? I should have called you more, I should have told you more, I should have hugged you tighter the last time I saw you. It's so much easier to be angry at myself. Maybe one day you'll give me the answers that keep me awake at night. Maybe one day I'll accept the fact that you're gone. But for today my world is in pieces and everything I do I try to show you how much I loved you and miss you. Do you see?